P's P's Please

[matthew cissell]

Paul,

Not sure about your evaluation. Boris Kachka wrote the piece for Vulture
which belongs to NY Magazine, so from a journalistic point of view it's not
exactly a rag and I'm sure they have lawyers and editors to avoid problems
(like writing crap about an author that is as hooked up as TP - can you say
libel suit?).

We might note that Kachka clearly attributes a lot of his information to
people that he cites in the piece. Where he does not state the source
clearly we might reasonably assume it's because the source didn't want to
be mentioned.

Finally, a lack of footnotes in a journalistic piece like this is hardly a
sign of lacking investigative rigour. But I'll let other journalists judge
that.

I'd say the piece looks pretty solid as far as the information provided is
concerned.

ciao
mc

On Fri, Feb 19, 2016 at 3:45 PM, Paul Mackin <mackin.paul at gmail.com> wrote:

> Not very authoritative.  No footnotes probably because sources aren't very
> authoritative either.
>
> On Fri, Feb 19, 2016 at 3:56 AM, matthew cissell <mccissell at gmail.com>
> wrote:
>
>> Tyler,
>>
>> Thanks, I had forgetten about the Kachka piece. That must have been it,
>> but I thought I had come across something that referred to his parents
>> later years and a reconciliation of sorts.
>>
>> (What is the Pyn community consensus on the piece? I know that Jules
>> Siegel's Playboy interview is sometimes called into question on grounds of
>> motive (self-serving, revenge, etc.), but what about Boris' work?)
>>
>>    Ok, wait, you deserve big thanks my man. I went back to look at the
>> Kachka piece and not only does it have the line you mention, but it also,
>> further on, includes that in the 1990's, "Pynchon told friends he was
>> seeing a lot more of his parents" which following what we know about
>> Pynchon's politics and his parent's (father a Serious Republican and mother
>> a serious catholic and likely anti-semite) allows us to infer that there
>> was at least a rift of sorts that was then mended.
>>
>>   That's what I was after. I owe you a beer, or whatever.
>>
>> Very Appreciatively,
>> Matt Cissell
>>
>> On Thu, Feb 18, 2016 at 5:57 PM, Tyler Wilson <tbsqrd at hotmail.com> wrote:
>>
>>> Matthew —
>>>
>>> Though it isn't stated explicitly, that information can be gleaned from
>>> a couple passages of Boris Kachka's 2013 piece for Vulture:
>>>
>>> http://www.vulture.com/2013/08/thomas-pynchon-bleeding-edge.html
>>>
>>> " . . . he and his then-girlfriend, Mary Ann Tharaldsen, were driving
>>> through Big Sur when she complained of nausea. She wanted to stop at a bar
>>> and have a shot to settle her stomach. According to Tharaldsen, he
>>> exploded, telling her he would not tolerate midday drinking. When she asked
>>> why, he told her he’d seen his mother, after drinking,  accidentally
>>> puncture his father’s eye with a clothespin. It was the only time, says
>>> Tharaldsen, who lived with him, that he ever mentioned his family. “He was
>>> disconnected from them,” she says. “There seems to have been something not
>>> good there.” "
>>>
>>> "Pynchon and Jackson married in 1990 and had a son—first name Jackson—a
>>> year later. Pynchon told friends he was seeing a lot more of his parents. .
>>> . . "
>>>
>>> Cheers,
>>> --
>>> T
>>>
>>>
>>> On Feb 18, 2016, at 3:59 AM, matthew cissell <mccissell at gmail.com>
>>> wrote:
>>>
>>> Dear P-listers,
>>>
>>> I have a problem and that is that I could swear that I read somewhere
>>> that  Pynchon had been a bit estranged from his folks but that he
>>> eventually made peace with them. Does that sound familiar to anyone? Where
>>> did that come from? I can't find the source now. Was it from Phyllis
>>> Gebauer?
>>>
>>> Beseechingly,
>>> mc otis
>>>
>>>
>>
>
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