Reed's Mumbo Jumbo and Pynchon

[Mark Kohut]

Mumbo Jumbo was published in 1972. I cannot easily find out what month.

Gravity's Rainbow was published early in 1973.
Which means the GR manuscript was turned over to Viking by summer
1972.

Which makes the mention late in GR a shout-out to a book he likes a lot.
An incorporated blurb as it were providing a cool aside about a new writer.

There is evidence---Catch -22 probably---that even then Pynchon was able to
read
some new novels in manuscript or galley form. But if he couldn't read
Mumbo-Jumbo
this way, then he must have read it as he was finishing up and or proofing
GR
himself.

If he could have read it earlier than 1972, most of GR was finished anyway
so
no major influence. Just Zeitgeist synchronicity.

which leads to the next post.
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