Miles Gift ATDTDA (1) pg 23/24

[robinlandseadel at comcast.net]

---I wonder whether Pynchon read Harry Potter. There are certainly a number of 
---elements in AtD which remind me of Rowling's wonderful novels. The hidden 
---alley in London on page 234 recalls Diagon Alley, on page 716 there is a 
---reference to a "cloak of invisibility", and the conscious fez on page 832 
---brings the sorting hat from the Potter books to mind. Of course, Pynchon 
---wrote about magic before J.K. Rowling was even born, and the 'references' 
---may just be a continuance of his old preoccupations, but I'd like to believe 
---that Pynchon reads and enjoys the Harry Potter series, and that the 
---references are intentional.

---Best,

---Tore

I wonder if Pynchon read the Lesser Key to Solomon?

http://www.sacred-texts.com/grim/lks/index.htm

I know he must have read A. E. Waite and Eliphaz Levi:

http://altreligion.about.com/library/graphics/bl_mtol8.htm

http://altreligion.about.com/library/texts/bl_sanctumregnum.htm

And that he keeps a close watch on pop movies with
related themes:

     "Well, we're no longer a low-rent as people remember us here 
either Zoyd, in fact since George Lucas and all his crew came and 
went there's been a real change of consciousness."
    
      "Yep, I noticed . . . say, you want to draw me a, just a lady's-sized 
beer there . . . you know I still haven't even got around to that picture?"
     
     They were talking about Return of the Jedi (1983), parts of which 
had been filmed in the area and in Buster's view changed life there 
forever. He put his massive elbows on about the only thing in here 
that hadn't been replaced, the original bar, carved back at the turn 
of the century from one giant redwood log. "But underneath, we're, 
still just country fellas."

     "From the looks of your parking lot, the country must be Germany."
Vineland, pg 7

http://www.folkstory.com/articles/petersburg.html

http://www.skepticfiles.org/atheist2/hero.htm

I know he read "Stone Junction:

     Under the bed, bolted to the frame between two sheets of plywood is
a mirror. Prop it up securely and position yourself comfortably in 
front of it. Count your bones until they glow, then relax for about ten 
minutes, until you're breathing calmly and evenly. Shut your eyes 
and try to empty your mind. When you open your eyes again, look at
yourself in the mirror. Look deeply into your own eyes. See  yourself 
through yourself. The point of integration is the surface of the mirror. 
When you join yourself there, you will vanish.

     These are your final instructions. Try as often and as long as you 
want. I maintain my faith in your success.
Jim Dodge, Stone Junction pg 195

Now, misdirection's the soul of three card monte:

http://www.ehow.com/how_4410_perform-three-card.html

and it's one of the cheapest, easiest and most fraudulent
of card tricks, but Miles' gift is of a different order. And a few 
pages later future Cyclomite addict Lew Baslight :

   . . . .found himself surrounded by a luminosity new to him, 
not even observed in dreams, nor even observed in dreams, 
nor easily attributable to the smoke-inflected sun beginning 
to light Chicago.
AtD 42

     And while talking about how everything connects can
get you a one-way ticket to Newburgh, that Illumination is
prerequsite to working in the realms just described.