Against the Day/Songs

[jbor at bigpond.com]

On 21/07/2006, at 2:12 PM:

> (I'm on the Pynchon list, so digressions
> are welcome, right?)

Sure are. Welcome, Chris.

I agree with you that Pynchon's songs and lyrics are often interesting 
to look at closely. I actually think some of the numbers in the various 
books are anachronistic, i.e., that they haven't strictly speaking 
always been composed to reflect musical conventions of the time of the 
setting.

I like the bit about GR exemplifying "those who struggle against the 
idea of apocalypse" though I'm not sure how it ties in with the 
"mysterious missives" (I take it you mean the "now you see it, now you 
don't" Amazon.com blurb.) Would that also imply a "struggle" against 
those who weigh things and adopt codes of ethics in terms of an 
ultimate "apocalypse", such as the prophesied "Day of Judgement" of the 
Christian Bible, and thus possibly signify an ironic layer to the title 
and its possible allusions to the Bible (... and FDR ... Faulkner too)?

best

Chris Broderick wrote:

> Hello.  I'm one of those who just joined the list
> thanks to Slate, though I knew of it, thanks to the
> someone passing out free copies of Lineland at Burning
> Man, which I finished reading before I washed off the
> crust of Black Rock City.
>
> Anyway, I just wanted to comment on the various bits
> of speculation about the title Against the Day.  It
> seems that this is all in a piece with a significant
> (to my mind at least) thematic element in GR, that of
> preterition.  If so, the part in Pynchon's blurb (I
> cling to the belief that it was him!) that begged off
> any comparison of the Day in the title to the present
> is at least a little disingenuous, considering how
> many American foax are of the belief that, to
> paraphrase Robert Anton Wilson, the eschaton is
> immanent (as evidenced by the horrors in the Mideast,
> Gay Marriage, parents unwilling to whip their kids,
> etc.)
>
> But I digress (I'm on the Pynchon list, so digressions
> are welcome, right?)  My point is that an element that
> was prevalent in GR of those who struggle against the
> idea of apocalypse seems to be front & center in this
> latest novel, at least as far as these mysterious
> missives are concerned.  That warms my heart
> considerably, not that I would shun any work by Mr.
> Pynchon at this point regardless of its level of
> apocalypse shunning.
>
> Another element that makes me particularly hungry for
> this piece is the time period.  To my mind, one of the
> stronger elements of GR (and one of the lesser
> elements of the subsequent 2 novels) was Mr. Pynchon's
> facility with song lyrics that fit the period.  The
> man obviously knows his Cole Porter and Rodgers &
> Hammerstein, and knows how to tweak them
> appropriately.  It has long been a fantasy of mine to
> put many of the lyrics of GR to music, simply because
> it would be so easy (which is less true of Vineland
> and M&D, since he seems to have less facility with
> rock both punk and hippie and early American music,
> respectively.  So a novel by TP set in the dawn of the
> 20th-Century sets this musician's heart aflutter.
>
> Anyway, I blather on too long.
>
> Thanks,
> Chris