Deep state

Wed Oct 8 20:19:02 UTC 2025

No one has to read me. I’m sure many here on the Plist don’t read me any
more. (But I know that when I can talk to more public experts elsewhere and
they take me seriously, sometimes praise an insight;  can often help Mike
Jing with his readings (but am also wrong too often and you’ve been real
good there lately Mike and I’ve learned much) …. incomplete sentence.

Pynchon is personal to me too and I want to think much of what I post is
interesting, revealing, true quite often and can lead many to define
themselves against my notions if they disagree and they want. Look up the
best of such Groups and see why. IMO.

I actually wanted to believe it was better than the silent shadow the list
has been for, what?, years now. The old Dave Monroe embrace. ( I am glad it
led to Laura appearing again. So rare. )

I hardly respond to Joseph and everyone can. Thanks, Laura for adding me to
your post.

I’ll cut down on my compulsive posting. A Habit when immersed in both
Pynchons in the time of his lifetime. (One of them)

I’ll do the posting separately from the Plist. To other friends and myself.

I’ll send long finished pieces on the movie and the novel, which I am
writing, which will be very easy to ignore. And rare by definition.

Sorry you feel this way Mike and I hope you post insights beyond your
dialogue with Joseph. We seem to differ in our judgment of much there.

All Best,

Mark

PS: was soon to have time to start a group read but that was yesterday. The
Group Read is dead it seems.

On Wed, Oct 8, 2025 at 3:40 PM Mike Weaver <mike.weaver at zen.co.uk> wrote:

> While awaiting chapter 2 of Joseph's latest I must ask what is the deep
> state being referred to in the review and by Joseph.
>
> I was under the impression the deep state was a red flag waved by
> reactionary leaders to distract the animus from the capitalist structure
> onto a confection of bureaucrats, and  scheming statist decision makers
> who probably doesn't exist in any joined up way which could be described
> as either deep or state actors.
>
> Apart from that I do have to say I'm the same as Joseph, still here
> because I like to read comments from so many of the people here, but 50%
> of posts coming from one person just ain't healthy and suggests he's
> using the list as an outlet for something not satisfied elsewhere.
>
> Maybe it's time to take a sabbatical Mark. Come back in a year or so and
> see how the list has developed without your compulsive posting.
>
>
> On 08/10/2025 20:15, J Tracy wrote:
> > I don’t care about many of  the things the reviewer was talking about,
> but I kind of agree that some kind of Pynchonian deep look into the deep
> state would be a reasonable hope or expectation at this point in history.
> This review was as personal as anything I have read, too personal in my
> view, whiny even.  Pynchon seems to me to have had a somewhat Brechtian or
> socially revolutionary outlook in his early work, and he clearly admired
> the moral and analytical consistency of Orwell and 1984, but Pynchon is
> more of an analyst of humanity seduced by control systems and personal
> ambition than a believer in any counterforce.   But my expectations of
> anybody agreeing about what Pynchon’s writing is all about or  about the
> quality of that writing are pretty low. I remember when several p-listers,
> including M. Kohut disparaged Against the Day and I found another reading
> group to discuss it with. Now he acts as though he always recognized the
> genius of that novel. Not that he had anything of depth to say about it .
> >     The truth is that the list has been almost taken over by his
> bombastic garbage. Mark Kohut  seems to think that without any serious
> attempt to write coherently or in any depth of thought about anything
> Pynchon writes he qualifies as some kind of guide to the perplexed in
> understanding this complex and layered writer.  I really like the other
> list participants whether we agree or not on any topic, but  with both
> parties supporting genocide and facilitating the monstrous macinery of the
> .1 % I  look for little solace or wisdom in this novelist who was once a
> powerful influence on my map of the world.  He has written some wildly
> entertaining books to sell and has done pretty well for himself.  I
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >> On Oct 8, 2025, at 1:25 PM, Mark Kohut <mark.kohut at gmail.com> wrote:
> >>
> >> All reading of literature is or should be personal.
> >> And infused with one’s personally human.
> > what does “infused with one’s personally human” mean?
> >
> >> That five decade stuff is like people who tell you they must be right
> >> because they’ve been thinking about it so long. Or they have a PH D.  A
> >> soft intimidation. And/or Tom might be feeling otiose after all these
> >> years. I remember and liked and learned from him so he may be right.
> >>
> >> But I don’t care.
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >> On Wed, Oct 8, 2025 at 1:19 PM Michael Lee Bailey via Pynchon-l <
> >> pynchon-l at waste.org> wrote:
> >>
> >>>
> >>>
> >>>
> >>>
> >>> “With me, Pynchon is personal.  I’ve been reading him for more than
> five
> >>> decades….”
> >>>
> >>>
> >>> Yada yada yada
> >>>
> >>> “…his ninth novel.  Maybe he just wanted to have some fun in what may
> be
> >>> his final book.  But he wasn’t free for fun.”
> >>>
> >>> (Quelle Douche comment)
> >>>
> >>>
> >>> …bla bla bla
> >>>
> >>> (more douchey comments)
> >>>
> >>>
> >>> *”Tom LeClair is …”
> >>>
> >>> …forgetting what Gaddis said in re  his critics & the importance of
> what
> >>> one brings to a reading?
> >>>
> >>>
> >>>
> >>> --
> >>> 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
>