Gravity's Rainbow in depth on Studio 360
Joseph Tracy
brook7 at sover.net
Fri Mar 9 14:09:01 CST 2012
> A pynchonized world ought to seem like a world of futility, without hope. Yet I don't think that is the way readers experience it. Why? may be a mystery. I think it's the comic twist put on virtually everything. Where there's laughter there is hope. And that hope is the universal one--for Salvation. Whether there is any or not may be beside the point.
As long as I am partaking of laughter and satire I feel I am relying on some kind of common sense shared with the joker, like we are sharing a disjointed and exaggerated comparison to something hopeful, fun, friendly. Inside I am referring to states of play, moments of freedom, the absurd discrepancy between social rules and the wild self and I am releasing the pleasure of my own wildness, and this is a kind of Karmic adjustment, I think. Pynchon is often like literary peyote, bitter and purgative of the old, opening doors that may lead anywhere.
On Mar 9, 2012, at 12:16 PM, Paul Mackin wrote:
> On 3/9/2012 9:22 AM, David Morris wrote:
>> Read the whole post.
>>
>> http://waste.org/mail/?list=pynchon-l&month=0006&msg=46451&keywords=Dali%20Morris
>>
>
>
> Good post and incoming.
>
>
> "As a general statement I know this sounds trite, but part of GR's "mission"
>> seems to be the laying bare of these terms "paranoia," "pornography," and
>> "delusions" as the universal condition, thus exposing the strengths and
>> weaknesses of the human-mind's creative/perceptive abilities (I guess
> this
>> is part of what makes him PoMo). Yet, rather than collapsing into a
>> self-centered mindlessness or despair, he continues to seek out "Truth &
>> Justice, and the American Way," plumbing the depths of the condition in
>> search of a balance. In this regard I would agree with Jane that
> Pynchon's
>> writings are inherently "religious.""
>
>
> Pynchon's method seems to be take delusion/paranoia, and pornography too, and move them from sideshow status (which we still hope they are, even in our deranged modern world) and put them in the main ring, relegating most of the rest to the role of added attraction.
>
> To pynchonize is to start with a reality, sometimes meticulously researched, and subject it to an ingenious kind of rearrangement, taking an arguably important part of life on earth and elevating it to the whole show, or the main part of the show.
>
> Such rearrangement is done to serve the Pyncher's purposes, which of course are subject to endless speculation.
>
> Take Katje's thought--that War is mainly about buying and selling. Well, war does involve an abundance of buying and selling, often of the most despicable kind. This is the part of War Katje experiences most. War has been pynchonized, to very good effect, moral effect no doubt.
>
>
> A pynchonized world ought to seem like a world of futility, without hope. Yet I don't think that is the way readers experience it. Why? may be a mystery. I think it's the comic twist put on virtually everything. Where there's laughter there is hope. And that hope is the universal one--for Salvation. Whether there is any or not may be beside the point.
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