1984 Foreword

[jbor]

on 13/5/03 11:48 PM, pynchonoid wrote:

>> The first paragraph is a straightforward
>> biographical summary and typical of
>> the genre. The details Pynchon includes here aren't
>> obscure or unusual.
> 
> You're satisfied that most high school kids in the US
> know that the British Empire once conducted an
> international trade in opium?

Where does it say he's writing for high school kids only? The biographical
details aren't obscure or unusual, and including them at the outset in a
text of this kind is a commonplace. The information about his father's job,
and about his own work in Burma, sets up, if obliquely, an important part of
the context for Orwell's writing of the novel.

> I guess maybe you don't
> live in the US after all.
>
>> There's no mention of
>> September 11, 2001, however.
> 
> You've made this assertion quite a few times here.

It's an accurate assertion.

best
 
> Your analytical tools seem relatively useless when
> they are unable to detect ironies and references
> present in the text -- your methods seem particularly
> unsuited to come to grips with Pynchon's work, after
> all; they make fine blunt instruments with which to
> take your interlocutors to task, but they do a
> terrible job at helping you deal with Pynchon's
> subtext.