TP on the shelves, not M&D

[matthew cissell]

John,

  That's just the information that I lack, thanks. Nabokov and Borges are
clearly canonic; I see Atwood and the rest as having already acheived a
certain name recognition status that has thus far eluded TP. Movies play a
big part in that.

  Some might say that Tp has eluded the fame machine with no desire to
become a name-brand. It may also be that until now he has not been prepared
to have any of his work put on the big screen. It seems TP wasn't inclined
to Laurie Anderson's idea back then about GR, so what has changed?

   I propose that after finsihing up his mammoth literary project, TP was
able to indulge himself with some "lighter" fare. (I mean, what does a
writer do after finishing a work? Start another. What does s/he do with it?
Try to sell it. Simple.) This TP "light" will make a great gateway
experience to his other works, allowing his readership to grow over time.
Somewhere some young person will see IV and buy the book and then get into
Pynchon's oevre. That's not going to happen to Nicholas Sparks.

  From a hill,
otis

On Mon, Jan 12, 2015 at 12:35 PM, John Bailey <sundayjb at gmail.com> wrote:

> In Australia Pynchon doesn't seem to be very widely read but he's
> certainly ahead of the pack in the way you mention, bookstore-wise.
> I'd put his presence well ahead of Gass, Barthes and Coover (for any
> of which I've had to waver divining rods around second-hand bookshops
> near decent local universities for even the slightest chance of
> reading).
>
> Generally Pynchon's books here have almost (but not equally) about the
> same availability as those of Atwood, Nabokov, Borges, Morrison, Le
> Guin, Rushdie, McEwan. The relatively recent Vintage reissues with the
> crazy-busy-cartoon-pop-art-Bruegel covers flooded the stores and I
> picked up a bunch of remainders to throw at friends. I expect the IV
> movie edition will have the same storefrontage.
>
> On Mon, Jan 12, 2015 at 10:19 PM, matthew cissell <mccissell at gmail.com>
> wrote:
> > Dear all,
> >
> >   Having just returned from the states I thought I would offer up my
> view on
> > where TP stands in comparison to other writers from his cohort e.g. W.
> Gass,
> > J, Barthes or R. Coover.
> >
> >   I was in Illinois over the holidays and when I could I went to
> bookstores,
> > looking into a couple of used bookstores and 3 different Barnes & Noble
> > locations from Southern Illinois to Chicago. Now, I know it's a small
> sample
> > and hardly scientific but the conclusion was clear: TP is on the shelves
> and
> > the others are not generally present. Whatsmore, I noticed that IV has
> come
> > out in a movie paperback with Joaquin's face on the cover. It seems to me
> > that he is very much out in front of the pack.
> >
> >    (In one B&N outside Champaign-Urbana, I saw Luc Herman and Steven
> > Weisenburger's "GR, Domination and Freedom"! Not many TP scholars can
> that.)
> >
> >   It would be interesting to see if other folks noticed something
> similar, I
> > expect there could be some regional differences. (Maybe more John
> Barthes in
> > Marlyland stores?)
> >
> > ciao
> > otis
>
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