Beyond the Rainbow

[Keith Davis]

Maybe because it takes so much time to do the research concerning the
technology, that it doesn't leave time to
work out what might be the more important, or simply the different, areas
of his interest?

And, been there, done that....

On Wed, Nov 2, 2011 at 10:55 AM, Kai Frederik Lorentzen <
lorentzen at hotmail.de> wrote:

>
> On 02.11.2011 15:40, Paul Mackin wrote:
>
>  On 11/2/2011 9:55 AM, eburns at gmail.com wrote:
>>
>>> It's "how we learned to stop worrying and love the bomb."
>>>
>>> I still fail to see how anyone could see this as a "problem" in GR.
>>>
>>
>
>> Perhaps the word was not used in the sense of a complaint, misgiving, or
>> objection, but rather as a question to be considered and solved. ( or even
>> left unsolved)
>>
>> P
>>
>>
> Yes. I'm just trying to understand why there is, since VL, that change in
> Pynchon's writing about technology.
>
>
>
>
>>>
>>> -----Original Message-----
>>> From: kelber at mindspring.com
>>> Sender: owner-pynchon-l at waste.org
>>> Date: Wed, 2 Nov 2011 09:53:23 -0400 (GMT-04:00)
>>> To:<pynchon-l at waste.org>
>>> Reply-To: kelber at mindspring.com
>>> Subject: Re: Beyond the Rainbow
>>>
>>> I don't think the fetishization is unconscious - it seems a crucial
>>> element in the book.  The eroticization of violence, always present,
>>> exemplified by the reported Rita Hayworth pin-up on the Hiroshima bomb,
>>> must have been a contributing factor - probably the main theme - that
>>> inspired Pynchon to write the book.  I agree with Kai that the V-2 is the
>>> real protagonist of the book.  Maybe GR is the story of it's erotic
>>> awakening?
>>>
>>> Laura
>>>
>>>
>>> -----Original Message-----
>>>
>>>> From: eburns at gmail.com
>>>> Sent: Nov 2, 2011 9:33 AM
>>>> To: Kai Frederik Lorentzen<lorentzen at hotmail.de**>,
>>>> owner-pynchon-l at waste.org, pynchon -l<pynchon-l at waste.org>
>>>> Subject: Re: Beyond the Rainbow
>>>>
>>>> "By such an anachronism Pynchon intentionally avoids the (unconscious)
>>>> fetishization of destructive up-to-date technology, which might have
>>>> been the problem with GR."
>>>>
>>>> The problem!? That's the best part!!
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> Sent from my BlackBerry® wireless device
>>>>
>>>> -----Original Message-----
>>>> From: Kai Frederik Lorentzen<lorentzen at hotmail.de**>
>>>> Sender: owner-pynchon-l at waste.org
>>>> Date: Wed, 2 Nov 2011 14:26:55
>>>> To: pynchon -l<pynchon-l at waste.org>
>>>> Subject: Beyond the Rainbow
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> The problem with GR might be, that the Rocket is the novel's master
>>>> significant, so to speak. You could also say that inside the
>>>> international socio-technical network in the final days of WW II Pynchon
>>>> pictures, the V2 takes the role of the main protagonist. While we lose
>>>> Slothrop along the way, the Rocket stays with us from first to last
>>>> page. And although Pynchon, there's no question about this, is
>>>> intentionally writing furiously against the military-industrial complex,
>>>> the book's high level of poetic energy also results from Pynchon's
>>>> fascination, even obsession with destructive hightech air engineering.
>>>> The novel ascribes to the Rocket "a Max Weber charisma" (p. 464), but
>>>> for Weber charisma is strictly personal. This can, of course, be read as
>>>> satire, but I think those critics who spoke re GR of "the technological
>>>> sublime" were right. So were the readers who considered it to be a
>>>> 'cyberpunk' manifesto. From the perspective of Pynchon 2 (the one since
>>>> VL), Gravity's Rainbow thus may appear to be infected by the
>>>> avantgarde's fascist involvement with techno-rapidity, especially in
>>>> Italian Futurism, which gets dissed in AtD. And that's, imo, the reason
>>>> the question of technology is played down in VL by making a simple
>>>> pistol the crucial weapon of the book. Do also note that the the balloon
>>>> travels of the Chums of Chance are, inside the historical timespan of
>>>> AtD, already a little anachronistic. New and fresh such a setting was
>>>> around 1800 when narrations like "Des Luftschiffers Gianozzo Seebuch" by
>>>> Jean Paul appeared on the market.
>>>> By such an anachronism Pynchon intentionally avoids the (unconscious)
>>>> fetishization of destructive up-to-date technology, which might have
>>>> been the problem with GR.
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>
>>
>>
>


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