Shadow Ticket: an assumption

[J Tracy]

You, Mr Kohut, are the prime example of no effect. You are the same as when you first came on the list- unable to follow through on any reading; stuck in the same patriotic conformist nonsense as always, unable to see large patterns, your reaction to thoughts you don’t agree with are insults.  After having read quite a few pieces of scholastic Pynchon writing and studied his books with other groups, I know that my ideas are very similar to many other readers.  

> On May 5, 2025, at 4:46 PM, Mark Kohut <mark.kohut at gmail.com> wrote:
> 
> I stopped reading after reading that Pynchon had little effect on people on this list.....as well as the culture, which shows you
> are not reliable to speak about either, as has been evident to me forever.....Pynchon changed my life and I have had a miniscule effect on others 
> and within 'the cultire" if that counts as a refutation. ( Which I know it won't for you)....
> 
> And the saddest thing for me is that Pynchon had no effect
> at all on your critical thinking....
> 
> On Mon, May 5, 2025 at 3:13 PM J Tracy <brook7 at sover.net <mailto:brook7 at sover.net>> wrote:
>> I wonder what difference any of these books make. They profoundly affected my thinking, but I see little impact on the culture or people on the list.  Trump is a  symptom of a  fascistic trend in a  celebrity obsessed  culture toward a police state society managed by criminal cartels competing for the role of macho super-hero savior.  Thie players include  but are  not limited to the 2 major parties,  the MIC,  and  Israel who, together, control the US media and Congress to the point where a large scale genocide is being conducted  and made observable on video with full US government support against the will of US citizens. We also watch as  an ecological catastrophe is being ignored by a world civilization addicted to unsustainable extractive economies, and repetitive entertainments.  Science and the US Constitution  have been shredded by propaganda and both parties.  
>> 
>> Gravity’s Rainbow made multiple layers of comparisons between German Industrial scale Imperialism and Western Industrial scale systems of Imperial control.  It was not flattering to either side of the war, a war portrayed as a competition among markets. ATD, M&D  and V took the themes and comparisons back to their modern-world origins. Throughout his writing there are occasional heroic , but ineffective counterforces as there certainly have been but the trend is a steady loss of human freedom, compassion, and peaceable self governance .  The individual in this body of work can join one of the flag -waving  war machines or drop out, but the ways to drop out or assemble resistance shrinks as the mechanisms of control and the propaganda of salvation through personal success insures compliance or persecution as the only real options.  By the time we get to BE there is nothing left to resistance but personal self-defense and going silent when you know enough to be dangerous.    
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> > On May 4, 2025, at 10:15 AM, rich <richard.romeo at gmail.com <mailto:richard.romeo at gmail.com>> wrote:
>> > 
>> > Hello all
>> > 
>> > I was wondering this Sunday morning as I read the continuing grim news
>> > emanating out of the present US administration: would we have a new novel,
>> > which I believe will be Pynchon's last (more below) if not for the roads
>> > the US took since 2016. Yes, recent events have always influenced Pynchon's
>> > writing, but seems to me, without the swift turn for the worse globally,
>> > would he had written another book? BE seemed to be a fine capstone warning
>> > of the dangers of tech and how that has led us to where we are. and then DT
>> > comes along.
>> > So, I think this may be his last book because Pynchon had scraped the
>> > barrel, flushed out all the things he had obsessed over, over many years to
>> > publish two massive books, M&D and AtD, followed by what I call Pynchon's
>> > late phase, two 'personal works' wrapped around the PI detective noir frame.
>> > ST seems to suggest using the frame of the last two books, but within a
>> > 'framework' found in his earlier work, but at a smaller scale. Now, I'm not
>> > saying specifically DT was the main cause we have a new book, but without
>> > all the craziness of the last decade, maybe Pynchon felt emboldened to have
>> > one last say.
>> > 
>> > just a thought
>> > rich
>> > --
>> > Pynchon-L: https://waste.org/mailman/listinfo/pynchon-l
>> > 
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> --
>> Pynchon-L: https://waste.org/mailman/listinfo/pynchon-l