IVIV (12): Yakkin' Broads

[kelber at mindspring.com]

p. 197 – "'These broads are all itchin to talk, because nobody in their home life wants to hear anything they have to say.  Sit still for two seconds, and they’ll be yakkin your ear off.'"

Layer one:  an accurate portrayal of the lives of housewives at the dawn of the resurgence of activist feminism.

Layer two:  an accurate portrayal of a misogynist viewpoint of the day.  Here's the problem, though.  There's nothing historical about the comment.  Bill Maher, whose viewpoints are often worth listening to, has a standard misogynist riff running through his routines -- being driven crazy by yakking females is a big part of this.  He's mostly a progressive, and it only gets worse as you move rightward.  The image of women in films, TV and the news is as bad or even worse than it's ever been.

Layer three:  Pynchon's depiction of women in IV.  Oedipa Maas in COL49, back there in 1965 California, is a housewife, a Young Republican, but she's logical and intelligent  -- the essence of rationality.  Pynchon wrote that book prior to the time he depicts in IV.  Assuming IV to be a mix of the life and attitudes of LA-1970 Pynchon and the current NYC-2009 Pynchon-the-Elder/Family Man, well, where's Oedipa or anyone like her?  Sure, the male characters are all buffoonish – but we never forget who's in the White House, the CIA, the Police Force, the Golden Fang.  Amidst the housewives, the stewardii and bimbettes only two women modestly stand out: Sortilege, the flaky New Ager, who stands out by virtue of having a steady boyfriend so that she's not actively fucking everyone in sight; and Penny, who's an ADA (sexually taken with Doc and certainly willing to, at least metaphorically, put out for the FBI).  The reality is that a woman with Penny's job back in early 1970, would have been relentlessly discriminated against and harassed, relegated to chicken-shit assignments, etc.  Pynchon gives a very inaccurate, anachronistic portrayal of her situation.  

The endless parade of mini-skirted bimbos starts to get really boring after a while.  There's really zero even knee-jerk social commentary to be gleaned from it about "(sob) the oppression of women."  For those of you who've seen the TV show Madmen, about the advertising business in the early '60s, the show does a helluva better job of showing us the roots of the rebirth of feminism in the 70s.  Assuming then, that social commentary is off the table, why is TRP depicting women this way in IV?  To paraphrase (don't have the book handy) his description of a racy pinball machine in GR:  "A little offensive to the ladies, but all in good fun."

Laura