VLVL2 (9): Outro / Wayward Thoughts

[Tim Strzechowski]

1.  The doubling of Takeshi and Brock Vond (physical appearance) obviously parallels the DL / Frenesi doubling, but also seems to echo the whole Slothrop / Major Marvy doubling in GR. 

What is the narrative purpose of this doubling, both in terms of Pynchon's ouvre and in this particular novel?

In ancient mythologies, a sort of doubling exists in which a god/goddess may be said to contain both a good/evil side (e.g., the dual Horus/Seth god of ancient Egypt, representing two sides of a divine principle).  Can any of the doublings in P's works be said to reflect a similar good/evil symbolic function?



2.  Swapping identities is a common Pynchon motif, and this is typical of what we find in P's fiction.  Takeshi/BV and Frenesi/DL in this chapter, the Vomitones/Italian wedding band in a previous chapter, even Zoyd in drag early on . . . characters don't seem to search for their identities so much as they *lose* their existing identities, often as a result of some form of beaurocracy or institutionalized (government, corporate, etc.) conspiracy or sorts.

Since this is common to Pynchon's fiction, does his treatment of identity swapping in VL seem any different from the ways it's done in his other works?

Also, since a "search for identity" theme is fairly tried and true throughout a few centuries of literature (from Don Quixote on, at least ...), might this "identity swap" notion be said to reflect a more postmodern condition?




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