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December 29, 2009                        Also, of Course

chocolate, coffee, eggnog and vodka---in random order throughout the day---

Fanatics and History

Remember when the web began and we all worried about the fate of books?  Take a look at the website for this new book by Thomas Pynchon and worry no longer.  Inherent Vice is Pynchon's latest and my British friend Rupert last August said he read it on vacation in Italy and thought it was pretty funny so I bought it and started reading.  I mean it had been years since anyone I knew said they had just read some Pynchon and I don't think I've ever heard someone say he was funny.  I am almost finished the book now but I've read it in short morning one or two page reading sessions so I googled it to find a good plot summary to remind me of what had happened and where I was.  On the regular Wikipedia there is a summary that I have read over twice and I still couldn't really follow the "plot."  But various quotes on various websites reminded me that plot was not the issue here & just keep reading, relax, smoke some more weed and go with it.  And indeed each page yields rich laughs and rewards.  Pynchon is just spot on about so many things, who needs plot?

Here is a two line cut from page 316:  quote  Inside, the woman at the front counter gave Doc the impression of having been badly treated in some divorce settlement.  Too much makeup, hair styled by somebody who was trying to give up smoking, a minidress she had no more idea of how to carry than a starlet did a Victorian gown.  unquote

The whole book is like that and very delightful all the way through.  Take a look at the website about the book, linked above, to see how well Pynchon's fans, nay fanatics, serve him, his work.  With websites like that, the book is sure not as dead as Sven Birkerts said it would be back when we were all saying that.  (in 1994)

Pynchon's main character, Doc, is a private investigator, very much as is Javier Marías's Jacobo Deza, although Deza is not on his own (American) but part of a sketchy British intelligence unit directed by the enigmatic Bertram Tupra.  But both main characters, --heros? we're never sure---are pretty much lost as they try to figure WTF is going on all around them.  So what we've found out since the noir narrative was invented is that we enjoy reading about our heroes wandering around in chaos pretty much as we always have, isn't that it?  So noir is after all as young as Homer?

The fans are those Pynchon devotees who have already annotated each page of this new novel on the website.  With fans like these, should an author like Pynchon worry about his work being forgotten?  Would every author not dream of having each book so lovingly caressed?

Maybe because earlier today I was foolishly trying to read some theory, some Burke to go with my Lacan and Zizek, that I suggest we need not bother to distinguish any more between fans and fanatics.  Though finding out from the OED when and why the terms did once try to be distinguished should prove interesting for history buffs.

Pynchon

Well, I tried, lamely, to continuously enjoy Inherent Vice.  And it worked for a while.  Towards the end, though, I skimmed and then consulted some online cribs.  The Wiki devoted to the book is in some ways more amazing than the book itself.  Not really, but still.  The fans are devoted to Pynchon.  As much as I enjoyed parts of the book, many of its insider jokes, wit, incredible detail, learning, savy and sensibility, ultimately it lost my interest.  It might have the best and funniest collection of names of any book any where.  Yet  I would still say, if you're in the mood for a Big book of compelling intensity, try Infinite Jest.  And even more so, Your Face Tomorrow.