The new thread about books we're reading...

[slow west vultures]

i read Crying of Lot 49 for a summer school lit class one year, and on the online forum we had to post opinions on every day i think i said something about it being a "clunky synthesis" of the scientific and the historic (or something like that.  the professor brought it up in class the next day, saying "one of your fellow students called it a 'clunky' syntehis'.  i don't think its clunky, i think its masterful."  that's kind of my feeling on pynchon though, i think he likes to play around with the scientific, abstract subject matter - but does it really have much meaning? 

the other phrase i remember from that class was my professor quoting some literary critic who said finding the meaning in pynchon's novel is "harder than nailing down a blob of mercury."  i want to read Gravity's Rainbow and V, i just wonder if i'll keep coming to the same conclusion - that this is kind of fun and whimsical, and full of detail, but does it really have much of a meaning and solidity to it, or is it just kind of a postmodern jumble of facts and oddities coming to no real conclusion. 

[dumbfish]

Based on my experience with those three, I'd bet Lot 49 gave you what you're going to get out of Pynchon.  The "fun and whimsical" you refer to is done better in GR than Lot 49, but it's not any more coherent or focused.  If anything, its extreme length makes it more rambly.

And that prof is a clunky hack for using your comment that way.

[elpollodiablo]

I'm in no shape to give you substantive reasons why, but as something of a Pynchon devotee I feel fairly safe in saying that you absolutely will not get the Pynchon experience without reading GR.

[dumbfish]

but does it really have much of a meaning and solidity to it, or is it just kind of a postmodern jumble of facts and oddities coming to no real conclusion. 

Based my rec on this. I don't think the Pynchon experience includes the sort of solid, definite statement swv wants. I loved the way GR played with language, images, and history, but didn't get any "big picture" theme out of it beyond "Life is much more absurd than it appears to be."

If you feel otherwise, I'm all ears.

[guanajuato]

i'm a big pynchon fan, more in some years than others. his books can matter to you if you let them. they continue to matter, even when you're in an off-pynchon year. even if it's just the memory of a funny bit stuck in your head. pynchon's one of the great ones, it seems appropriate to say

[cool banana]

I bought V and it has been sitting on my bedside table for about 3 months. I'm about a chapter in. I'm probably going to read that chapter six or seven times before advancing. I have little doubt that the same will apply for GR and whatnot when I eventually buy them. I had Infinite Jest for about 2 years before I got past the first five or six chapters. Actually, the same applies for almost any actual literature I've read. I judge books buy their covers, too. I only bought Infinite Jest because it was a fucking behemoth on the shelf and it had a white cover, which cover stood out on a shelf of arty greens, blues and browns. No doubt in three years you'll find me raving about Pynchon.

For now, I'll let it fester on my bedside table until it consumes the room and I have to give it another go. And in the meantime I'm going to reread Northern Lights cause apparently there's a movie coming out starring Bond, who I don't really like.

[elpollodiablo]

I think the best advice with the hysterical realist "big idea" novels is to just jump in with both feet and take away what you can, take some notes and come back to it later. Plus it sounds like you feel victim to IJ's organizing conceit. Which is pretty neat when you think about it.

[hannah]

Juggling three books now, two more than I can usually handle at once.


A bit overwritten, but enlightening always.


Yeah, still. Hard going. I mean, very accessible, but tough subject matter.


Janet Hobhouse. November. I read her Nellie Without Hugo before I left. It was pretty incredible. November is less so, but it's a nice vacation before I start her Furies, which my father claims will knock me to outer space.

[Greg Nog]

Wow, I totally missed that Oprah argument, there.  That got pretty absurd.  Still reading Master and Margarita, but it's not doing too much for me.  It has become a chore.

[elpollodiablo]

YOU are the one who is ABSURD, my cartoon character FRIEND

[Greg Nog]

I can't keep posting

[Greg Nog]

I'll keep posting

[edison]

Wow, I totally missed that Oprah argument, there.  That got pretty absurd.  Still reading Master and Margarita, but it's not doing too much for me.  It has become a chore.

Damn, that's not good to hear. Last year the ladyfriend and I even tried to start learning Russian with the ultimate goal of one day reading that book in Russian, because it looks so great. It's probably not going to happen ever, but now I have an English translation that I'm looking forward to reading after I'm done with the first volume of The Man Without Qualities (which is a pretty mindblowing book)

[casey]

I'll keep posting

Was that a Beckett joke?

[elpollodiablo]

Did you end up crying in frustration?

[Greg Nog]

Nah, me and Lucky went out for burgers instead

it was pretty sweet

[Andrew_TSKS]

I'll keep posting

Was that a Beckett joke?

i certainly thought so.