Liss/stepvr but also Molly Hite

[peterthooper at juno.com]

I apologize for not remembering the 2 who previously posted this utterly wonderful link, but there’s a temporarily free book, _Pynchon, Sex, and Gender_ online. 

https://ugapress.manifoldapp.org/projects/thomas-pynchon-sex-and-gender

But and anyway, the 1st essay is by the redoubtable Molly Hite who likes Pynchon but calls him on some problematic areas. 

Wonderful essay.

Small topic: there’s this footnote. 

“2. I don’t see Prairie as fully imagined, despite her centrality. Her two-dimensionality coexists with her passivity and her niceness, and to an extent both passivity and niceness are qualities limiting the possibilities for character development in the women Pynchon creates.”


But Ms Hite, is she only passive and nice?

You spend the better part of 14 years with Zoyd and see if you end up passive and nice. I think she’s competent and prickly.

Item: at the Sisterhood of Kunoichi Attentives she ruminates, “Earn what you eat, secure what you shit. Been doing it for years.”

Is it possible that even superb readers miss an element of taunting that leaps out at me with her quip about their blood types when he’s actually present...

and refuse to attribute to the possibility that he might “rilly” be her father her words, “You can take me anywhere you want?”

Pynchon’s range includes teen lust (not that he specializes in it) and we’d see it if it were here. IMHO, it’s not. 

She’s multitasking emotionally: 
1) obeying Zoyd’s much earlier, “keep ‘em legs together, teen bimbo!”
2) by turning away from Alexei, who’s gotta be more attractive than BV
3) pursuing a glimmer of hope that maybe Zoyd isn’t really her Dad - the guy is no prize!
4) whistling *after* passing the graveyard, minimizing the threat in her memory, telling herself she’s up for whatever 
5) choosing a chaste night in a sleeping bag and being rewarded with a smooch from the family dog. It’s like a Hallmark movie!