The Realist Fantasy

[Dave Monroe]

... from Paul Coates, The Realist Fantasy; Fiction and Reality Since
Clarissa (New York: St. Martin's, 1983), Ch. 6, "Post-Modernism,' pp.
180-222:

(b) The Crying of Lot 49: Mirrors, Paranoia and the Senselessness of an Ending.

Despite the undoubted intelligence of much of the existing Pynchon
criticism, one reads even the fine essays of Richard Poirier, Tony
Tanner and Edward Mendelson with a mounting sense of disappointment.
For, by placing him solely within the framework of literary criticism,
they mute the radicalism of his novels, sub-dividing them into a neat
series of lots and themes that prevent us from perceiving what--if
any--necessity has gathered together all this exotica and information
from different fields. [...]  Moreover, Pynchon's awareness of cinema
and its near-mystical capacity to overwhelm the viewer is alien to
them.  I will try to remedy this omission in part by suggesting some
parallels between The Crying of Lot 49 and two films in particular,
Blow up and Vertigo.  And I will try to indicate the seriousness of
Pynchon's engagement with low culture by comparing him with ... Edgar
Allen Poe." (193-4)

[...]

http://books.google.com/books?id=jH5ZAAAAMAAJ