Can Pynchon write (yet)?

[Paul Nightingale]

A curious complaint, but one that arises frequently--that P's characters are
'cartoonish'. And then, the response--are they or are they not 'properly
fleshed out'?

In fact P's approach to characterisation is what we might call anti- or
post-realist. He isn't really interested in representing 'real people'; and
furthermore, as much as anything, his characters are a running commentary on
the process of writing characters.

A character isn't a representation of a real person, offered against the
backdrop of a suitably realised 'context': Pirate and Zoot waking up in GR
and VL respectively, for example.

The realist writer might offer us some or all of the information P offers at
the beginning of those novels; but the realist writer would make sure they
added the degree of plausibility that P's texts so often ignore (the critic
would say 'miss out' because of a weakness in the writer's technique, as
though everyone should aspire to write like [.....]).

To say 'cartoonish' is to suggest a superficiality of a certain kind: two as
opposed to three dimensions. One might say the character is 'flat'. To say
'fleshed out' is to imply the third dimension has been added. Some metaphors
come from the visual arts, of course; and yes, the visual arts have moved on
since a time when the illusion of 'depth' was considered a criterion of
quality (even though the criticism might still be made of anyone
post-Manet).

It's certainly interesting that writers, even when they protest to the
contrary, still approach writing as though they lived in the C19th, quite
oblivious to the fact that many C19th writers themselves did not, in the
writing, subscribe to such realist notions. This I think is a point made by,
among others, Robbe-Grillet (mentioned here recently).

Well, my approach to Preading--sorry, Pidolatry--is to consider the
relationship between the different elements in the text: the character,
so-called, is but one such element (thinking of R-G, of course, this is
something he has always been doing, practising what he preaches). As I
suggested at the time of the VL reading and the aborted GR reading a year
ago, the interesting point about their opening passages is the way in which
the named characters--Pirate, Zoyd--have to 'insert' themselves into the
narrative. The relationship between 'character' and 'context' is thereby
problematised. The other novels open in similar fashion; and I suppose I'm
suggesting--offering hostages to fortune, dammit--AtD will also.