IVIV (1) "She came along the alley and up the back steps ..."

[John Carvill]

Tore's point about IV's opening line being a better fit for the
ATD/M&D/GR 'abstract' category, rather than the direct,
character-introducing ones, is interesting, particularly in light of
recent discussions here on how to categorise Pynchon's novels. It's
good to see a categorisation criteria introduced which places IV in
such exalted company!

The other aspect of this is that, I think, this opening scene is the
only one which Pynchon pulls the reader into sideways, the way he does
so often in GR, eg. that 'sensitive flame' intro to the seance episode
in Part One. It's maybe significant that, while we pretty much follow
Doc;s point of view all the way through IV to the end of the book,
here, in the opening scene, the way Sasha's approach is described
could possibly be from the omniscient narrator point of view. After
this, so far as I can remember, we always see what DOc sees, and it
could almost be switched to a first-person narrative without too many
changes.

I suppose it's a nicely Pynchonian touch that, in a 'light' book,
which is supposedly suited to, and maybe aimed at, a more mainstream
audience, he uses teh only instance of more complex narrative
technique right at the start of the book.