Let's Discuss The Crying of Lot 49, If You'd Like.

[Anonymous No.22279754]

The postmodern work is the one which, by the last page, has torn every preceding one from its spine and left you alone with a flapping empty paperback cover. The Crying of Lot 49 is this exactly. Drenching itself in what passes in literary academia for comedy, Lot 49 tries its very best to hide itself among its fellow satires, with characters like Fallopian and Hilarius camouflaging a novel with something to say as one that says nothing at all, or vice-versa? Ironically, Pynchon manages both. Like her namesake, Oedipa is presented with a riddle. Unlike him, Oedipa ostensibly has no sphinx, save for the titular subject, and reaches no conclusion. She has only, by the end of the novel, the riddle itself, which may or may not even exist, which may or may not be a hallucination, which may or may not be a cold-hearted prank.

The novel is /exactly the same/. Pynchon tells you exactly what he plans to do to both Oedipa and you, the reader, at various points throughout; in the first place, Oedipa notices the visual similarity between the circuits of radio and the circuitry of San Narciso, ready to reveal something to her if only she takes the time to study it. Pynchon here turns his gaze to his reader: 'Here is /your/ circuitry,' mockingly, 'now make sense of it.' So much of the circuitry is bundled into his second gambit, being The Courier's Tragedy. The plot of the play, mirroring that of the 'actual' conflict between Turn & Taxis and The Tristero, is what first drags Oedipa out her "tower" and plunges her head first into the "tapestry" of the conspiracy, if there is one.

And that is the question indeed: Is there anything more to it than a series of coincidences? As Oedipa asks this question of the evidence she finds, so to does Pynchon ask it of the novel as a form: Is any novel, really, anything more than plot? Is there ever a hidden message in the circuitry, or is it circuitry for circuitry's sake? Is there a Demon sorting this disparate information, and if so, can only the "sensitives" of academia reach him? Or does it all amount to so much "crying?" Pynchon was in fact criticized by the New York Times for coming up short to suffuse the novel with meaning by way of Oedipa's musings on the railroad tracks in the final chapter; I should think this was all part of the act.

Personally I'm unsure of Pynchon's stance; on the one hand he seems critical of those who meander through life devoid of meaning, love, and actual living, yet on the other, he suggests that any actual meaning is impossible, if not unreachable by the mind that is un-sensitive, unaltered by drugs, or, at perhaps his most desperate, alive.

What do you think, /lit/? I'll be the first to admit I am a novice to his work but I'm utterly captivated. Moving on to either Gravity's Rainbow or Bleeding Edge next, having wrapped up Inherent Vice before Lot 49 (entertaining, but a void by comparison to the implosively dense Lot 49, the latter being less than half the length of the former).

[Anonymous No.22280008]

>>22279754
tl;dr

[Anonymous No.22280112]

>>22279754
You will want GR next. Maybe later when I am not phone posting I will give you some discussion.

[Anonymous No.22280129]

>>22279754
You're doing this wrong anon. You're supposed to make the OP a low effort baitpost and then save your actual opinions for a reply in which you pretend to be a different person.

[Anonymous No.22280150]

>>22280129
Nah, this is better and I would reply in kind if not phone posting right now. I applaud OP.

[Anonymous No.22280197]

>>22279754
I’ve never read the book but appreciate the post. You should look up the Not Bill Murray/Pynchon post. He had an interesting theory but I forget what exactly. Something about the poet Tasso, and how he went mad

[Anonymous No.22280331]

>>22280008
FPBP

[Anonymous No.22280343]

>>22279754
I hope this thread gets traction. If not it’s sad and probably a sign of /lit/‘s death. OP actually effortposts and I hope it won’t be in vain. I wish I could contribute but I can’t

[Anonymous No.22280368]

>>22280343
what effort? it says nothing about the book and he says it's the first pynchon book he read. typing up 500 words of vague crap isn't effort. i wouldn't be that surprised if that shit came out of some llm.

[Anonymous No.22280399]

>>22280368
sorry no one replies to your effort posts cope harder faggot

[Anonymous No.22280422]

>>22280368
Based.

[Anonymous No.22280457]

>>22279754
Thomas Pynchon here. The answer lies in Maxwell's Demon.

[Anonymous No.22280515]

>>22279754
>Oedipa ostensibly has no sphinx
pierce inverarity is pretty much a sphinx THOUGH

[Anonymous No.22280526]

I don't have much to add to this right now but I would say that your post just about sums up my impressions of the book. I just finished reading it for the first time a short while back and I found it to be the most satisfying mystery story I've read. Satisfying in the sense that it's unsatisfying, thus becoming more "real" and believable despite the ambiguousness of its reality. It somehow feels organic. It feels like a work that completely defies close critical inspection of its content and detail, but I feel that I am not one equipped to make that determination.

[Anonymous No.22281158]

I'd advise you to read Gravity's Rainbow next, as Bleeding Edge (and Vineland, really) is pretty underwhelming compared to the rest of his bibliography

[Anonymous No.22281686]

>>22279754
i wish i could respond with something better but i only read it once like 7 years ago so it isn't very fresh in my mind. i would recommend GR next and hope you follow that up with the overlooked son & xon, which is my personal favorite.

[Anonymous No.22282775]

>>22279754
>Bleeding Edge

[Anonymous No.22282797]

>>22279754
I found Lot 49 to be the weakest of his first three but it also stuck with me in a weird way. The book is a hard one to shake, and genuinely quite good at making you think.
It's interesting how weak Pynchon considered Lot 49 to be, I can't recall the exact phrasing but he said something like it was "trying too hard to be literary."

[Anonymous No.22282839]

>>22282797
>"trying too hard to be literary."
He says that about his early short stories in the Slow Learner preface. About Crying he wrote
>As is clear from the up-and-down shape of my learning curve, however, it was too much to expect that I'd keep on for long in this positive or professional direction. The next story I wrote was "The Crying of Lot 49," which was marketed as a "novel," and in which I seem to have forgotten most of what I thought I'd learned up till then.
I read on some blog of who knows what credulity that he used Crying to get out of a publishing contract so he could give GR to the people he wanted.

[Anonymous No.22282851]

>>22282839
Ah yes, thank you, that is the right quote. Interesting about the "trying to get out of a contract" theory. Didn't Lot 49 do well enough initially that publishers would be happy?

[Anonymous No.22282861]

>>22282851
I assumed he owed them one more book.

[Anonymous No.22282871]

>>22282839
>I read on some blog of who knows what credulity that he used Crying to get out of a publishing contract so he could give GR to the people he wanted.
I doubt he had a contract, publishers generally do not give multibook deals to nobodies, which he was when he published V..

[Anonymous No.22282886]

>>22282871
Could have been a single book deal after v. was published?

[Anonymous No.22283051]

>>22282886
V. got nominated for the National Book Award so he could pretty much pick his publisher, why would he sign a contract with a publisher he did not want to deal with? Personally I would say the key word in the quote above being "seem" as in he is playing on the novels reception and his general nebulousness as a celebrity, he is hinting at his reasons; he focused on what he did poorly in V. and forgot about what he did well, it was a way to focus and work on his weaknesses as a writer. Viewed from this standpoint it makes a fair amount of sense, he went with a simpler narrative structure that would not hide those flaws and we get a much tighter work than V. with its pointless digressions, editing errors/oversights, stylistic inconsistencies and general immature behavior on the authors part. Lot 49 is a more mature work in every way and we get hints of where he is headed next as OP demonstrated so well with his write up on Lot 49.

[Anonymous No.22283070]

>>22283051
>why would he sign a contract with a publisher he did not want to deal with?
The story doesn't require him to have done so since people can change their mind during a period of several years, and he could have got in contact with Viking people later etc..

[Anonymous No.22283098]

>>22283070
But that story also requires assuming Pynchon was short sighted and and lacking in any business sense and also had an equally short sighted agent lacking in any knowledge of the field. Possible but it is pure conjecture. Personally I think Pynchon is very deliberate in his wording those rare times he directly addresses his audience and that "seem" in the above quote is him saying to everyone else it seemed he forgot everything he had learned as a writer, which also fits with his general style as a writer, he hints at the truth, never states it.

[Anonymous No.22283112]

>>22283098
>requires assuming Pynchon was short sighted and and lacking in any business sense and also had an equally short sighted agent lacking in any knowledge of the field
I disagree but it's not the most important thing.

[Anonymous No.22283130]

>>22283098
He knew he would turn out mediocre back when he wrote GR kek

[Anonymous No.22283158]

>>22283112
Ultimately the rest of my comment is the point, Lot 49 is built around what he did poorly in V., he focuses on those things exclusively in a way that can not obfuscate them. This is hard to ignore and just writing it off as him going through the motions to get out of a contract is silly, it is a work he needed to write to progress as a writer.

[Anonymous No.22283166]

>>22283158
>writing it off
I wasn't trying to do that.

[Anonymous No.22283222]

>>22283166
I am not really clear on what you were trying to do, you repeated hearsay which you admitted was dubious and then proceeded to defend that dubious hearsay while ignoring the content of what was said and reducing it to "it suggested I was wrong!"

[Anonymous No.22283274]

>>22283222
I wasn't trying to do something.

[Anonymous No.22283735]

>>22280526
huh?

[Anonymous No.22284579]

i read this book a few months ago and it gave me the distinct feeling that it had been written specifically to/for me in 2023. it's a lot like waiting for godot in this respect. if you've ever been a prisoner, literally or otherwise, you just sort of get it. waiting. for godot. for silent trystero. for the (indium) crying of lot 49.

[Anonymous No.22284645]

>>22279754
Here is a good analysis
https://thehotstar.net/lot49.html

[Anonymous No.22284873]

>>22284579
lol

>>22284645
nice thanks

[Anonymous No.22285031]

>>22284873
cheers luv

[Anonymous No.22285277]

>>22284873
Lobsters all died from cold.

[Anonymous No.22285347]

>>22279754
Thank God almighty for giving me an IQ of 105 so I don't ever feel compelled to read this type of bullshit.

[Anonymous No.22285403]

>>22285347
post taste

[Anonymous No.22285416]

>>22285403
Mainly Harry Potter / rereading the series. Tried Game of Thrones but the show did it better. I don't know. That's about it.

[Anonymous No.22285428]

>>22285416
Not me.
>>22285403
I like Borges. I often come out thinking I didn't understand much from his stories. But I like him.

[Anonymous No.22285446]

>>22285428
>impersonating me to announce you like some obscure bullshit
But why?

[Anonymous No.22285599]

>>22285446
Anon, I can screenshot myself youing my own post.
>borges
>obscure
10/10
>>22285347
Here, screenshot in a mimute.

[Anonymous No.22285603]

>>22285446
I"m going to rape you, nigger.

[Anonymous No.22285664]

>>22280457
Big if true

[Anonymous No.22285715]

>>22280457
Apparently, Thomas Pynchon liked Simpsons.
Do you think he still had mental faculty to enjoy internet? Does he browse 4chan?

[Anonymous No.22285736]

>>22285599
>>22285603
Anon... you didn't save your edits on the image... this proves you're imitating me. Trolling 0/10.

[Anonymous No.22286211]

>>22285736
11/10 trawling.

[Anonymous No.22286231]

>>22285428
>Borges
pineconecore

[Anonymous No.22286256]

>>22285736
lmao good catch

[Anonymous No.22286276]

>>22279754
Ace brainjamming postmodernism. Beautiful hermeneutic whorls. Subtly autodismantling. Many of the same gambits as V. but done in a hypercondensed way that makes the 150ish pages into Oedipa's planetarium box. I wonder if there's something in its design like the vistas in Inverarity's stamps—the novel feels huge when I'm reading or thinking about it. Damn I love this mfer.

[Anonymous No.22286328]

>>22279754
Makes me think of the scene in No Country when he says not to put his quarter in his pocket, lest it will become "just a coin." If the mystery has a determined end, it will become just that, an open and closed case like any other typical mystery story. But he didn't want to be clear cut. The story is about systems and their interconnected parts, their emergent qualities which obfuscate the understanding of the system. I'm assuming he's tying two major concepts here: synchronicity OR pareidolia (as in the paranoia and NEED for humans to seek meaning which can lead to conspiracy) as well as concepts/paradoxes in physics he'd be familiar with like heidegger's uncertainty principle, schrodinger's cat, chaos theory, fractals, etc. To make an analogy, it is like trying to predict the weather, you're limited in everything's relationship with respect to everything else, and time. Maxwell's Demon signifies a stop to entropy or cyclic nature of a perpetuity, so it makes sense that the story would end open-ended, somewhat on the same closing lines as "it's turtles all the way down."

[Anonymous No.22286339]

>>22286328
>heidegger's uncertainty principle,

[Anonymous No.22286353]

>>22286339
lol whoops, was writing while taking a shit

[Anonymous No.22286379]

>>22286231
What in the actual fuck is that.

[Anonymous No.22286381]

>>22286379
shig

[Anonymous No.22286392]

>>22286381
Oh I think I get it now.
Godspeed faggots, I hope ypu all die in a fire.

[Anonymous No.22286402]

>>22286392
bit rude desu

[Anonymous No.22286407]

>>22286402
I'm just telling you godspeed.

[Anonymous No.22286668]

>>22286407
you're disgusting

[Anonymous No.22286671]

>>22286668
nice digits

[Anonymous No.22286750]

>>22286671
thanks!!!!!!!!!

[Anonymous No.22286778]

>>22285715
GR is a story about dubs after all

[Anonymous No.22286835]

>>22286778
It's about quints, rocket 00000.

[Anonymous No.22286955]

>>22286835
this is now a get thread

[Anonymous No.22286964]

>>22286955

[Anonymous No.22287239]

>>22286964

[Anonymous No.22287511]

[Anonymous No.22287524]

>>22279754
This book is so fucking lame and gay, and you're the epitome of the MFA wannabe target audience writing a massive wall of text over Pynchon shidding and farding in a book. Only redeeming thing about it is that it was pretty cool to have someone predicting electronic music clubs in 1966
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LRnGXi2nSF0

[Anonymous No.22287537]

>>22287511

[Anonymous No.22287554]

>>22287537

[Anonymous No.22288544]

>>22279754
I didn't understand shit but it was a fun read
>>22285428
Borges is pretty accessible tho

[Anonymous No.22288733]

>>22287524
I liked a contemporary take on the Beatles, from pynchon no less

[Anonymous No.22289274]

>>22288544
I like the concepts he explores. He's pretty comfy

[Anonymous No.22289285]

>>22289274
Borges I mean.

[Anonymous No.22289289]

>>22289285
Might actually give pybchon a chance when I'm older.

[Anonymous No.22289405]

>>22279754
What I took from it mostly was the conversation with the doctor at the end (Hilarius?) where he asks Oedipa if she has a delusion. When she answers yes he tells her to cling to it, because many people don’t have any delusion to cling to and how important it is to believe in something even if it’s nonsense.

I read this because I couldn’t get through Gravity’s Rainbow and it helped a lot. But even when I finished that, I was still thinking about this one. I should probably read GR again.

[Anonymous No.22289412]

>>22280399
Kill yourself retard faggot

[Anonymous No.22290748]

>>22289405
Fair.

[Anonymous No.22291103]

>>22279754
I got Mason & Dixon for a dollar at the book fair. Should I just read it, or should I read his other work first? The only other book by Pynchon I've read is TCoL49.

[Anonymous No.22291671]

>>22279754

[Anonymous No.22292118]

>>22291103
>Should I just read it
yes
prepare for comf

[Anonymous No.22292256]

>>22291671
Come to think of it has anyone ever seen norm and Tom in the same room?