I found Inherent Vice slight.....ly hilarious <3
― Emeralds should have definitely done this before they split imo (bernard snowy), Sunday, 21 April 2013 11:17 (eleven years ago) link
I think of that "yikes, scoob" scene from IV all the time.
― Chuck E was a hero to most (s.clover), Sunday, 21 April 2013 17:54 (eleven years ago) link
froot loops again, i guess.
― j., Saturday, 4 May 2013 06:41 (eleven years ago) link
http://www.vulture.com/2013/08/thomas-pynchon-bleeding-edge.html
― alimosina, Monday, 9 September 2013 16:26 (ten years ago) link
Really, the guy lives on the Upper West Side and we don't have a photo of him?
― eris bueller (lukas), Tuesday, 10 September 2013 08:19 (ten years ago) link
New book kinda...sucks. Does not live up to Inherent Vice.
― Beatrix Kiddo (Raymond Cummings), Sunday, 15 September 2013 03:28 (ten years ago) link
on a subtextural level there's a cleverness to it but it takes reading the whole thing and musing for a bit on why it's so disappointing in a traditional sense.
― Beatrix Kiddo (Raymond Cummings), Tuesday, 17 September 2013 00:25 (ten years ago) link
I dreamt I read it last night. And liked it. I couldn't explain why.
― Frederik B, Tuesday, 17 September 2013 07:06 (ten years ago) link
flicked through this in a bookshop last night... opening quote from donald e. westlake!
― Ward Fowler, Tuesday, 17 September 2013 08:30 (ten years ago) link
oh man, today's the day. tempted to play hooky from work.
― "Dave Barlow" is the name Lou uses on sabermetrics baseball sites (s.clover), Tuesday, 17 September 2013 13:01 (ten years ago) link
I thought it was today but saw it in Waterstone's on Saturday. 100pp in; I'm really enjoying it so far.
― woof, Tuesday, 17 September 2013 13:08 (ten years ago) link
It's got its own thread by the way:
Bleeding Edge, by Thomas Pynchon. Due September 2013
― Matt DC, Tuesday, 17 September 2013 13:09 (ten years ago) link
ohhh the cultural references seem like they're going to make me sad
― ♛ LIL UNIT ♛ (thomp), Friday, 20 September 2013 20:52 (ten years ago) link
So I re-read GR last week and I was wondering what other reading this lead you to.
I think I have a copy of Scholem's book on the Kaballah, read a good article on the German genocide/occupation in South-West Africa, read some good amount of Rilke, and this makes me want to return to the latter's work. The Erotics of suicide bit was fantastic, echoes of Mishima in a way.
I want something on the Tarot? Is there a guide anywhere?
― xyzzzz__, Sunday, 3 November 2013 09:17 (ten years ago) link
this may be nuts, and more knowledgable people may be able to point elsewhere (sure AE Waite wrote something that might even pass for scholarly) but I really like The Book of Thoth by Aleister Crowley.
― Fizzles, Sunday, 3 November 2013 11:00 (ten years ago) link
get a Rider-Waite deck and 'The Complete Guide to the Tarot' by Eden Gray is a good place to start for a newbie.
and Fizzles ain't nuts - 'Book of Thoth' is one of the best books and essential if you get into his deck, but probably too much Crowley for the uninitiated.
― saki, Sunday, 3 November 2013 14:23 (ten years ago) link
Also, if you want to know more about Tarot in Pynchon, be sure to read the chapters of Against the Day where Lew Basnight comes to London. There are some really interesting ideas about characters and the Tarot, which offers a complete way to interpret pretty much all Pynchons books. Though it's obviously just a lark. The parallels between Slothrop and Basnight are really interesting, though.
― Frederik B, Sunday, 3 November 2013 15:43 (ten years ago) link
Been curious abt Crowley in about forever so maybe its time. Thx for all recommends!
― xyzzzz__, Monday, 4 November 2013 16:55 (ten years ago) link
at one point I looked around for any other references to the Kirghiz Light and eventually assumed that Pynchon just made it up.
― sleeve, Monday, 4 November 2013 17:26 (ten years ago) link
finished a few months back: and LOVED (it took me several years and one complete re-start)
favourite moment = when i suddenly realised the story was unavoidably approaching the tunguska incident
(more in-world overlap with vineland: the traverses are ancestors of frenesi)
― mark s, Saturday, 13 August 2016 14:56 (seven years ago) link
Oh, I just got my hope up that a new was on the way :(
Another possible in-world overlap: Lew Basnight is described as The Fool in the Tarot conspiracy, and he seemingly has the ability to move between worlds. Tyrone Slothrop also becomes The Fool and vibrates his way out of this world.
― Frederik B, Saturday, 13 August 2016 15:05 (seven years ago) link
man this thread makes me sad: I don't know whether I could imagine approaching that specific modality of enthusiasm ever again
― the ghost of tom, choad (thomp), Saturday, 13 August 2016 15:14 (seven years ago) link
xp
as i was reading i was often wondering if it was going to intersect more definitively with GR
(there's a throwaway bodine but i don't really count that)
thomp the film fired me up all over again :)
― mark s, Saturday, 13 August 2016 15:19 (seven years ago) link
the film of IV i mean, there isn't an ATD film scheduled yet
was loving against the day last time i got halfway through it but then it disappeared; this was a couple years ago but just last week i ordered another copy actually.
honestly was relieved when this revive didn't mean a new one.
have the monk notes from which ATD's epigraph is taken on my wall.
― le Histoire du Edgy Miley (difficult listening hour), Saturday, 13 August 2016 15:26 (seven years ago) link
i got halfway through it but then it disappeared
when the weird shift happens in ATD with the Balloon Boys section it is very disorienting, but it eventually gets back on (an alternate reality?) track. I am really looking forward to re-reading this.
― ro✧✧✧@il✧✧✧.c✧✧ (sleeve), Saturday, 13 August 2016 21:54 (seven years ago) link
Best Name Award goes to Bevis Moistleigh this time, speshly if Bevis is pronounced how I suspect
note. - the name bevis should be pronounced with a short e (the fact there is a richard jefferies ref in atd = awesomeness!)
i really do need to read this through again without the multi-year gap of my first go through.
― no lime tangier, Sunday, 14 August 2016 05:36 (seven years ago) link
yeah this book is like the greatest thing
― imago, Sunday, 14 August 2016 08:38 (seven years ago) link
I took dlh to mean his copy literally went missing, hence ordering a new one
this is probably my favourite Pynchon of the four I've read
― llandfillpollgwyngyllgogerychwyrndrobwllllantysiliogogogoch (wins), Sunday, 14 August 2016 08:42 (seven years ago) link
it might be his best, which puts it somewhere at or near the literary pinnacle. maybe gr is still more mysterious and holistic or w/e but this is a thousand pages of dropped jaw
― imago, Sunday, 14 August 2016 08:47 (seven years ago) link
and no it shouldn't be filmed
gr = ten-hour anime m&d = hbo series atd = the point-and-click to end them all
― imago, Sunday, 14 August 2016 08:48 (seven years ago) link
yeah this. if it were GR i'd say it disintegrated; won't be sure until reread what the michelson-morley-metaphorical equivalent is.
― le Histoire du Edgy Miley (difficult listening hour), Sunday, 14 August 2016 10:13 (seven years ago) link
displaced?
― le Histoire du Edgy Miley (difficult listening hour), Thursday, 25 August 2016 00:09 (seven years ago) link
omg it happened again
― le Histoire du Edgy Miley (difficult listening hour), Sunday, 4 September 2016 18:37 (seven years ago) link
Would totally play the shit out of a point-and-click Against The Day.
― Matt DC, Tuesday, 6 September 2016 09:37 (seven years ago) link
From the wiki:
According to Robert Bramkamp's docudrama about the V2 and Gravity's Rainbow, entitled Prüfstand VII, the BBC initiated a project to produce a film adaptation of Gravity's Rainbow between 1994 and 1997. Some unfinished footage is included in Bramkamp's film.[18] The Bramkamp movie includes other dramatized sequences from the novel as well, while the main focus is on Peenemünde and the V2.
Saw this, its ok, like lots of the footage, but its marred by a quirkyness that doesn't quite fit. However it was good to see an European take on GR
― xyzzzz__, Tuesday, 6 September 2016 22:25 (seven years ago) link
Someone should do a Pynchon inspired conspiracy/alt-history/anthology tv-show like Fargo called P.
― Frederik B, Tuesday, 6 September 2016 22:38 (seven years ago) link
I am in the middle of a second reading of GR (ten years since the last one) and one thought i keep having is that while it would be totally fun to see someone attempt to film it i just dont see how it wouldnt be a total disaster.
― ryan, Tuesday, 6 September 2016 22:47 (seven years ago) link
oh and the 10 year gap means that i am only slightly less lost than the first time, but i remember a unusually high number of set pieces and scenes, if in a disjointed fashion.
― ryan, Tuesday, 6 September 2016 22:48 (seven years ago) link
yeah kinda tantalizing xp cuz it lends itself to cinema better than yr average giant unfilmable novel -- frames of film as integral slices a key part of the image system; movie genre pastiches; musical sequences etc
laurie anderson says that she took his conditions for a GR musical adaptation (ukes only) as "a polite no" but why
― le Histoire du Edgy Miley (difficult listening hour), Tuesday, 6 September 2016 22:53 (seven years ago) link
I think a "free" -ish adaptation is the only way a film of GR might work.
― xyzzzz__, Tuesday, 6 September 2016 22:58 (seven years ago) link
Alex Ross Perry did do a very free version of it, though I haven't seen it. I haven't seen Inherent Vice either. And Pynchon is by far my favorite writer, I don't know what's wrong with me.
― Frederik B, Tuesday, 6 September 2016 23:16 (seven years ago) link
Inherent Vice is good but i feel like the distinctive qualities of Pynchon's voice only emerge intermittently.
― ryan, Tuesday, 6 September 2016 23:42 (seven years ago) link
gr = ten-hour anime ― imago, Sunday, August 14, 2016 3:48 AM (three weeks ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink
― imago, Sunday, August 14, 2016 3:48 AM (three weeks ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink
This is exactly right: Studio Gainax or bust
― one way street, Tuesday, 6 September 2016 23:51 (seven years ago) link
ukes only = polite no kazoos = yes do it
― mark s, Wednesday, 7 September 2016 21:55 (seven years ago) link
ows - the ten-hour anime of GR is one of the worst ideas ever and it pains me to see you subscribe to it, even if jokingly.
― xyzzzz__, Wednesday, 7 September 2016 21:58 (seven years ago) link
it's cute that someone's still hazing me in 2016
― imago, Wednesday, 7 September 2016 22:26 (seven years ago) link
where would yous situate gravity's rainbow - in terms of difficulty - with reference to the rest of Pynchon's ooooeuvre? liked it but found it hard-going
― ælərdaɪs (jim in vancouver), Wednesday, 7 September 2016 22:31 (seven years ago) link
have only read crying and the three epics but GR is comfortably the hardest
― imago, Wednesday, 7 September 2016 22:33 (seven years ago) link
I think Gravity is by far the hardest. Pynchon is actually really careful to create red threads throughout his books, he almost never jumps into something completely new without warning you first, but some of the links in Gravity are very minor. Yes, it's stated that Slothrop will take part in some experiments with drugs, but it's still a shock when the book devolves into hallucinatory nonsense about the Kenosha Kid. The Pökler's are only introduced in a vision from a medium, before the book all of a sudden jumps back to early thirties Germany. GR really is more fragmented and 'harder', while Mason & Dixon and Against the Day are more straightforward. GR really rewards rereading as well.
Something like Infinite Jest is much more willfully fragmented than anything Pynchon has ever done.
― Frederik B, Wednesday, 7 September 2016 22:46 (seven years ago) link