the "Movement"

[jbor]

Thanks for posting this. It's clear that the Student Movement wasn't ever a
monolithic bloc, which is a mistaken assumption often made, that it evolved
and changed over time, and that Pynchon is depicting a particular period and
particular factions within the Movement in his satire. I suspect that those
"traveling Movement co-ordinators" who visited College of the Surf might
correspond to "the infusion of new SDS members from mid-America which moved
the power base from the East Coast and radicalized the movement" that the
Amazon reviewer refers to. (Cf. the Pisk twins heading off to a "bomb-making
commune" in Oregon after its failure on 259).

I imagine that Sale's _SDS_ book was one of Pynchon's primary sources for
_Vineland_.

A recent interview with Sale here which might ring a few Pynchon bells:

http://yeoldeconsciousnessshoppe.com/art42.html

Fortunately, more recent evidence would suggest that his prophesy of ozone
doom is unlikely. 

And this is a fairly comprehensive discussion and overview of sources which
refers extensively to Sale's book, the split between SDS and the student
anti-war movement (SMC) in 1965, and which is very relevant to some of the
territory Pynchon covers in _Vineland_:

http://www.findarticles.com/cf_dls/m2005/1_33/56027322/p1/article.jhtml?term
= 

(watch the wrap)

best

on 8/1/04 11:57 AM, Toby G Levy at tobylevy at juno.com wrote:

> Yes, Pynchon blurbed this book. Interesting that this came out the same year
> as Gravity's Rainbow.
> 
> SDS by Kirkpatrick Sale out of print (used copies start at around $100)
> 
> reviewed on Amazon.Com by Jeff Leach
> 
> It quickly becomes apparent that this is the bible for anyone interested in
> the Students for a Democratic Society (SDS). Clocking in at a whopping 700+
> pages, Sale has exhaustively researched almost every aspect of this
> organization and turned that research into interesting and concise reading.
> His research on SDS encompasses books, the SDS archives in Wisconsin,
> interviews and letters with some of the movers and shakers in SDS, and even
> archives for the League of Industrial Democracy (SDS's parent organization).
> The book is divided into four sections: Reorganization, Reform, Resistance and
> Revolution. Within these divisions Sale creates chapters based on the seasons,
> such as Summer 1965 or Fall 1967. The book covers roughly 12 years, from 1960
> to 1972 (the book was published in 1973). Sale still writes articles for such
> magazines as The Nation, as well as other books, one on Robert Fulton being
> his most recent. 
> SDS started out as SLID, or the Student League of Industrial Democracy, an arm
> of the LID mentioned above. LID was an Old Left organization made up of
> cautious anti-Communist liberals/socialists. Sale details every aspect of SDS;
> the formation of the group under the watchful eyes of Al Haber and Tom Hayden,
> the writing of the Port Huron Statement, the tensions between the
> intellectuals and actionists which resulted in the ERAP projects (and the
> failure of those projects), the infusion of new SDS members from mid-America
> which moved the power base from the East Coast and radicalized the movement.
> Sale continues his account all the way to the demise of SDS into two Communist
> factions: Weatherman and PL-SDS. Sale knows he's telling a long tale and
> constantly stops along the way for summaries and recaps of problems. The
> ominous appearance of sections on the Progressive Labor Party (PL) provides a
> separate timeline of this group until its infiltration and destruction of SDS
> in the later 1960's.
> 
> As useful as this history is, Sale does have his limitations. He rarely
> provides any look at the intellectual underpinnings of SDS, an aspect that is
> critical in understanding their ideas and some of their weaknesses. There are
> only a few mentions of C. Wright Mills, for example. Mills was critical to
> early SDS thought and should definitely have a place in any history of SDS
> (James Miller's book provides an intellectual history of SDS). Another problem
> is that Sale is writing so close to his subject. In 1973 Weather bombs are
> still going off and principal members of SDS are still protesting. Sale misses
> out on what the perspective of time can do for people. Finally, for a book so
> exhaustive and meticulous in its approach, there is no reprint of the Port
> Huron Statement to be found, not in the text or in an appendix, which I find
> very surprising. 
> 
> If you are going to do any reading on SDS, let alone any research, you must
> read this book, and I recommend reading it before you read any other books on
> the topic. Unfortunately, it's out of print. I haven't seen a copy available
> anywhere ..., but a reprint could always happen at anytime. Highly
> Recommended. 
>