Mike's right. An addiction is hard to break...METAPHOR REVEAL FROM SHADOW TICKET SO DELETE IF NECESSARY

[Mark Kohut]

Wrong in my opinion. Let me count the ways, but I’ll only offer one and an
observation. Most importantly he has been the same since before his first
novel.

A friend who only knows GR long ago wrote me. “Hey, from the catalog
description TP must be writing about the roots and rise of fascism in
America, right? " ( which nobody will remember is like what I sent around
when I too learned it was set in Milwaukee, a city with a real socialist
mayor once upon a toime—and Hungary, the autocracy many are pointing to as
Trump’s model for his takeover---and I said Yes

And every one is saying that so there is that for a supposed deep state of
America theme...

On Sun, Oct 12, 2025 at 9:42 AM Mike Weaver via Pynchon-l <
pynchon-l at waste.org> wrote:

> Mostly written before Joseph responded, nearly deleted but wotta hell,
> here's my weekend supplement.
>
> -----------------------
>
> There'll be no end to Pynchon as long as people read books, But that
> doesn't make Shadow Ticket any more than it is. Rich is right, the voice
> is still there, which makes for good reading, but there's no subversive
> perspective showing in what I've so far read and the lack of emotional
> intensity reflects the disengaged life he has chosen to live.
>
> His refusal to engage with the public world has no doubt made for a much
> more relaxed life than he would have otherwise had but it has deprived
> him of the material he needed to continue to write great books. It's
> back to that John Barth quote - with Pynchon the virtuosity remains but
> the passion - that comes from engagement  - has been lost in the calm he
> has chosen. The authorial voice in GR covered the whole gamut of
> passions but in everything that followed there was a detachment, a
> storyteller's viewpoint.
>
> I've no complaint about how he's lived his life, I thank him for the
> effect on my life his books have had on my ways of seeing, but what
> works as a political act in one era becomes, down the line, no more than
> a lifestyle choice.
>
> In Been Down So Long Farina paraphrased Lord Buckley on the Nazz -
> having a hipster character say of Gnossos - "He got them pretty eyes. He
> wants everyone to See what he See".  That's Pynchon too. 'Pretty' only
> really works in the original, neither Farina or Pynchon seeing pretty
> the way Lord B had Jesus do. Though the reference, coming near the end
> of the book, was probably meant ironically, given Gnossos is about to be
>
> figuratively crucified.
>
> Cheers
> Mike
>
> On 11/10/2025 12:50, Mark Kohut wrote:
> > I still want to pretend Pynchon still matters on what is still the Plist
> >   despite the last two deep state hombres declaring the end of Pynchon.
> > Pynchon is buried in the deep state now. "Come back, Shane"
> >
> > I've left off my comments about this, since I'm on leave from my own
> > glossing,  when I sent this to a larger group of friends or near-so,
> people
> > who don't want me gone..;.yet...
> >
> > All I will say is this made the hair on the back of my neck stand
> > up----Nabokov on feeling great writing, in this case one of the most
> > brilliant metaphors
> > from the guy who is still a genius....
> >
> >
> > "Since about 1930,immigrants arriving at Ellis Island have been receiving
> > boxes of Jell-O plus a Jell-O mold in the shape of some famous US
> > landmark....This one they're handing Hicks happens to be the Statue of
> > Liberty. Plus a handy kitchen-size pamphlet full of creative Jell-O
> > recipes. "
> >
> > "So,I'm an immigrant now?"
> >
> > "Maybe not to the US as you know it.Maybe to the future US we in the
> Bureau
> > expect to see before long." [ it is 1934 in the novel]
> >
> > .....and a sarcastically witty exchange as the Bureau guy defines the
> > rights-lessness of the new immigrant...."....loyalty oath and so forth"
> >
> > "A Statue of Liberty made of Jell-O. Where do you start eating it? The
> > head? The torch? "
> > --
> > Pynchon-L:https://waste.org/mailman/listinfo/pynchon-l
> --
> Pynchon-L: https://waste.org/mailman/listinfo/pynchon-l
>