VLVL 24fps and "the Movement"

[davemarc]

From: jbor <jbor at bigpond.com>
Subject: Re: VLVL 24fps and "the Movement"


> I think that Pynchon satirises the American Labour movements (Jess and
Eula,
> Sasha and Frenesi), as much as he satirises everything else in the novel,
> and that he emphasises the failures and sellouts they accrued.

I think that, in Vineland, Pynchon establishes a tragic motif of how the US
government used anti-labor, anti-Communist, and anti-drug hysteria to
advance nondemocratic agenda. Pynchon shows how government agents use their
power to exploit weaknesses in popular movements, undermining them by
deliberating creating "failures and sellouts" in their ranks. There's an
element of satire throughout Vineland, but this motif prevails (in
accordance with Pynchon's belief that power is a sworn enemy of writers).
Everyone's a caricature, but the caricature of Brock is that of a
manipulative, powerful predator. Recall that in 1984, Orwell (through his
predator O'Brien) is in a position to toy with Winston and Julia, getting
them to pledge to do all kinds of despicable harm. Yet it's O'Brien who,
like Brock, is the actual agent of despicable harm, the government agent who
succeeds in entrapping and victimizing Winston and Julia like Brock entraps
and victimizes his victims.

> I think that 24fps, the Pisks especially, are depicted as part of the
> problem. They've been around since those early days at Berkeley but they
> don't seem to have any consciousness at all of how "the Movement" has
> shifted ground, of how the original causes have all been forgotten and
lost
> in the dance and thrill of protest. They're into dressing up in battle
> fatigues and pretending to be martyrs and spray-painting violent slogans,
> but what political or social causes do they actually support, what do they
> ever actually do? They make films of hippie chicks dancing, chain smoke
and
> play three tvs at a time while they work, and have sex on the beach. They
> like driving around in flash cars with state-of-the-art CB radios, getting
> stoned, and mouthing off about martyrdom and anarchy and setting off
bombs.
> But their biggest gripes are about shopping and food. By the time of
College
> of the Surf it's all become just image and hot air, protest for the sake
of
> protest.
>
The above critique seems misguided in judging the Pisks according to a
puritanical standard of
behavior. So
what if they chain smoke, have sex, use "illegal substances," mouth off, and
feel nostalgic? So does Winston Smith--for someone as disempowered as
Winston, much of that kind of behavior is a form of personal rebellion. In
some (not all!) ways, the folk in Vineland aren't much more empowered than
he is--those
in the government are the ones who, like O'Brien, are pros at gaining and
preserving power,
those in the movement are, like Winston and Julia, relatively powerless and
unskilled amateurs.

d.