Pynchon's reading

[Monte Davis]

I've always thought that both the White Visitation's Schwarzcommando plan
to disturb the dreams of the Reich and its own belief in Slothrop's starry
map owed something to 'Our Man in Havana', in which the spymasters eagerly
receive and amplify a feckless informant's fabrications.

(As a fan of  the Greene book and Guinness movie, I had anticipatory doubts
about Le Carre's homage/update in 'The Tailor of Panama' and the 2001
movie, but both turned out well, setting a high bar for quasi-remakes.)

On Tue, Jan 19, 2016 at 7:20 AM, Mark Kohut <mark.kohut at gmail.com> wrote:

> Scholars, academic and independent--some of us--have
> explored Pynchon's elusive allusive sources in classic and important major
> books.
> Pynchon has given us or confirmed a few. A voracious reader, some books
> drunk deep,
> others, as he in SLOW LEARNER and as Paul M.reminds, just surface-skimmed
> for
> his writing needs.
>
> But we know he reads, read, many novels when brand new. See *Mumbo
> Jumbo. *
> He mentions *Our Man In*
> *Havana* in SL. We are pretty sure about *Catch--22.* He must have kept
> up with LeCarre
> as he published his now 26, i think again SL. Most of us assume he read
> the books he has blurbed.
> Others we know of?
>
> I imagine a steadily-working writer, who, however. with firm
> self-criticism, considered himself slothful, like another productive
> writer, Sam Johnson who would write as well s he could most days, research
> and plan on others and would read--and watch TV and go to the movies--many
> a night and weekend.
>
> Nothing special here I know, just putting it down.
>
>
>
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