What to read next?

[braam van bruggen]

I'd really like it if we did V - I haven't read it for
20 years and it's still the most difficult (for me)
and there's something hauntingly beautiful about
that mysterious valley, not so much a place in physical
reality as somewhere inside us all....?

On the other hand, Vineland would be great too...


----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Mark Kohut" <markekohut at yahoo.com>
To: "pynchon -l" <pynchon-l at waste.org>
Cc: <kelber at mindspring.com>; <robinlandseadel at comcast.net>
Sent: Tuesday, July 29, 2008 11:28 AM
Subject: What to read next?


>
>> I vote for the consensus..........
>>
>> In fact, in a kind of homage to timelessness, I vote for
>> maybe reading more than one at a time???
>>
>> many on the the p-list is already doing that, it seems.
>>
>> a--and we always have more than one thread going
>> anyway.........
>>
>> We can make some wonderfully contrapuntal, full orchestral
>> sounds..........
>> Talk about Stravinsky!?
>>
>>
>> --- On Mon, 7/28/08, robinlandseadel at comcast.net
>> <robinlandseadel at comcast.net> wrote:
>>
>> > From: robinlandseadel at comcast.net
>> <robinlandseadel at comcast.net>
>> > Subject: Re: AtD (37) p. 1055, Kafkaesque dream,
>> guilt, paranoia, Where is LAPD?
>> > To: "P-list" <pynchon-l at waste.org>
>> > Date: Monday, July 28, 2008, 7:18 PM
>> > Laura:
>> >           Anyone up for a group read of Vineland next?
>> >
>> > I'd be up for it, someone else recommends
>> > "V.", I  suggested
>> > CoL 49—all have tight connections to AtD.
>> >
>> > Vineland is about surveillance reversed, turning the
>> > cameras on the finks.
>> >
>> > Considering how much space the creation of modern-day
>> spy
>> > networks
>> > takes up in AtD [GR, for that matter], Vineland offers
>> up
>> > much relevant
>> > material as regards spies, spying and the creation of
>> a
>> > permanent police
>> > state in the good old U.S.A. Vineland is also
>> connected to
>> > AtD via  the
>> > presence of Jesse Traverse and Frenesi"s taste
>> for
>> > C.O.P.s.
>> >
>> > If it turns out to be "V.", though, I'll
>> have
>> > a chance at connecting with a
>> > book that has left me cold ever since I first had a
>> crack
>> > at it twenty years
>> > ago. On the one hand, the characters in "V."
>> are
>> > the thinest in any of
>> > TRP's novels—the cardboard cutouts in Against
>> the Day
>> > usually have
>> > something funny ha-ha to say, there's a greater
>> > amusement potential.
>> > On the other, the time frame of "V."often
>> matches
>> > Against the Day,
>> > obviously OBA needed to tie up a lot of loose ends.
>> >
>> > I'll end by noting here, and probably later on,
>> that
>> > la Jarretière's
>> > little entrance on p. 1066 is partially in the way of
>> a
>> > belated apology for
>> > la Jarretière's scene in "V.", an ugly
>> > compendium of slurs and clichés
>> > on the arts scene. La Jarretière returns to assure us
>> it
>> > was only an
>> > outrageous stunt, no cause for concern. Must have been
>> what
>> > our boy
>> > was talkin' about when he said:
>> >
>> >           "It is only fair to warn even the most
>> > kindly disposed of readers
>> >           that there are some mighty tiresome passages
>> > here, juvinile and
>> >           deliquent too.  At the same time, my best
>> hope is
>> > that, pretentious,
>> >           goofy and ill-considered as they get now and
>> > then, these stories
>> >           will still be of use with all their flaws
>> intact,
>> > as illustrative of
>> >           typical problems in entry-level fiction, and
>> > cautionary about some
>> >           practices which younger writers might prefer
>> to
>> > avoid.
>> >           Slow Learner page 4
>
>
>
>