on The Family---for possible discussion re Vineland/TRP

[David Morris]

A very glib quote, tellingly from a "British novelist."

Families in conglomerate form communities that embody cultural values.
 It's a little hard to determine the chicken from the egg, but I'd say
the family is the egg that produces a culture and its values.

David Morris

On Wed, Apr 22, 2009 at 10:12 AM, Paul Mackin <mackin.paul at gmail.com> wrote:
>
>> From: "Mark Kohut" <markekohut at yahoo.com>
>>
>> As to the family, I have never understood how that fits in with the other
>> ideals — or, indeed, why it should be an ideal at all. A group of closely
>> related persons living under one roof; it is a convenience, often a
>> necessity, sometimes a pleasure, sometimes the reverse; but who first
>> exalted it as admirable, an almost religious idea?
>> — Rose Macaulay (1881-1958), British novelist
>>
>
> Interesting quote, Mark
>
> Don''t think Pynchon ever implies with any convicttion that the Traverse
> family tradition of resistence as well as other things is necessarily
> admirable.
>
> Family must have some effect on character formation.
>
> p-lister discussion does seem to honor the family quite a bit.
>
> Is this related to Heikki's idea that the novel lends itself more to
> traditiional type criticism? Character-,  morality-driven?
>
> I'm pretty muddled on the whole thing at the moment.
>
> P