COL 49 2024 group read MPIN-AT

[Joseph Tracy]

Yes Mark,  you , who claim to be so text oriented, need to pay attention to who is saying what. Still I like Michael’s answer of Pynchon’s own words as much as anything I might say. 

My thoughts on your idea that you own the true and final inside track on the writing of Thomas Pynchon are simple. If it were true you would be able to demonstrate serious insights in more than 2 or 3 sentence posts. You would possibly be published in large body of Pynchon criticism and would occasionally come up with at least an essay on this list.. You have done nothing of the kind and live in a state of delusion aligned on a dying list-serve with an angry idiot who can’t spell. You are ultimately afraid to think for yourself and put those ideas in a coherent form which stands on its own. As a result you are deeply stuck in your absurd authority posturing and unable to engage respectfully with others. 

I am not alone in disgust at the way you and Morris presume to be the arbiters of what can be said about Pynchon or world events.. Several others have left and been in contact with me to say they avoid the list because of you 2.  That is your great contribution to this project. I have had enough the 2 of you with your pettiness and harassment. I will probably post some final thoughts on COL49 and will not return though I will miss the thoughts of Michael Bailey and James very much, just as I miss others who have left.  I hope you can find a more peaceable and friendly way of talking about the arts. Maybe you should try actually creating something. It ain’t as easy as it looks.

> On Aug 9, 2024, at 7:37 AM, Mark Kohut <mark.kohut at gmail.com> wrote:
> 
> This line was about Tracy’s words on America. 
> Sent from my iPad
> 
>> On Aug 9, 2024, at 3:17 AM, Michael Bailey <michael.lee.bailey at gmail.com> wrote:
>> 
>> On Thu, Aug 8, 2024 at 5:21 AM Mark Kohut <mark.kohut at gmail.com> wrote:
>> 
>>> I do not think that is the real realization she comes to....and I'll take
>>> Pynchon's words and vision on America
>>> any day over and over over yours....
>>> 
>> 
>> Well, of course! Mine’s non-authoritative, and idiosyncratic. I’m not
>> wedded to it myself.
>> 
>> There’s not a lot from the author about the book:
>> 
>> “The next story I wrote was “The Crying of Lot 49,” which was marketed as a
>> “novel,” and in which I seem to have forgotten most of what I thought I’d
>> learned up till then.” (SL intro)
>> 
>> He doesn’t seem to give any pointers about what to look for.
>> 
>> 
>> IJS:
>> - She finds out more, bit by bit, about the stamps
>> - she often feels on the verge of a revelation
>> - She never actually has that realization - hence “asymptotic” as she keeps
>> learning more
>> - She goes to the auction to find out more about the source of all those
>> stamps.
>> 
>> But we already know: the author made them up.
>> 
>> That’s the truest revelation she could come to, & it would make it clear to
>> her that she’s in a fiction.
>> 
>> That’s kind of a short circuit, breaking the 4th wall from the outside as a
>> reader. One is always aware in the background that a story is a story. But
>> if in the course of examining things in the story, its fictive nature comes
>> to the foreground, then you have the option to think about that.
>> 
>> Or not (-;
>> --
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