GR vis a vis RS

[Lary Wallace]

That's a very thoughtful and perceptive response, and after reading it several times I think I can honestly say that I comprehend it. Thanks for hitting me back. Anyone else who has something to add: additions are still welcome. 
   
  P.S. By the way, this isn't the author of _LIbra_ writing in, is it? Just checking. 
  

libra 008 <lbr_008 at yahoo.com> wrote:
  I read Ratner's Star this year. While Pynchon's emphasis is more on the interface between technology and control, Delillo's is more on language and meaning. Both author's explore the way science tries to codify meaning through the framework of scientific truth, and criticize this framework for being blind to its own shortcomings.

The main difference that I can see is that pynchon comes to this criticism through the examination of how this knowledge is applied, while Delillo is more interested in how it is communicated. It is now mere happenstance that Delillo parody's Alice in Wonderland in Ratner's Star. Where Lewis Carroll's fascination with mathmatics served as the thematic foundation of Alice's adventures, Delillo uses it to point out the absurdity of mathmatics by highlighting the irrationality of the humans who try to comprehend the deeper elements of mathmatical knowledge.

At least that's my theory for today. Ask me tomorrow and I am more than likely to have a different response. lol.

- Anatole

Lary Wallace <pytheas76 at yahoo.com> wrote:  I've recently been reacquainting myself with DeLillo's most blatantly Scientifick novel to date--you know the one: Ratner's Rainbow--and I can't help but wonder how much it owes to Pynchon and Gravity's Star. But seriously: what's the deal with these two books? We know that DeLillo admires Pynchon and Gravity's Rainbow, and that he studied mathematics for two years prior to writing Ratner's Star, which was published three years after GR. Other than that, I know next to nothing else about the relationship between these two books--other than, of course, the way the lines in their titles single up against oen another so perfectly. What's the deal? Can anyone shed light on this?   
  
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