IJ

[Paul Mackin]

On Mar 25, 2006, at 9:01 PM, Michael Bailey wrote:

> On 3/25/06, jbor at bigpond.com <jbor at bigpond.com> wrote:
>> This article gives a pretty decent overview of the post-Pynchon and
>> DeLillo crop of American postmoderns and what they're on about, and
>> rates Wallace and his achievement with IJ (and the rest of his work)
>> fairly and sensibly.
>>
>
>> http://afr.com/articles/2003/10/16/1065917545463.html
>>
>
> wanted to share a chuckle I got from an ambiguous antecedent in the  
> article:
>
> "Amanda Davis's "Faith" delivers a disturbing portrait of a raped girl
> with an eating disorder that is as elegant and poised as anything in
> contemporary short fiction."
>
> (nothing funny about the rape, of course)
>
> (waiting for the chuckle, now spoiling it by trying to come up with  
> a capper)
> -- so that is the state of contemporary short fiction?  an eating
> disorder can be as elegant as the best current short stories?  even
> the ones in the New Yorker?
>
> ---
> The article also mentions IJ ringing changes on Shakespearean themes
> (obviously Hamlet, but I keep wanting to do something with the name
> "Hal") and Yorick is the clergyman in Tristram Shandy, and I've
> detected more than one respectful nod to Pynchon (but unfortunately
> didn't make a puissant enough mental note to specify)

Note the Walpurgisnacht scenes comparison below. For p-listers who  
were not here ten years ago, we did have back then quite a discussion  
about  comparisons between the two authors. See the achieves for  
February 1996 and thereabouts.

For example:

From: mackin@[omitted] (Paul Mackin)
Subject: Re: mother quest
Date: 28 Feb 1996 10:21:58 -0800


On Wed, 28 Feb 1996, Bonnie Surfus (ENG) wrote:

 > On Pynchon and DFW:  have you noticed Wallace's use of
 > shadow and light?  It plays like it does in GR--all shadowy  
lattice work
 > here and there.  It's interesting and kind of erie.  And did you  
catch
 > that not-so-subtle nod to "V."?

Yes, from the start, p. 1 of IF, where spidery Arizona noon light
strikes the conference table. Occurs throughout in both authors. At the
lowest level it can be a convenient device to stop action for a
moment, like lighting a pipe or cleaning your glasses, but isn't it
often (always?) much more? Suggesting gulfs to be bridged or
something like that maybe. That's a trivial way of putting it.

Of course the light sources can be artificial as well as natural.
I'm near the point in IF where important action takes place in
the administrative office of the tennis academy. Much is made of
lamp light--coming from the inner offices and stopping just outside
in the waiting room where boys and girls are waiting anxiously
to be dealt with for major infractions.

Light play may be at its most exaggerated in the Walpurgisnacht scenes
in both P. and W. Actually _recurring scenes_ in IF, which in my mind
can only be a deliberate tribute to the older by the younger author.
Interestingly, it is in _these_ scenes that the Vs begin to pop up,  
don't
they. In fact the pendantive Vs are themselves a shadow effect. Not  
quite
a conincidence, eh?

Seems to me the opportunity to compare these two talented authors
is too good to pass up--even though this is the Pynchon, not the
Wallace, list. The two seem so alike in some ways and so different in
others, as continues to be pointed out in recent postings.

				P








> ---
>
> ...and I'm reminded of seminal treatment of AA in "Secret Integration"
> - alcoholism as great leveler, no respecter of persons, or social
> lines
>
> -------
> --
> "Acceptance, forgiveness, love - now that's a philosophy of life!"
> -Woody Allen, as Broadway Danny Rose
>