Pynchon & Religion

[Alex Colter]

Continued from Madeline's post in the Pynchon Lit. thread, cause I figure
it would be more appropriate to start a different one...
We can't escape it so let us try to keep the discussion focused on the
works of Pynchon and what they indicate, while keeping our own beliefs
along the margins.

We know Pynchon was raised Catholic, and, inasmuch as anything Jules says
can be trusted, continued to go to Confession while at Cornell.
There we begin to loose him, biographically speaking, and must resort to
his Novels.
I am inclined to agree with Madeline that the greatest writers among us
have rarely been 'Christian' 'Jewish' or 'Muslim' in anything but
upbringing, such Institutions seem to be downright hostile towards anything
called imaginative thought.
I am inclined to draw the closest portrait of Pynchon's Religious Views (a
phrase that makes me bored just typing it) in Cherrycoke's wonderful
narration. One thing is obvious, that Cherrycoke, despite his own attempts
to make himself appear so, is anything but orthodox, and often waxes into
Gnostic Thought, which was experiencing a revival amidst the so-called Era
of Enlightenment.
I would include among the institutions of Christianity, Judaism, and Islam,
the institution of Deism, now known by its proper name Atheism, as being
downright hostile towards anything called imaginative thought.
I am inclined to believe Pynchon is something of an imaginative Skeptic in
his literature, and is careful to censor himself whenever he approaches a
sort of 'Gnosis' therein.
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