On Moral Equivalence

[robinlandseadel at comcast.net]

I'm sorry but I must argue that the readings here are simply wrong.
Wrong for fiction. 

Fiction is not non-fiction grounded in fantasy or irreality. Fiction is not 
history judging the literal equivalence of historical actions, historical evils. 

Pynchon's works are NOT Nicholson Baker's "Human Smoke"--a recent non-fictional 
work which I think fails for large historical moral inequivalent reasons...[Mr. 
Baker is on Charlie Rose toninght, if interested]

Moralism, first, is usually used to characterize self-righteously expressed
statements judging facts or situations. In fiction, it MEANS the intrusion
of such non-fictional literalism into the whole visionary world of the fiction. 
I figure that a lot of the personalities in the scenes in Dante's Inferno 
come from the real-life experiences of that illustrious Italian poet.
We see these monsters through the eyes of a poet with an agenda.
Pynchon is a poet with an agenda. Just like Dante, he's keen on 
karma. Karma's the rule in Pynchonland. I realize, vide his 
Dudeness, that you could call it Justice. But Pynchon's mind
is filled with internal dialogs that merge with vectors and bell curves, 
the poetry and essentially Taoist nature of mathematical equations, 
and of nature's accounting of all things in time. Justice is the 
imposition of will and order. Karma's just nature doing her job.


Mark:

A moral vision is a writer's whole worldview. For a writer of fiction, that 
worldview is only literal in the worst fiction; irony, satire, vision of who 
says what, in context, enwraps it all. 


Pynchon's outraged [see satire as the deepest ideals frustrated by reality] 
linking of historical situations, historical evils and modern companies in 
GR and Against the Day IS the vision....by satirizing them individually yet 
linking them shows he does not see them as equivalent.....we cannot leave 
simple distinctions at home as we read; he didn't.............we have to judge 
why he links them, where he sees common sources..............Pynchon tries 
to do that (and largely succeeds in my opinion). He finds the repression of 
certain universal psychic realities, the structures of the modern world and 
the way it warps all in it leading to much of the evil in it..........

His 'moral vision' is his deep condemnations AND his moments of 
transcending, being human within, surviving such History. GR, 
passim. .....Mason AND Dixon............the whole 'spiritual' 
exploration in Against the Day......the whole finding of a human 
wholeness in pre-modern history, communities in Against 
the Day....  

I am sorry but TRP has incorporated such "reductionism" into his vision of 
what is wrong with our thinking in the modern world. 

 

--- On Thu, 7/10/08, malignd at aol.com <malignd at aol.com> wrote:

> From: malignd at aol.com <malignd at aol.com>
> Subject: Re: Repost: "The Big One"
> To: pynchon-l at waste.org
> Date: Thursday, July 10, 2008, 3:54 PM
> As far as Pynchon's concerned, Shell's just as much
> a Nazi as the rest of 'em.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Which was, or course, my point:  that that is
> Pynchon's moral universe.