Not Drugs The Anatomy of Melville's Melancholy (Thoreau:

[Robin Landseadel]

On Nov 15, 2009, at 4:25 PM, Mark Kohut wrote:

> I was so blinkered. I do not remember seeing our soldiers on drugs  
> on TV news. Just remember the major 'news' shots and the steady  
> drumbeat of the war and protests against.

I remember my uncle coming home from Vietnam around '66, working post- 
war for an aerospace firm but also still a junkie from experiences in  
'Nam..

> Discussion question:
> Were "addictive" drugs, as they spread out from more limited  
> circles, such as musicians' worlds, the inherent vice?

"Inherent Vice" also pretty much includes a galaxy full of entropic  
processes including self-destruction via drugs and late capitalism. I  
suppose the Inherent Vice of simply being alive—the inevitability of  
death, a subject the author touched upon quite eloquently in "Slow  
Learner—needs to be figured into the mix as well. Getting old, memory  
getting messed up or maybe even pre-messed on account of an excess of  
Mindless Pleasures; it all comes with the territory of turning 70 or so.

> This question presumes pot is not addictive yet that 'harder' ones  
> are. Which might be one way Pynchon sees it??

Remember that the one time Doc gets a bad trip on weed is when he's  
dosed with PCP. Other folks throughout the book get burned by a host  
of other drugs, but getting burnt by weed is comparatively rare. Denis  
might seem like a casualty of weed, but it's equally possible he was  
born stupid. After all—one does not get to pick and choose one's  
neighbors in an apartment complex.