VLVL College of the Surf and PR3

[jbor]

>>>> Meanwhile, back at the text, Rex Snuvvle is described as follows:
>>>> 
>>>> while being indoctrinated into the government's version of
>>>> the war in Vietnam, [he] had, despite his own best efforts,
>>>> been at last as unable to avoid the truth as, once knowing
>>>> it, to speak it, out of what he easily admitted was fear of
>>>> reprisal.  (207)
>>>> 
>>>> The point Pynchon is making in _Vineland_ is that, by 1969, there was no
>>>> longer a "combined civil rights/anti-war movement". The students and
>>>> agitators were busy bickering amongst themselves, smoking dope and playing
>>>> dress-ups and, eventually, making bombs and breaking things, and
>>>> demonstrating and rioting just for the sake of it. The Civil Rights and
>>>> anti-War and free speech causes got lost along the way.
>>> 
>>> Why would P make this point? I don't think this is his point at all.
>> 
>> Why not? 
> 
> Because it's not a point worth making.

I'm not saying it's his only point.

> If this is his point why does he
> trace the Turnings and Betrayals we have been talking about into Vietnam
> and back into 50's Hollywood and Cold War organized labor?

Is there any evidence in the text to support this idea that he's tracing a
causal sequence between these events?

> The bickering
> and the in-fighting, doesn't begin in the late '60s.

So? Neither do the strong arm tactics of the authorities.

> There is  poignancy
> in the lost Civil Rights cause for sure, but if Pynchon's point is to
> tell us his version of what happened by 69 he should get out of the
> novel writing business.

        War in Vietnam, murder as an instrument of American
        politics, black neighborhoods torched to ashes and
        death, all must have been off on some other planet. (38)

As I said, I'm not saying it's his only point. I'm pretty sure I don't agree
with you, but I guess you'll clarify your arguments when you have time.

>> I don't think he's reducing the whole '60s Student Movement, from
>> Berkeley to Columbia and beyond, to the farce which is College of the Surf.
>> Is that what you're arguing his point is?
> 
> No, Im not arguing that at all. The novel doesn't even address the whole
> of the 60's student Movement. It's not in the book. We agreed, I think,
> that VL doesn't take up the free speech movement or the anti-war
> movement or hundreds of other causes and movements that were active at
> the time. It's just not in the book.

I agree. But these causes (civil rights, anti-war) *were* active at Columbia
in '68. That they're not present at "College of the Surf" in '69 is
significant. It's worth having a closer look at the meeting between Rex and
the members of BAAD to illustrate the point I'm making (230-1).

best