Possible Interpretation of the title Vineland

[Mark Kohut]

Ah, so I was wrong. Again, as Tracy (and others) have said. Good. public
and proven, a good thing for any discussion group. But yes, that scene IS
the one where I stopped out of the book my first read  because dislike,
some ununderstanding of how anyone of the Crew could do that. ( I was of my
times too re women in books and life, but differently. I remember one of my
close buddies when we three were hanging back in the hood one holiday
during college: we all knew the book Lolita but hardly "knew' it, of
course, saying he had a Lolita complex---what he meant was he liked to date
later high school age girls/women instead of coeds....the age at which he
started 'dating' and it did not always mean then pretty immediate sex... He
had broken up with his highschool girlfriend during first year of
college....

  Now my memory should get this right until the end--of me
and/or my memory.....I guess what Laura and Joseph say might be what
Pynchon himself meant in that Slow Learner intro.....Also, I half wondered
why V was not reissued,made much of
at its 50th 0r 60th anniversary and why it was taken out of the Modern
Library.....Pynchon with Melanie musta made that happen I think.....and I
have thought and still think he just did not like tht
kind of elite recognition.....I once heard a rumor that GR would become a
Modern Library book or an Everyman's, can't remember but that never
happened....

On Tue, Feb 3, 2026 at 11:56 AM Laura Kelber <laurakelber at gmail.com> wrote:

> No, I was talking about Lucille, one of three 14-year-old girls Profane
> and his Puerto Rican friends pick up. Later he has sex with her, if I
> remember, on a pool table. Look, this is the young Pynchon, his time at
> Cornell (in the age of panty raids) followed by a stint in the Navy - not
> exactly plot points in "The Making of a Feminist." So I agree with Joseph
> that some of the frat boy tropes on women should be taken at face value.
> That's okay. He was a product of his times who also happened to be
> brilliant. I loved V. when I read it while in college and still like it, on
> the whole, though clearly Pynchon was finding his voice, writing about
> stuff that privileged white kids found edgy -- ooh, Harlem! - dabbling with
> being a "New York" writer in cringy ways. GR is my desert island book, one
> of the greatest books ever written, in my opinion. As readers, we have
> every right to point out its flaws.
>
> On Tue, Feb 3, 2026, 4:07 AM Mark Kohut <mark.kohut at gmail.com> wrote:
>
>> Some questions are open-ended to prompt genuine discussion. And to show,
>> in
>> this case, that my expressed reading
>> may be wrong and Laura's more right.
>>
>> Also, I did look it up....it was Paola and she was eighteen...
>>
>> On Mon, Feb 2, 2026 at 7:30 PM J Tracy <brook7 at sover.net> wrote:
>>
>> > but why did he later say what he did?
>> >
>> > I do think she---was it Paola?---was not underage literally....??
>> >
>> > Hey Mark why don't you look it up before commenting. What you “think” is
>> > irrelevant and often wrong. You want others to answer your?? Do your own
>> > research.
>> >
>> > On Feb 1, 2026, at 1:08 PM, Mark Kohut <mark.kohut at gmail.com> wrote:
>> >
>> > I love this counterpost, so to speak, to too-easy fanboys--like me....
>> >
>> > My history with this in the readings goes like this,.....I stopped out
>> of a
>> > solid reading of V in my youth
>> > because of that scene in V. which Laura speaks of ......for me, and
>> > everyone's mileage may vary, I later
>> > came to see it as a scene Pynchon was not identifying with or wanted us
>> to
>> > but why did he later say what he did?
>> > I do think she---was it Paola?---was not underage literally....??
>> >
>> > AND same with Bianca in GR, to me none of that stuff and her could be
>> seen
>> > as anything but bad shit.....and written to show that...
>> >
>> > On Sun, Feb 1, 2026 at 11:52 AM Laura Kelber <laurakelber at gmail.com>
>> > wrote:
>> >
>> > Pynchon has some disturbing misogynistic tropes in his work. The first,
>> > obviously is sex with the underaged - Lucille (?) in V, Bianca in GR. He
>> > seems to have finally understood that this isn't cool in his later books
>> > (unless I've missed anything). Then, the idea of women going weak in the
>> > knees over men in uniform or cops or law enforcement men in general -
>> > Frenesi, Maxine. As Mark mentions, the title of Plath's poem, dumbly
>> taken
>> > literally, probably encourages Pynchon and others in this trope. Third,
>> > worst in some ways, is Woman as Betrayer of movements, of political
>> > ideologies. I'm sure there may be some historical examples,
>> particularly in
>> > histories written by men, but offhand, I can't think of one. Certainly
>> not
>> > on the level of, say, the embedded stooges of COINTELPRO or the
>> Pinkertons.
>> > And in terms of family betrayal, it's usually the dad who walks out, the
>> > son who betrays the father, at least in real life. So why Frenesi, why
>> > Lake?
>> >
>> > As a side note, I found PTA's casual adaptation of two of these
>> > misogynistic tropes particularly vile. A beautiful young Black woman has
>> > sex with the repulsively old and ugly Sean Penn character because ...
>> why?
>> > She's already ratted out her friends. So obsessed with a decrepit old
>> > fascist that she just can't help herself. Blecch!
>> >
>> >
>> >
>> --
>> Pynchon-L: https://waste.org/mailman/listinfo/pynchon-l
>>
>