The Non-Conformist Society discussion

Jam Master Brock (the mad Canadian M.C. and guru extraordinaire) will be leading a group read of this monster in late Spring or early Summer. We will have more details as the time draws nearer. Please come join us in discovering the treasure at the end of (and throughout) Gravity's Rainbow. (Yes, I realize this was lame. It was my first posting ever as a moderator and the pressure was just too much for me! I may edit later.)
-LTH

If you have not read this book, this is one of the greats.

Haven't read it. Read Vineland in college, and remember it being ponderous. Would probably be worth a re-read, now that I'm a grownup. What do you like about Gravity's Rainbow?

Valerie wrote: "Haven't read it. Read Vineland in college, and remember it being ponderous. Would probably be worth a re-read, now that I'm a grownup. What do you like about Gravity's Rainbow?"

Gravity's Rainbow is Brilliant. It is a madcap adventure through the ridiculous, but perhaps one of the great books about the 2nd world war. If your only taste of Pynchon is Vineland, then you have not tasted Pynchon.

I would also highly recommend The Crying of Lot 49.

Harold Bloom regards him as the one and the only novelist who has
"surpassed every American writer since Faulkner" and draws attention to Pynchon's unparalleled "invention."

Bloom maintains that Pynchon's greatest talent is "his vast control, a preternatural ability to order so immense an exuberance at invention." His "supreme quality is what Hazlitt called gusto, or what Blake intended in his infernal proverbs, 'Exuberance is Beauty' " (Bloom, 1986: 2).

Thomas Pynchon (1937-) wrote Gravity's Rainbow in 1973 creating a
novel which according to Moore (1987: 1) is among the "most widely
celebrated, unread novels" of American literature and already "a piece of minor folklore." This novel has caused extreme reactions by being praised and berated. Similar to his novel, Thomas Pynchon, the contemporary novelist, has been the target of controversial criticisms and judgments by various critics. He is "universally perceived as a writer of the first magnitude" (Cowart, 1980: 6), one who, according to Mendelson, "is the greatest living writer in the English-speaking world" (qtd. in Cowart 6). He has, "in Housman's phrase, shouldered the sky, set himself the task of responding to everything in the experience of modern man" (qtd. in Cowart
4).

Gravity's Rainbow is, according to Richard Poirier, an eccentric mixture of "the esoteric and insanely learned with the popular or supposedly popular" (qtd. in Bloom 3). Pynchon's genius manifests itself in his uniquely wide range of subject matter and literary techniques of presentation, narration, and interpretation. Though extremely serious in content and concern, this book presents a continuous hilarity that underlies even the gloomiest scenes. Pynchon indulges himself in playing with the readers' feelings and sense of comprehension, yet his ultimate end is by far different.
Gravity's Rainbow "bombards us with data, tempts us with a surfeit of clues." Yet, "the data never entails a sure conclusion," and the clues do not lead us to "solutions." They just expose "further problems" (Mackey, 1986:60).

In Pynchon's own words, "this is not a disentanglement from, but a
progressive knotting into" (Gravity’s Rainbow, 1973: 3).


Pynchon's treatment of his major themes, his method of narration and his unique pattern of characterization are in accordance with his doctrine of parallelism and plurality. With the unraveling of the novel his narrative voice and narrative strategy alter and adjust themselves to the demands of the content. His characters constantly map into each other and are either paralleled by others in their lifestyles or common destinies or stand at the end of a spectrum of dichotomy, and thus their characteristic features are
highlighted. The major themes are also presented in binary patterns. The list of binaries is endless in Gravity's Rainbow. In fact, the novel is a universe of parallels, binaries and dichotomies.

Gravity's Rainbow, as T. Tanner (1986) says, is a work of "such
vastness and range that defies--with a determination unusual even in the age of 'difficult' books-- any summary" (69). It offers an unparalleled vastness of scope and an unprecedented variety of themes and content.

Pynchon represents the "intricate networking of contemporary technological, political, and cultural systems," and "in the style and its rapid transitions," he attempts to adjust the "dizzying tempos, the accelerated shifts from one mode of experience to another" (Poirier, 1986: 12). Gravity's Rainbow is shaped by the memories of the Second World War, its end and "its immediate aftermath" (Fussell, 1986: 22). As E. Mendelson (1986) points out, it is a book of "recall[ed] origins" and "foresee[n] endings" that highlights the relentless continuation of the "responsibility of those who live
in present that lies between" (46).

As Kathryn Hume (1987) puts it in her book, Pynchon's "pyrotechnics–explosive, surreal, and violent" have introduced a completely different and "new form of fiction" (xi).


Embodying such a vast scope and content by means of so many varied structures and techniques, it is of no surprise that the book has motivated the appearance of as many different, and at times contradictory, criticisms as there are critics. Criticisms concerning Gravity's Rainbow are multiple and colorful.

Many condemn the work as "committed to the easy myth of apocalyptic nihilism" (Siegel, 1987: 3). Some readers find it "essentially nihilistic, ultimately downbeat in the way it regards human experience" (Moore, 2: 1987).

Others, like Joseph Hendin, describe the book as "the sign of 'Death'shate, Death's grimace, the tragic mask of heaven's pulled down forever in one inviolable affirmation of depression" (qtd. in Moore 2).

Tony Tanner, sadly describes Pynchon as "a genuine poet of decay and decline . . . of a world succumbing to an irreversible twilight of no-love, no human contact" (qtd. in Cowart, 1980: 7). However, such simplistic nihilistic interpretations leave "much of the novel unaccounted for" (Siegel, 1987: 73).

Nevertheless, as Siegel suggests, this controversial claim is not that surprising, for "important novels almost always offend the sensibilities of some readers and create problems of comprehension for others"(3).

Apter believes that “paranoia consistently emerges as a preeminent
topos in major works of the post-World War II American canon”
(2006: 366). As fragmentation, discontinuity, and intentional complexity are major features of postmodern literature, many critics believe this work to be a true postmodern masterpiece, since, as Charles Russel puts it, Pynchon's novel presents a "massive system of analogies of decay and destruction, of repression and fragmentation, analogies that may only fall apart as does the
book in its final section." He refers to Pynchon's "art of fragments" and wonders whether these fragmentary pieces promise "death or revitalization."

He believes that this is the "final art of Pynchon. It is an anarchic vision that promises freedom or impotence, creation or mindless pleasures" (qtd. in Hume, 1987: 3-4).

In arguing about the nostalgic aspects of the novel, Attewell (2004)
states, "it is paranoia, the inability to accept discontinuity that turns the mechanics of a supersonic explosion into a conscious mockery of the abstraction "return" (29).

What is key to Pynchon's books is hilarious brilliant paranoia, in my view, making me question my own belief and perception that I am in fact, standing up.

When are we to start Gravity's Rainbow? Anyone ready?

“There is no real direction here, neither lines of power nor cooperation. Decisions are never really made – at best they manage to emerge, from a chaos of peeves, whims, hallucinations and all around assholery. ”
― Thomas Pynchon, Gravity's Rainbow

Not ready yet - still mired in leisure-oriented travel novels from spring break. Pynchon sounds like work!

it is a pretty fun read. I must admit, I have been spending more time with scandinavian crime novels than any canonical fiction.

Hmmm... Who do you like in that genre? Have you read the Ice Princess by Camilla Läckberg? I've been all through the Stieg Larssen novels already and really enjoyed them.

I am reading Sun Storm by Åsa Larsson and like it

I enjoyed Red Bird by Jo Nesbo

Hey all! Is everyone still game? When can everyone start? I have a major presentation on the 21st of May and then I am in anytime. Thanks for holding off and waiting for me to finish my student teaching experience. Let me know what works. I am excited to read this with great readers and a brilliant guide.

I hope everyone is well.

I am still in

I'm gonna take a stab at it too.

Student teaching wrapped up, class finished, project completed, capstone presentation presented(?)! Finished! Thanks again for waiting for me. Starting date is up to the group now.

I thought it would be here by now, but my book is on the way.

Do we have a plan or timeline for reading, discussing, etc.,?

We could do that.

Would you like to set a schedule?

Sure. I would be happy to do that, but I do not have the book yet to see how it all breaks down. I will post something shortly after the book arrives. I am assuming it will be here by Friday at the latest.

If people have preferences for a start date, please let me know.

I have already read 6.32 pages

Crap, I'll never catch up. Maybe I should just forget the whole idea.

I recently acquired a copy, so I'm ready to go whenever.

Wonderful!

Pardon my interruption, but I'd scream at myself across the sky if I didn't mention that some members on Reddit have planned a group read of Gravity's Rainbow set to takeoff in the near weeks.

http://www.reddit.com/r/bookclub/comm...

No interruption at all. Thanks, Jack. I don't know if we want to move our group elsewhere, but we can at least snoop for planning ideas.

Alright folks, so this is the schedule I have worked out based on the breakdown of the book and an amalgamation of how other groups have read it. If this seems too slow or too ambitious, please let me know and I will adjust. I think we can use this as a guideline and adjust as need be.

So, the book is written in 4 parts. Each of those parts has various sections delineated with a square. In my book there is no other marking point. Each of those squares will serve as a subsection, so our beginning is 1.1. I am listing the beginning and end points, page number (from my book), and the date to have that section completed for discussion.

Reading End Pg # Date
1.1-1.11 p. 83 June 3rd
1.12-1.17 p.169 June 10th
1.18-2.2 p.239 June 17th
2.3-2.8 p.323 June 24th
3.1-3.5 p.418 July 1st
3.6-3.11 p.505 July 8th
3.12-3.19 p.589 July 15th
3.20-3.29 p.676 July 22nd
3.30-4.3 p.764 July 29th
4.4-4.7 p.823 August 5th
4.8-end p.887 August 12th

Please let me know how this looks to you all.

First, GR does not space the way it appeared when I typed that. My apologies.

Second, here are some resources that people have posted elsewhere and I am simply compiling. I am not guaranteeing they are spoiler proof as I have not fully perused them. View at own risk.

This gives opening and closing words of many of the sections in the book:
http://infinitezombies.wordpress.com/...

http://www.thomaspynchon.com/gravitys...

http://gravitys-rainbow.pynchonwiki.c...

Chapter/section summary:
http://web.archive.org/web/2002111423...

Original 1973 NY Times Book Review:
http://www.nytimes.com/books/97/05/18...

http://www.themodernword.com/pynchon/...

I am completely unfamiliar with methods of judging the schedule, but it looks good to me.

I will pass this proposal by the FIRM.

Thanks, Aubrey. It is all new to me as well.

. . . gulp.

Please put in a good word for me, Brock.

Brock, any word from the FIRM? (Now I understand.) Do we need to set up another page or should the discussion start/continue here?

let's just start here with a banana fry

Sounds like a plan!

Hey all! I do not have an agenda or an attention grabbing comment to get things rolling, but wanted to check in.

How are the bananas tasting? Come across enough acronyms yet? What is gripping you and what is frustrating? Highlights? Lowlights? Quotes? Anything to get the ball rolling? Please feel free to take over.

I am wondering if I am missing something because so far I am not feeling overwhelmed or completely lost. It feels very much like Catch-22 on speed to me.

So can it be helped?

The opening of this book introduces us to a group of folk waiting for a breakfast of marshmallow, bananas, and milk and other sordid english cuisine. A breakfast to calm the booze corroded stomaches of a city hungover from the night.

There is a war. But it is not here in England.

There is terror from above.

Missiles are shot from continental Europe. The trail of their fuel can be seen as they are launched high in the atmosphere to land somewhere in England. This is akin to the nightmare of modern day drones, but this telling comes ripe with imagery:

bananas, missiles, VD day, and . . .

we all view Osbie Feel, who stands in the Minstrels Gallery with a banana protruding out of the fly of his striped pajama bottoms.


it is only a reprieve. a comic moment of slapstick.

but we all see it. the guests all see it.

the vapor trail, a white line, somewhere out over the north sea.

incoming mail . . . who whispered that?

the range of those things is supposed to be 200 miles.

airplanes don't launch straightup. this is one of the new V2 missiles.

but it has not come down yet, and if it has, perhaps it missed and landed somewhere out to sea.

you see it go up, and wait for it to land

that arrow looked really nice going up till it went out of sight.

I read where a guy in Okla. did that and it came down and went in the top of a shoulder near his neck and he died. Its a foolish thing to do........

now with high explosives with extra terror.


but no worries, it is just a pretty thing. A vapor trail. a new star or moon.


they have a word for it.



brennschluss, the fuel cut off, or, the end of fuel burning -- their word, the Germans.

banana breakfast is saved.

will we all kill ourselves slipping on these banana peels?

out to sea maybe.

it is only a reprieve.

premature brennschluss


Pirate hunches his shoulders, bearing his bananas down the corkscrew ladder.

emptying his mind,
life goes, on. Routine takes over.


Pirate is a man who wears his bathrobe inside out so that his neither his pocket or the cigarettes stored there are exposed to others. He is a man of great empathy, which is why he works for the FIRM.

Will he have this all in hand soon?

I give Gravity's Rainbow 3 stars

I am about 70 pages from the end of this epic novel. The middle section about Slothrop’s adventures really had me hooked. But they came after page 400 which is leaving it very late; I might well have given up before then if it hadn’t been for a friend’s encouragement. I also love Byron the (eternal) Bulb’s story. It’s very witty and just the sort of thing I love. For instance, my favourite bit of Life of Brian is the alien spaceship bit. I love frivolity which throws the main story into focus. There is no doubt Pynchon has a keen wit.

I must admit I struggled a lot until half-way through. At 900 pages it is way longer than anything of its kind that I have read before. It has very little chronological structure – indeed very little structure of any kind. The author attempts to make words the fabric of a reality without the meaning that we apply to the one around us but one in which everything is inter-connected. He is reducing reality to a serendipitous flux. I know Pynchon flirted with the beat writers but did he finally settle for the existential school of Camus et al? I haven’t finished yet but that seems so at this point; it’s a kind of American existentialism.

There are a few errors; Luftwaffe pilots did not get ‘furlough’s or holidays for instance. They had to fly until they dropped. There are a few references to things that didn’t come until after the War. So unless this is a time-travel story they are out of place. But fair dos – the book is very complex and Pynchon was writing before the world wide web so its a masterful piece of period depiction (and research), even with the mistakes (if you meant them Thomas, forgive me).

As I understand it, Mr Pynchon is shy of public intention so he’s unlikely to correct me. What are your views?

Postscript. I finished it. No change to my comments.