Editing Pynchon?

[Ian Livingston]

One of the reasons I find structuralist approaches to literature
unsatisfactory -- as I do most exclusive approaches -- is that it
inclines the reader to limit his view of the work to only what can be
talked about in the language of structuralism.  A work of fiction is a
work of art, formed in the mind of a complex, dynamic individual
working within a complex, dynamic culture.  The resulting reductions
of the work in question beyond what the author has already managed
tend to mangle what does not fit into the frame of reference of
structuralist perspective.  Much of Pynchon's work, especially the big
3 (GR, M&D and AtD) works on too many levels to be reduced to
structuralist approaches.  Sure, you can throw out what doesn't fit a
specific interpretation, but what remains is not the novel the author
wrote.  It is something else.  Certainly exclusion is necessary for us
as mortal, finite humans and all.  That is certainly true of how we
interpret the world we inhabit, and it also applies to how we read,
but that does not indicate that exclusion of any particular sort can
claim autocracy over other interpretive approaches.

What many people find objectionable in Pynchon's sexual imagery
becomes quite interesting when we look at it in terms of its
illustration of certain archetypal images deeply entrenched in the
Western traditions.  For instance, when Lake steps aside from between
Deuce and Sloat, she leaves the King and Son of a shadow variety in
direct confrontation, which is an intolerable position for both.  That
metaphor has many allusive potentials that a reader can reflect on
through the course of the work as triads form and decay.  It is,
however, only one of the many colorful threads at work in the
tapestry.  Pulling any of the threads may not cause the fabric to
unravel, but it detracts from brilliance of the whole.

When church representatives hired hack painters to come in and paint
coverings over some of Michelangelo's nude figures, they did not
destroy the paintings, they just made them other than what M. had
intended them to be.  They effectively created in the paintings a
sense of shame the artist did not recognize.  If some critic decides
that certain elements ought not to be included in a great work and
causes those elements to be changed, what has that critic done for
art?

On Thu, Aug 6, 2009 at 3:43 PM, alice
wellintown<alicewellintown at gmail.com> wrote:
> Check out what Freud says about Michelangelo's Moses. There are not
> set pieces in the chapel. Pynchon's novels are full of set pieces.
> Now, set pieces make the works wonderful. They can also make a work
> long and tedious, tiresome, terrible. Can we take some set pieces out
> of atd? What would happen to the structure? Well, we would need to
> establish that there is a structure and then, and only then, argue if
> removing a set piece would violate the building code or blue print
> or/and other structural concerns. Of course, one could argue that the
> set piece is needed for other reasons. Then we could argue those.
>
> I've been teaching some works for over 11 years now. I read these
> works over and over again and again. Since I stop teaching in the
> university, where I taught labor and literature, and started teaching
> in top rated national
>