CoL49 Group Reading - Week 1 Summary & Questions

[Laura Kelber]

Just how obscure or metaphorical of a writer is Pynchon? I mean, in terms
of the "COL49 is really about the JFK  assassination" theory.

One of the delights of Pynchon, pre-internet, was the tremendous research
he put in, using resources such as old Baedeker's guides and the Boeing
archives, among others, which would be hard or impossible for his readers
to access. This richness of obscurity was his signature. It's why Bleeding
Edge, written about and amidst the Internet, didn't have that Pynchon aura
about it (for me, anyway).

But making a leap from obscurity to metaphor seems unwarranted. His gift to
the readers of his pre-internet books, read in pre-internet times, was to
give them a nodding acquaintance with the obscure and the hidden, and to
point them ( as he did for Oedipa) towards unseen connections.

I don't believe that he was trying to become his own obscure material; that
he was playing Pierce to a future Oedipa who would point out: COL49 is a
metaphor for the JFK assassination. I think he wanted to connect with his
readers, not dodge them. Joseph, do you actively disagree with this, or are
you on the fence? Yes, I know, he was a student (i. e. he sat in his
lectures for one course) of Nabokov. But Nabokov wanted his readers to
fully participate in his jokes and games.

LK


On Fri, May 3, 2024, 8:49 AM Joseph Tracy <brook7 at sover.net> wrote:

> It sounds to me that psychiatrists pretty much invented the term paranoia
> , so kind of have first dibs on what it means. But Hey. The greek root ,
> para( beside, outside of,)and noos ( mind, higher self) does not seem to me
> to automatically imply unwarranted fear, even if shrinks  may have been
> looking for a term that could label that mental state. The thing is that
> there are ,as I said before, often  actual reasons for wariness and
> watchful distrust.  The root word could apply to either situation or even
> just an altered mental state. The reasons for Oedipa  to be on high alert
> are many and grow as her journey proceeds. The good sense of that wariness
> or paranoia is born out as she investigates the stamps and Tristero  and
> when Hilarius goes full insane Nazi. Her calm handling of that  is more
> fearless than fearful and defuses potential violence.
>
> Howard Hughes came to mind as I was searching my memory for someone who
> was rich , attractive, mysterious, a ladies man,  suited the Hollywood
> Mazatlan crowd of the time and who Thomas Pynchon was interested in( in
> Inherent Vice he is an important character). That he was involved in Radio
> and Movies along with aerospace seemed a further plus for him as a model
> for PI. He also lost his attraction to several women and was unfazed. It is
> just a working theory and I’m seeing some other evidence, but my idea is to
> keep going as long as it fits and to explore the Couriers Tragedy as it
> might relate to the JFK assassination.. If Pynchon actually had this in
> mind he left it pretty obscure, but I am also seeing some strong
> coincidences. Not expecting agreement but hoping for a respectful look at
> where this idea takes  a reader.
>
> > On May 2, 2024, at 10:19 PM, O G <octogonalyoyo at gmail.com> wrote:
> >
> > Yes I appreciate your political reading of 49.  I have not yet reached
> much beyond the first scene at The Scope, and so cannot judge for example
> how the JFK/CIA scenarios may map onto Courier's Tragedy.  I might be
> somewhat surprised if it did, only because it was so very contemporaneous
> to the penning of the novel, and Pynchon so young.  But then again I read
> into the book some things that weren't known until a decade or five after
> the book was written.  That's my paranoia.  How is that possible.  And I
> agree with you, I'm not afraid of it either.  The only aspect of all the
> items you listed regarding the CIA of that time is that I happen to believe
> that JFK had no intention of leaving Vietnam.  His inner circle, oh I'm not
> real good with names, was it McNamara perhaps, and one other one especially
> wrote memoirs shortly after and rewrote JFK's intentions, or misremembered
> the facts.
> >
> > Earlier today for the hell of it I googled the definition of paranoid,
> and holy shit, that's not what I mean by paranoid, that dark clinical
> psychiatric stuff.  Who cares.  I mean, the psychiatrists can own the word,
> but it happens to be a great word so I'll use it how I please.  When I said
> "orbital paranoia," it was quite intresting to me because just a couple
> days ago I came across a webpage called Spermatikos Logos, and the minds
> there seem much in the spirit as myself, and they just happened to, at the
> very beginning/top of the explanation/reason for "spermatikos logos", quote
> Oedipa from 49 saying "orbital paranoia."  Well, I had not reached that far
> in the book, but the phrase just happens to fit perfectly my "paranoid"
> "reading" (last time I'll use quotes) of the book.  The question
> immediately became, is the guy who made the site aware of what "orbital
> paranoia" actually refers to?  It looks like he does, but hey, I'm paranoid
> that way.  Then five minutes later I learned the same guy is somehow
> connected with the p-list (I may not recall that right), and so I used the
> phrase in my groupmessage.
> >
> > What else was I going to say.  Oh I can go over in more detail about
> Oedipus from R.Graves, but I left my book elsewhere until tomorrow.  The
> piercing is what father Laius did to baby Oedipus before he deserted
> Oedipus on a mountaintop.  It's just interesting how obviously the word
> pierce occurs so closely to Graves saying Oedipus was originally Oedipai.
> And the bit about Oedipus changing the Theban matriarchy (goddess Hera
> worship, which gets to paranoid reading) to patriarchy, and you can see how
> a young Pynchon might see all that and do some simple inversions and boom.
> Plus there is Perseus which is a bit of an overkill but there it is.
> Graves also has a very interesting comment about the Freud complex with
> regard to Plutarch and hippopotamuses.
> >
> > Seeing DeVere in Pierce Inverarity, well I said that was my own
> lightningbolt, and that I see it.  As in the name, not the character.  But
> DeVere fits in with my paranoid reading, so he is sort of in the back of my
> mind as we go along.
> >
> > That reminds me, no I had never considered Howard Hughes as a model for
> Pierce.  Where did you get that, again?  If it has something to do with
> something that occurs later in the book, that may be why I didn't catch it.
> >
> >
> > On Wed, May 1, 2024 at 10:44 PM Joseph Tracy <brook7 at sover.net <mailto:
> brook7 at sover.net>> wrote:
> >>>>> The names are intended to induce a simultaneous sense of the shallow
> and
> >>>>> the arcane.  The style of writing itself is evocative.
> >>>>>
> >>>>> The effect of which is an orbital paranoia.
> >>>>>
> >>>>> The author has never in his ethereal earthbound stay stenciled a name
> >>>>> that did not for him flash a branching blue lightningbolt into other
> >>>>> landscapes territories and temporalities, which upon striking strike
> out
> >>>>> again, branching and flashing.
> >>
> >> I love this, especially the first  line and 3rd paragraph. The effect
> for me, though,  is different than paranoia. For me paranoia connotes
> unjustified fear. It isn’t what I feel from the referential and obscure
> nature of Pynchon’s  work , including his proper names. As far as the role
> of paranoia in P’s fiction I basically think the searchers are the least
> paranoid and the V characters who see themselves as in-the-know are the
> most paranoid.   There are times when extreme wariness and distrust make
> perfect sense and can enable someone to survive  or evade a real plot or
> deception. When I read in Pynchon about an unhinged investigation into
> Slothrop’s uncanny predictions of U2 rocket attacks and his growing
> apprehension that he is being manipulated and studied, I do not think of it
> as all in Slothrop's mind and just unjustified paranoia. His  own
> suspicions are imperfect and rather limited,  but fully justified in light
> of the reader’s knowledge of the larger picture.. Slothrop  never produces
> an elaborate conspiracy theory, but he  is in fact the object of an actual
> and rather weirdly elaborated conspiracy to get information without making
> direct inquiries. . So I do not buy into the idea that all attempts at
> meaning making from the available data in a Python novel or from history
> and current events are a doomed comedy of paranoid delusion as some here
> seem to suggest.( not saying that is your position) I will contend for
> Pynchon as a writer of wholistic satire whose stories reflect both a sense
> of humor about the sheer weirdness of things, along with troubling mythic
> and social comparisons between past and present, recognized criminality and
> hidden criminality,  and among various ways of knowing and living.
> >>
> >>  Rather than paranoia , the effect for me is relief that someone else
> has such a sceptical, lateral, branching, and searching mind, and intense
> curiosity as to why he is doing what he is doing and if it is worth
> thinking about. I think most Pynchon readers start with a fair amount of
> that particular relief of recognizing someone who sees the strangeness,
> creepiness and hilarity of reality and has made prose to match it without
> getting so obscure (Finnegan’s Wake) that only a handful can read it with
> any understanding . I want to know which parts emerge from a universal
> subconscious and which are a more deliberate mapping of social ,
> psychological and historical events and patterns.  For me it’s basically
> dark satire; kind of like several seasons of  South Park or Simpsons
> cartoons written by an intellectually omnivorous genius.
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >> "The Sphinx was the daughter of Typhon, or Orthrus, and Hera had sent
> it.
> >>>
> >>>> All four of those names orbit around to the origins of ancient Egypt,
> which
> >>>> gave birth to such embedded numbers throughout the subsequent
> traditions as
> >>>> 49, as DeVere was well aware.
> >>>>
> >>>> It is interesting to note that Graves states that Laius "pierced"
> Oedipus'
> >>>> feet after birth, and later Graves suggests the possibility that
> *Oedipus*
> >>>> was originally *Oedipais*, then immediately again mentions "the
> piercing
> >>>> of Oedipus' feet".
> >>
> >> Interesting mythic detail. We know Oedipa has been pierced with a
> capital P ( if you are translating from the vulgate), but how do the
> pierced feet  in the myth tie into  COL 49 ? How was she abandoned,  and
> who in this case is Laius, Oedipa’s father? She  helplessness is that she
> feels trapped with no savior prince and an unfulfilling but comfortable
> life. She seems more prone to save people than to kill anyone over a
> traffic dispute.. If it is a metaphor of internal life it would be helpful
> to fill out the picture. In the only battle in the novel she manages to
> save Hilarius’ life and deliver him to the police.
> >>
> >> De Vera seems a complete stretch to me, both linguistically and  as a
> life pattern. PI collects wealth and power, De Vera dissipates a received
> inheritance, and is not a credible candidate for the real  Shakespeare
> (Evidence exists that Oxford was known during his lifetime to have written
> some plays, though there are no known examples extant <
> https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/extant>.)
> >>
> >>
> >>> On May 1, 2024, at 2:11 PM, O G <octogonalyoyo at gmail.com <mailto:
> octogonalyoyo at gmail.com>> wrote:
> >>>
> >>> Association is the way a higher order of consciousness can operate.
> If you
> >>> see your uncle's favorite footwear, you can immediately see and know
> >>> everything about all your uncle's favorite footwear in all of his lives
> >>> forward and backward.  That is, the entity who plays your uncle, all
> its
> >>> other lives in which is obtained favorite footwear.  You would never
> have
> >>> to read about the footwear, or hear or learn about them.  They're all
> just
> >>> there, present, in a flash.
> >>>
> >>> That's how it is possible.  So then you just assume the entity playing
> >>> Pynchon is bleeding through to a degree.
> >>>
> >>> Yes I am being whimsical when I say forward and backward, as there
> isn't
> >>> any.
> >>>
> >>>
> >>> On Wed, May 1, 2024 at 1:24 PM O G <octogonalyoyo at gmail.com <mailto:
> octogonalyoyo at gmail.com>> wrote:
> >>>
> >>>>
> >>>> That is not to say that he sees everything.  It's a possible tract to
> >>>> peruse and pursue.  Imagine his great delight to learn subsequently
> that
> >>>> the images on rare stamps may be inverted.  Might also make him
> somewhat
> >>>> paranoid.  But we all have our own lightningbolts.  I for one see
> DeVere in
> >>>> Pierce Inverarity.
> >>>>
> >>>> I am interested in origins.  So when I see DeVere in a name clearly
> >>>> associated with ancient traditions, like Pierce Inverarity, I wonder
> what
> >>>> more esoteric items Tom may have indicated.  Master Atlan certainly
> knew
> >>>> all about eclipses, past and future.  They do cast a shadow.
> >>>>
> >>>> I am going to presume that Tom was well acquainted with Grave's Greek
> >>>> Myths.  The structure alone, the format, the layout of the book would
> have
> >>>> pleased him.  While it appears to be somewhat chronological and
> linear it
> >>>> often seems to carry on by association, and it's enjoyable to bounce
> around
> >>>> from the index to chapters to notes to names to index.  And it ends
> with
> >>>> Odysseus.
> >>>>
> >>>> The Sphinx was the daughter of Typhon, or Orthrus, and Hera had sent
> it.
> >>>> All four of those names orbit around to the origins of ancient Egypt,
> which
> >>>> gave birth to such embedded numbers throughout the subsequent
> traditions as
> >>>> 49, as DeVere was well aware.
> >>>>
> >>>> It is interesting to note that Graves states that Laius "pierced"
> Oedipus'
> >>>> feet after birth, and later Graves suggests the possibility that
> *Oedipus*
> >>>> was originally *Oedipais*, then immediately again mentions "the
> piercing
> >>>> of Oedipus' feet".
> >>>>
> >>>>
> >>>> On Wed, May 1, 2024 at 10:52 AM O G <octogonalyoyo at gmail.com <mailto:
> octogonalyoyo at gmail.com>> wrote:
> >>>>
> >>>>> The names are intended to induce a simultaneous sense of the shallow
> and
> >>>>> the arcane.  The style of writing itself is evocative.
> >>>>>
> >>>>> The effect of which is an orbital paranoia.
> >>>>>
> >>>>> The author has never in his ethereal earthbound stay stenciled a name
> >>>>> that did not for him flash a branching blue lightningbolt into other
> >>>>> landscapes territories and temporalities, which upon striking strike
> out
> >>>>> again, branching and flashing.
> >>>>>
> >>>>> It is almost as if everything happens all at once.
> >>>>>
> >>>>>
> >>>>>
> >>>>> On Wed, May 1, 2024 at 3:21 AM Mark Kohut <mark.kohut at gmail.com
> <mailto:mark.kohut at gmail.com>> wrote:
> >>>>>
> >>>>>> The pretty great Richard Poirier's review of *The Crying *had this;
> >>>>>> paraphrased but very close:
> >>>>>> Funny names like Pierce Inverarity turn out to lead to, if you went
> >>>>>> there,
> >>>>>> a famous real life stamp collector
> >>>>>> named Pierce who could tell you (or sell you) an "inverse rarity".
> >>>>>>
> >>>>>> I am of the 'school' that believes that unlike Dickens' characters'
> names
> >>>>>> (in general), Pynchon's are usually goofs, put-ons
> >>>>>> as that 60s phrase had it....they are Tom joking with all of us
> about all
> >>>>>> of the dead ends of supposed 'scholarship'.
> >>>>>>
> >>>>>> It is a name referentially leading nowhere, another part of the
> theme of
> >>>>>> 'conspiracy". Another sign that is a mystery.
> >>>>>>
> >>>>>> I will also put this reading in the context of Oedipa's name.
> First, I
> >>>>>> like
> >>>>>> the scholar who read her full name as Oedipa my ass....
> >>>>>> We cannot easily map her name onto any of Sophocles" drama and basic
> >>>>>> meanings obviously. I say Pynchon knew that,
> >>>>>> intentionally, of course. He has said in one of his early letters
> to a
> >>>>>> friend (or his first editor)--'"my meanings are all there; on the
> surface
> >>>>>> of the texts"and in one sense we can get that. Even if we have to
> look up
> >>>>>> much, it is right there.....
> >>>>>>
> >>>>>> So, since for those of us who know the whole short novel already
> and know
> >>>>>> especially Pynchon's thematic use of the law of the excluded middle,
> >>>>>> I also see Oedipa Maas as a name between logic and farce, so to
> speak...a
> >>>>>> surreal joke of a name.
> >>>>>>
> >>>>>> But also, speaking of both sides of an excluded middle, IF Oedipa
> Maas
> >>>>>> has
> >>>>>> any connection to real world meaning, I think this: It comes from
> >>>>>> Pynchon's immersion in Freud and his entourage--Fromm; Brown, esp
> as we
> >>>>>> know---who deeply explored what Freud said the Oedipa Complex was
> really
> >>>>>> about: The psychodynamics of history. Pynchon is a profound
> historical
> >>>>>> novelist. Lot 49 is, among much else, his great thematic statement
> of
> >>>>>> THAT
> >>>>>> concept....
> >>>>>>
> >>>>>>
> >>>>>> On Tue, Apr 30, 2024 at 6:43 PM Michael Bailey <
> >>>>>> michael.lee.bailey at gmail.com <mailto:michael.lee.bailey at gmail.com>>
> >>>>>> wrote:
> >>>>>>
> >>>>>>> Everybody probably knows the lore tidbit about “Pierce Inverarity”
> >>>>>> being
> >>>>>>> very similar to stamp collecting terms, as in “pierced inverse
> rarity”
> >>>>>>>
> >>>>>>> But I’m trying to remember a source for that - didn’t have any
> success
> >>>>>> with
> >>>>>>> a cursory Google.
> >>>>>>>
> >>>>>>> Will find it eventually but assistance wd be appreciated
> >>>>>>>
> >>>>>>>
> >>>>>>>
> >>>>>>>
> >>>>>>>
> >>>>>>> On Sun, Apr 28, 2024 at 10:55 AM J K Van Nort via Pynchon-l <
> >>>>>>> pynchon-l at waste.org <mailto:pynchon-l at waste.org>> wrote:
> >>>>>>>
> >>>>>>>> Greetings,
> >>>>>>>> Welcome to the first week of our group reading of CoL49. I'm your
> >>>>>> host
> >>>>>>> for
> >>>>>>>> the week, James, and I'm providing a summary as well as some
> >>>>>> questions to
> >>>>>>>> ponder as we read. I'm really looking forward to this deep dive of
> >>>>>>> Pynchon,
> >>>>>>>> as this will be my first group reading. So here goes!!
> >>>>>>>>
> >>>>>>>> Summary -
> >>>>>>>>
> >>>>>>>>
> >>>>>>>>
> >>>>>>>>
> >>>>>>>> Oedipa Maas comes home to find that she has been assigned
> executrix
> >>>>>> of
> >>>>>>> the
> >>>>>>>> estate of a former boyfriend, the real estate mogul, Pierce
> >>>>>> Inverarity.
> >>>>>>> She
> >>>>>>>> remembers images of their relationship and then spends the
> afternoon
> >>>>>>>> completing her housewife duties of shopping, preparing lasagna,
> and
> >>>>>>> mixing
> >>>>>>>> drinks, while she tries to remember the last time she spoke with
> >>>>>> Pierce.
> >>>>>>>> Only while watching the news does she remember a 3am phone call
> from
> >>>>>> him
> >>>>>>>> where he uses a number of caricature voices without saying
> anything
> >>>>>> about
> >>>>>>>> why he has called. When her husband wakes and tells her to hang
> up,
> >>>>>>> Pierce
> >>>>>>>> promises a visit from the Shadow and then hangs up. As she is
> >>>>>> remembering
> >>>>>>>> this, Wendell, her husband comes home, his sad work stories take
> >>>>>>> precedence
> >>>>>>>> over her questions about the executrix role. Mucho’s job at the
> radio
> >>>>>>>> station is unfulfilling and his previous job as a used car
> salesman
> >>>>>> made
> >>>>>>>> him commiserate more with the purchasers than his profession. When
> >>>>>> she
> >>>>>>>> finally tells him, he suggests their lawyer, claiming to be
> >>>>>> incapable of
> >>>>>>>> helping. That night she gets a call at 3am from her shrink, Dr.
> >>>>>>> Hilarious,
> >>>>>>>> who asks if she is taking her pills and if she will participate in
> >>>>>> his
> >>>>>>> LSD
> >>>>>>>> experiments. She tells him no on both counts. She wakes the next
> >>>>>> morning
> >>>>>>>> and goes to their lawyer, Roseman, who first takes her to lunch
> and
> >>>>>> hits
> >>>>>>> on
> >>>>>>>> her then offers his advice and services. Roseman has an issue with
> >>>>>> the tv
> >>>>>>>> show, Perry Mason, whom he considers a poor representative of his
> >>>>>>>> profession. Oedipa remembers a trip to Mexico City where she
> viewed a
> >>>>>>>> triptych by Remedios Varo. The center panel shows women weaving
> >>>>>>> tapestries
> >>>>>>>> that flow out the window of a tower into a void that their
> tapestries
> >>>>>>>> attempt to fill. She cries realizing that Pierce is not the
> rescuing
> >>>>>>> knight
> >>>>>>>> that would save her Rapunzel. She asserts to herself that an
> >>>>>> “anonymous
> >>>>>>> and
> >>>>>>>> malignant” magic holds her in place. This magic can only be
> measured
> >>>>>> with
> >>>>>>>> her cunning and fear, leaving her to wonder what could rescue her
> >>>>>> from
> >>>>>>> the
> >>>>>>>> magic.
> >>>>>>>>
> >>>>>>>>
> >>>>>>>> Questions to ponder -
> >>>>>>>>
> >>>>>>>>
> >>>>>>>>
> >>>>>>>>
> >>>>>>>>
> >>>>>>>> How do Mucho Maas' self-recriminations reflect an alternative to
> >>>>>> Oedipa's
> >>>>>>>> Tupperware world?
> >>>>>>>>
> >>>>>>>> How are we to interpret the four images that come to Oedipa when
> she
> >>>>>>> first
> >>>>>>>> receives the letter (Mazatlan hotel door, sunrise over Cornell
> >>>>>>>> western-facing slope, Bartok Concerto, Jay Gould bust)?
> >>>>>>>>
> >>>>>>>> Is there a pattern to Pierce Inverarity's various voices in his
> >>>>>> cryptic
> >>>>>>>> phone call?
> >>>>>>>>
> >>>>>>>> Who is speaking in the last paragraph? Is this the narrator, or is
> >>>>>> it a
> >>>>>>>> monologue inside Oedipa’s miind?
> >>>>>>>>
> >>>>>>>> Why does the Rapunzel allusion appear here?
> >>>>>>>>
> >>>>>>>> Can't wait to hear your responses. I'll respond to the questions
> >>>>>> later in
> >>>>>>>> the week (Wed?) with my thoughts.
> >>>>>>>> In solidarity,
> >>>>>>>>
> >>>>>>>> James
> >>>>>>>> ____________________________________________
> >>>>>>>> WARNING:  The National Security Agency is likely recording  and
> >>>>>> storing
> >>>>>>>> this communication as part of its unlawful spying programs on all
> >>>>>>>> Americans.  Mass surveillance doesn’t keep us safe, and even the
> top
> >>>>>>>> national security experts say that we don’t need it.  This
> >>>>>> communication
> >>>>>>> –
> >>>>>>>> and any responses – can and will be used against the American
> people
> >>>>>> at
> >>>>>>> any
> >>>>>>>> time in the future should folks in government decide to go after
> us
> >>>>>> for
> >>>>>>>> political reasons.   And private information in digital
> >>>>>> communications
> >>>>>>> may
> >>>>>>>> be given to big companies by the government.
> >>>>>>>> --
> >>>>>>>> Pynchon-L: https://waste.org/mailman/listinfo/pynchon-l
> >>>>>>>>
> >>>>>>> --
> >>>>>>> Pynchon-L: https://waste.org/mailman/listinfo/pynchon-l
> >>>>>>>
> >>>>>> --
> >>>>>> Pynchon-L: https://waste.org/mailman/listinfo/pynchon-l
> >>>>>>
> >>>>>
> >>> --
> >>> Pynchon-L: https://waste.org/mailman/listinfo/pynchon-l
> >>
>
> --
> Pynchon-L: https://waste.org/mailman/listinfo/pynchon-l
>