Pynchon and Roth

[Paul Mackin]

Yes, with Roth the language is simple and straightforward.  You never 
have to consciously pause and ask yourself why did he chose that 
particular word or image.   The  language is utilitarian, a means to an 
end. It's what the words relate that is important. With Pynchon language 
is all.  The genius is not is what he says, which often can't quite be 
parsed,  but how he says it.

P


On 5/11/2011 6:45 AM, Kai Frederik Lorentzen wrote:
>
> On 08.05.2011 16:49, Paul Mackin wrote:
>
>> I like Philip Roth.  He's funny, which is pleasurable, and there is 
>> constant struggle with social forces, his family, his women, etc.
>
> The good thing about Philip Roth for the non-native speaker/reader is, 
> that the books are written in an easy way. Sure, there is 'frames in 
> frames' and other pomo sophistication. But on the level of vocabulary 
> and sentence-construction you always catch it right away. That's 
> different with Pynchon's books, which also have a wider spectrum of 
> leitmotifs. Philip Roth is always primarily writing about Philip Roth. 
> Actually I haven't read him lately, but I remember "The Counterlife" 
> and "Operation Shylock" very well. Both part of my personal canon. 
> Perhaps this is because these books leave the relatively small social 
> life-world of the upper intellectual middle class of New Jersey. 
> There's more of the not so "funny" world in it, but it's still that 
> "pleasurable" straightforward style. And Roth is writing excellent 
> dialogue. Better than Pynchon, no doubt. But Pynchon, who has no 
> talent for clarity, is imo the far more poetic prose-writer. Pynchon 
> can evoke goose-flesh and hyperventilation. He's channeling the Orphic 
> stream ...
>
> KFL
>
> PS: Of course this doesn't mean that Tom can't be funny -- "'And 
> considered subjectively,' added Dr. V. Ganesh Rao of the Calcutta 
> University, 'as an act of becoming longer or shorter, while at the 
> same time turning, among axis whose unit vector is not familiar and 
> comforting 'one' but the altogether disquieting /square root minus 
> one/. If /you/ were a vector, mademoiselle, you would begin in the 
> 'real' world, change your length, enter an 'imaginary' reference 
> system, rotate up to three different ways, and return to 'reality' a 
> new person. Or vector.'/'Fascinating. But ... human beings aren't 
> vectors. Are they?'/'Arguable, young lady. As a matter of fact, in 
> India, the Quaternions are now the basis of a modern school of Yoga, a 
> discipline which has always relied on such operations as stretching 
> and turning. Here in the traditional 'Triangle Asana', for example' 
> --- he stood and demonstrated --- 'the geometry is fairly 
> straightforward. But soon one moves on to more advanced forms, into 
> the complex spaces of the Quaternions ...' He shifted a few dishes, 
> climbed on the table, announced 'The Quadrantal Versor Asana,' and 
> commenced a routine which quickly became more contortionistic and now 
> and then you'd say contrary-to-fact, drawing the attention of other 
> diners and eventually the maître d', who came running over waving a 
> vehement finger and was two steps away from the table when Dr. Rao 
> abruptly vanished" (Against the Day, p. 539). Oh Logik des Verschwindens!
>
>>
>>
>> I'm not sure sure I wouldn't quite enjoy a books full of Blicero.  He 
>> was a pretty marvelous creation.
>>
>> P
>>
>

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