authors under the influence

[Paul Mackin]

On Oct 20, 2006, at 2:13 PM, robinlandseadel at comcast.net wrote:

> I got out of the house earlier than usual this morning for coffee  
> and this high-density chocolate cookie that somehow justifies the  
> presence of all those overpriced boutique vegetables at the local  
> Whole Foods. Also picked up a New York Times, where I read of a  
> Glenn Gould movie festival, a series of films directed by Bruno  
> Monsaingeon of that famously self-medicated pianist:
>
> http://www.nytimes.com/2006/10/20/arts/music/20goul.html? 
> _r=1&ref=arts&oref=slogin
>
> I'm struck as how Gould, along with Elvis, Proust and author,  
> pianist, actor and general crank Oscar Levant were all self- 
> medicated (probably as a mode of coping with all this incoming data— 
> damn, it's paisley again![seriously, ask yourself: how many times  
> did this happen to Proust?]), and were all unique individualists  
> who produced rather large bodies of work. Might Pynchon be included  
> on this list? Inquiring minds want to know—well, not really. It's  
> pretty easy to figure out that one:
>
> "Next time we run across that Englishman," Dzabajev looking  
> curiously at his hands on the steering wheel, "or American, or  
> whatever he is, find out, will you, where he got this shit?"
> "Make a note of that", orders Tchitcherine. They both start cacking  
> insanely there, under the tree.
>                         GR, 398 (2000 repaigination. The rest of  
> you need to pull out your Captain Midnight Kaballah Decoder Ring to  
> find the right passage. Seriously, the new font for the Penguin QP  
> edition is lovely and all, but the binding still falls apart in two  
> months and you've gotta use a slide rule to find your place if  
> you're reading sombody else's commentaries—Is it in Pynchon's  
> contract that all paperback copies of GR have to explode in your  
> hands?)

My speculation would be that, though the attraction of drugs and even  
more so booze as an aid to the creative process is considerable, an  
ambitious novelist is only going to turn to really HEAVY use as a  
last resort. Proust needed dangerous substances just to keep going  
physically and mentally. He knew he was poisoning himself and  
shortening his life. It was a calculated trade off. . Incidentally he  
thought of himself as a pretty competent toxicologist.

I won't go into the reason for the mental stain because it impinges  
on the course the novel is about to take for Robin in volume 4. Won't  
do any harm to say it had to  do with the need to cross certain  
sexual and class boundaries. French and even more so  British society  
were quite rigid and one's career could be ruined if certain  taboos  
were not honored. The class boundaries were particularly important to  
preserve intact. .

To make the point here's a connection to  Pynchon. If a general of  
the British Empire were to be sexually defiled by a little Dutch girl  
in the early 1920's Pynchon would never have been able to eat lunch  
in New York again.,