Religious Fundamentalism in Orwell and Pynchon

[barbara100 at jps.net]

S~z
> Come on. Take a crack at the specifics of my questions.
> You answered neither. They're really good questions.

> So, from your perspective, why did he use the phrase
> bombs falling in an allusion to 9/11?
>
> And why did he date references to other things circa
> 2003 and use allusion for 9/11?

They're not that good'a questions, Keith. They're really just getting you
bogged down in details instead of allowing you to see a broader picture.
Certainly the FD paragraph is stated in general terms and could be applied
to those wars
and whatnots Jbor has listed. It's written to be applicable across time. But
we
know it's written in post- 9/11 times, and it shows in the subtly of words
like enemy bombs
(terrorist bombs), homeland ( the new office of homeland security), altered
landscape
(Twin Towers), friends and neighbors (TP's friends and neighbors no doubt).
Why doesn't Pynchon say 9/11 if he means 9/11? Because to do so would be to
bog down the Foreword in details instead of sending a more timeless message
that readers in 20 or 50 or a hundred years can pick up and apply to their
own tragedies and injustices. The Foreword is not about 9/11, or at least it
won't end up being about 9/11 in the end. But it
was about 9/11 when the author wrote it.

If in 20 or a hundred years, hungry young literature students look up
Pynchon's 2003 references on the new news.google.com (then archiving by the
century
instead of by the month), what do you think they will find searching for
"Department of Justice  Big Brother 2003" or Department of Defense Big
Brother 2003" or "Homeland Big Brother 2003" or even "British subservience
to Yank interests 2003"? What stories do you suppose will pop up?

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A19272-2003May21.html?nav=hpto
c_tn
or
http://www.sunspot.net/cgi-bin/ultbb/ultimatebb.cgi?ubb=get_topic;f=18;t=029
616
or
http://www.motherjones.com/news/warwatch/2003/21/we_419_05.html
or
http://www.guardian.co.uk/uslatest/story/0,1282,-2672606,00.html
or
http://www.wessexscene.co.uk/article.php?sid=555&mode=thread&order=0&thold=0
and of course
http://books.guardian.co.uk/review/story/0,12084,948203,00.html

All roads will lead back to 9/11--the day the world changed.

2) Why circa 2003 for an allusion to 9/11? Because 2003 still suffers in the
aftermath.
And because 2003 is Orwell's centennial.
And because circa 2003 is more important to the technological aspect of the
piece. It relates beautifully to Big Brother, and it relates even better to
our current political state, making Orwell  relevant a whole century later.
And circa 2003 because he saw a lot of cool new stuff this year. And like
always with Pynchon on Technology, he's titillated and repulsed at the same
time.

Go ahead, capitalize the T on technology, deify it if it'll  make you
feel less responsible--GR



----- Original Message -----
From: "s~Z" <keithsz at concentric.net>
To: <pynchon-l at waste.org>
Sent: Friday, May 23, 2003 5:08 PM
Subject: Re: Religious Fundamentalism in Orwell and Pynchon


>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "Dave Monroe" <flavordav at yahoo.com>
> To: "s~Z" <keithsz at concentric.net>; <pynchon-l at waste.org>
> Sent: Friday, May 23, 2003 1:18 PM
> Subject: Re: Religious Fundamentalism in Orwell and Pynchon
>
>
> Allusion.  Analogy.  Whatever.  Why did he choose that
> particular bit of background to emphasize?  At this
> time?  In this place (NYC, USA)?  Orwell's situation.
> Pynchon's situation.  Again, it is hardly farfetched
> to read that as meant to evoke a similar situation
> prevailing at the time of writing, publication.  It'd
> be naive to disingenuous for an author to believe that
> talk of a repressive gov't response during a time of
> crisis wouldn't resonate here, now ...
>
> --- s~Z <keithsz at concentric.net> wrote:
> >
> > So, from your perspective, why did he use the phrase
> > bombs falling in an allusion to 9/11?
> >
> > And why did he date references to other things circa
> > 2003 and use allusion for 9/11?
>
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