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Thomas Pynchon is everything that's wrong with postmodernism. I get that he's difficult and I get that he's creating an internal system of signs but come the fu
by weeksie 12y ago
Thomas Pynchon is everything that's wrong with postmodernism. I get that he's difficult and I get that he's creating an internal system of signs but come the fuck on, already. It's literature to prove a point. It's the problem with assholes like Derrida who drone on endlessly in what is—has got to be—a massive practical joke/performance art project.
And that's, in its own way, _awesome_. The problem is that people take it seriously. People read the tea leaves of these chaotic texts and derive their own meaning (which means they're falling for the ruse). I have a deep problem with post modernism in literature and elsewhere because of the nature of the joke. It's a virulent meme that has made both art and literature indigestible and that's a shame.
Markets sort of win out and we get real art from television and popular entertainment these days. It's just sad that the legacy of postmodernism is a sort of flypaper trap for minds that would have been put to much better use elsewhere.
- acjohnson55 12y agoI've only read The Crying of Lot 49 and Bleeding Edge, but I love both of those books. I didn't find either particularly difficult to get through, even though they are long and dense with syntax. The stories themselves are still really engaging and hilarious. I guess it's not everyone's cup of tea, but I've certainly read books I've found to be way more tedious.
- failrate 12y agoI read Pynchon, because his books are fun.
- TheOtherHobbes 12y agoThis. Bleeding Edge is full of laugh out louds - and possibly of some minor interest to HN.
- ArkyBeagle 12y agoI will always appreciate the core of Gravity's Rainbow being "Been Down So Long It Looks Like Up To Me" by Richard Farina. That was cool, no matter how jokey and convoluted the work was.
- macho_pikachu 12y agoIn a similar vein I don't get these people that lionize Salk or Newton. Isaac's physics isn't relevant. Now that we have quantum mechanics what purpose is there in studying the process, people, materials and mechanics of a bygone era? Give me my atomic bomb and penicillin but Lord! Spare me the tiresome explanations. What value could there be in that fool Einstein's physical works? Burn it with the Rossetti archives and smother the ashes with Jerry Mcgann's tears. (excuse me, I'm off to play call of duty with people who understand games are supposed to be fun not make you think.)
- uptownJimmy 12y agoI've never had a more wonderful reading experience than "Gravity's Rainbow". Your words seem hollow and noisy by comparison.
- pauldirac137 12y agoThis. I also like the quote from the article that Pynchon is a great stunt-man but not a great artist. I read a few chapters from Crying of Lot 49, and it felt like every sentence was a crossword puzzle I had to solve, like the author was playing an elaborate practical joke on the reader. Fine, whatever, style is style and I struggled on. The problem for me came when I was several chapters in and realized that there was absolutely nothing going on in the novel that I cared a damn about. All of the characters were caricatures with no real personality, all of the scenes felt contrived, all the names were juvenile jokes, and it all felt like nothing more than scaffolding for the author to play his masturbatory English-major word games. That didn't work for me. Obscurity alone is not great art.