Watts article

[jbor]

http://www.themodernword.com/pynchon/pynchon_essays_watts.html

Rereading the article, and reflecting on the pedantic complaints about what
descriptive label should or shouldn't be applied to it, it occurs to me now
that "current affairs journalism" is the best fit. Sober, earnest in tone,
even occasionally impassioned, it's not that far removed from the style of
investigative report featured on programs like '60 Minutes'.

best

on 26/9/04 10:36 AM, jbor wrote:

[...]
> the point remains that, as an example both
> of news journalism and public activism, the Watts article is quite unique in
> Pynchon's oeuvre.

[...]
>> I'm not precious about the adjective "investigative"; I don't see that the
>> article has much in common with the Tom Wolfe or "faction" stuff. It's
>> definitely journalistic. It investigates a specific incident and relevant
>> participant perspectives. I've yet to see a more apt label provided.

[...]
>>> The article exemplifies the fact that the Civil Rights Movement was the one
>>> cause in the '60s that Pynchon was committed enough to to pull himself away
>>> from his glozing neuterdom and to get out and do. A lot of readers don't
>>> like to accept this fact, for whatever reasons, but there it is. It is,
>>> after all, a piece of investigative journalism, Pynchon's only foray into
>>> that field.
[...]