BE as P's attempt at Greek New Comedy

[Markekohut]

Like. 

Sent from my iPad

On Oct 8, 2013, at 8:07 AM, Heikki Raudaskoski <hraudask at sun3.oulu.fi> wrote:

> 
> 
> 383 pages in, I have the growing feeling that a work by Pynchon finally
> meets the totalizing "requirements" Jameson set for postmodernism
> decades ago:
> 
> - the waning of affect
> - blank and lukewarm pastiching
> - the abolition of critical distance
> - the all-pervasiveness of late capitalism with no space for opposition
> 
> 
> Heikki
> 
> On Mon, 7 Oct 2013, Fiona Shnapple wrote:
>> but P has Jameson out again here.
>> 
>> On Monday, October 7, 2013, John Bailey wrote:
>>> I think this is the first time P has used the term late capitalism. I
>>> haven't heard it outside the classroom myself, which made it stand
>>> out.
>>> On Tue, Oct 8, 2013 at 12:07 PM, Fiona Shnapple <fionashnapple at gmail.com<javascript:;>>
>>> wrote:
>>>> Another question: did Pynchon use the term late-capitalism in IV or in
>>> prior
>>>> novels? Been thinking about what Robin said about the Left Content in
>>> this
>>>> novel. I happened to be quite fond of a lady who may win the Nobel for
>>>> prosecuting a certain individual who is guilty of genocide with products
>>>> made in the USA.  How's that for a female heroine fucking a fascist?
>>>> 
>>>> There is so much in the narrative drift of this book that point to such
>>>> people, both the sinister and evil bastards who murder and waste life,
>>> and
>>>> those who fight them, protect the oppressed, resist the greeeed, the
>>>> guzzling SUVs.
>>>> 
>>>> 
>>>> So GTA, like so many Video Games is the topic of study in classes where
>>>> Jameson is read.
>>>> 
>>>> I don't think this is Game Over. That's not how I read it.
>>>> On Mon, Oct 7, 2013 at 7:12 PM, John Bailey <sundayjb at gmail.com<javascript:;>>
>>> wrote:
>>>>> 
>>>>> You know what these things mean FS.
>>>>> 
>>>>> On Tue, Oct 8, 2013 at 8:55 AM, Fiona Shnapple <fionashnapple at gmail.com<javascript:;>
>>>> 
>>>>> wrote:
>>>>>> John, I'd like to respond, but you lost me, so, if you don't mind,
>>> some
>>>>>> basic questions:
>>>>>> 
>>>>>> What is the old Greek comedy? What is the new Greek comedy?
>>>>>> What is a Coover take?
>>>>>> What is close third person?  I looked this last one up and was not
>>>>>> convinced
>>>>>> that the definition provided is what you have in mind.
>>>>>> 
>>>>>> 
>>>>>> On Monday, October 7, 2013, John Bailey wrote:
>>>>>>> 
>>>>>>> I'm increasingly wondering if the new novel isn't Pynchon's conscious
>>>>>>> attempt to write a New Comedy, in contrast to the Old Comedy that
>>> most
>>>>>>> of his work can be aligned with. Or, if we're going to get more
>>>>>>> detailed, with the Menippean Satire that some have convincingly
>>> argued
>>>>>>> is his forte. But I'm sticking with the Old/New divide of the Greeks
>>>>>>> for the moment.
>>>>>>> 
>>>>>>> It would perhaps explain why this one jars so much for so many. It's
>>>>>>> sitcom, not systems analysis, and when it gives us types (Jewish
>>>>>>> American, African American, Italian American) it doesn't do so in the
>>>>>>> obviously ironic way his earlier works did. It doesn't give us the
>>>>>>> linguistic miracles that offer a way out of the existential morass in
>>>>>>> the manner we're used to P providing. It tries to offer characters
>>>>>>> we're supposed to care for, which is antithetical to Old Comedy, even
>>>>>>> if that mode is a more compassionate one on a structural level. BE
>>>>>>> leaves us with mere people, individuals, not even a hint of the
>>>>>>> preterite, which is interesting and a problem.
>>>>>>> 
>>>>>>> A Coover take on 2001-02 would look more like what we could have
>>>>>>> expected from Bleeding Edge.
>>>>>>> 
>>>>>>> Why, in both IV and BE, has Pynchon returned to close third person
>>>>>>> narration (with at least one exception in BE that I've noticed?) It's
>>>>>>> not What He Does. Not even in Vineland. He toyed with it in COL49 but
>>>>>>> then declared it a minor work. Why go back there?
>>>>>>> -
>>>>>>> Pynchon-l / http://www.waste.org/mail/?list=pynchon-l
> -
> Pynchon-l / http://www.waste.org/mail/?list=pynchon-l
-
Pynchon-l / http://www.waste.org/mail/?list=pynchon-l