Ethical Diversions

[jd]

Ultimately isn't GR's non-recognition of the Holocaust more powerful
than attempting to dive into it in what could easily appear to be an
(albeit likely quite talented) attempt to force an extra artificial
sense of gravity into the book a la Jonathan Safran Foer?

I mean, it's a wildly hilarious novel that, on a second glance, behind
all the humor, is actually rather bleak, and behind that stands the
relatively unmentioned Holocaust that's going to shadow any book
dealing with the the subject.  I think it was rather tasteful of him
to be honest.

I have to side with the people who think the Orban quote is
over-written, and to me ultimately pointless...  this says nothing
about Dave and his taste, glad there's someone out there pounding
through all this, but this particular bit just sounds like an
over-academic stab at horning in on the glory of the novel by
attaching oneself to it through criticism.

On 6/21/06, jbor at bigpond.com <jbor at bigpond.com> wrote:
> On 22/06/2006:
>
> > Neither Pynchon nor his readers, however, can plead
> > ignorance.  And that's the important part there ...
>
> I don't think anyone has ever claimed here that Pynchon or his readers
> were ignorant of the Holocaust, Dave.
>
> best
>
> >> I agree that the other uses of the noun "holocaust" (small "h") in
> >> the novel carry with them a reminder for the reader of the Holocaust
> >> (capital "H"). It will always be a loaded word for us. But it wasn't
> >> a loaded word at the time when the events being described in the
> >> novel were happening, and so in terms of the narrative (i.e., the
> >> story) and the characters the use of the word has nothing whatsoever
> >> to do with Nazi genocide. It's in that way (along with all those
> >> loaded associations and images of smoke, soap, gas, the Oven Game
> >> etc) that the tension I mentioned is created and sustained in the
> >> text for the reader.
>
>