Wednesday, January 19, 2011
"crying"
It's worth thinking about this word as you re-read Lot 49, not just b/c of the punchline ending but also b/c of the way it gestures toward a whole history of the sentimental novel -- the novel of deep, weepy emotionalism -- that Pynchon sets his aesthetic project up against. "Too much kirsch in the fondue" might be another way for P. to think through, in the amazing madcap opening sentence, his own relationship to 1950s America & its sentimental images of itself.
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Some on-the-go thoughts here. My previous understanding of "crying" in the novel had been that crying, or any melodramatic emoting, was what Pynchon had concluded was our only real response to the proliferation and abundance of all the logo-centric, conspiratorial madness of the post-war age, that when you got down to the heart of it, everyone's pretty helpless. "Too much kirsch in the fondue" was a phrase I had steamrolled over in my first reading, and even with your clues this time around, I was struggling to give it any larger significance. But the thought struck me while browsing Google's selection of post horn images that maybe the Pyncher meant that by this point, by Oedipa, America was a little "drunk off that German stuff" (Kirschwasser being a weirdly specific liqeur, begging inspection), unprepared for what was already at work (Vietnam and consequentially Reagan, etc.) Drunk people cry. That's basically what I'm getting it, and when the drunk people start crying, they don't resent a big strong [government] hand rubbing their back.
ReplyDeleteDon't be afraid to respond with a boldfaced NO if this is dead-wrong. I've been in the Writing Center for like 8 hours today already.
[...and I'm a bit fried.]
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