Devil's advocate in Slate comments

[jd]

See, I've always felt that Cryptonomicon was a watered down attempt by
Stephenson as a wanna-be Pynchon to write a GR.  I think Matthew's
comment there about sums it up for me as well.

On 7/20/06, Matthew Ryan <matthew.ryan at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> If you want to read the book that Gravity's Rainbow aspired to be, read Neal
> Stephenson's Cryptonomicon, for it has many of the same concerns, it covers
> the same period and theatre of operations, and it is a much better crafted
> book.
>
>
> You've got to be fucking kidding me.
>
>
>
> On 7/20/06, Ya Sam <takoitov at hotmail.com> wrote:
> >
> >
> > Subject: Pynchon is a bad writer
> > From: thetwomacduff
> > Date: Jul 20 2006 3:52PM
> >
> > Many of the replies to danielmartinx have missed his main point, which was
> > not that the university crowd have abandoned him, but that he is,
> > technically, not a very good writer; that his prose is clotted and poorly
> > constructed, and that the praise he has received has been for the supposed
> > "ideas" content, not for the style, which is often excused, but seldom
> > praised.
> >
> > Of course, every now and then, he pulls off a beautiful passage, viz., the
> > opening of Gravity's Rainbow, but he isn't able to consistently write
> > readable prose, or even construct moderately well-crafted sentences.
> >
> > The stuff of Pynchon's Books is, mostly, science fiction, but his
> technique
> > is to swathe that stuff in a style that is self-consciously post-modern,
> > and, as he has gone on and on, it is the style that has brought him his
> fans
> > – and yes, I would agree, he has many, and that many are members or
> > hangers-on of the "university crowd." But he's an appallingly slipshod
> > writer, and, in my opinion, not a very clear thinker.
> >
> > If you want to read the book that Gravity's Rainbow aspired to be, read
> Neal
> > Stephenson's Cryptonomicon, for it has many of the same concerns, it
> covers
> > the same period and theatre of operations, and it is a much better crafted
> > book.
> >
> >
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