MetaFilter posts tagged with thomaspynchon and pynchon

Admit That Byron Was No Good

chavenet — Sun, 24 Mar 2013 16:50:04 -0800

The Free Information movement as seen through Thomas Pynchon’s ‘Byron the Bulb’ story. In one sense, Byron is a tangent—a rogue sketch that found its way into [Gravity's Rainbow] perhaps because Pynchon liked it. In another sense, Byron is GR condensed to a general thesis. On what? Hell, any number of interpretations could be derived from Byron, but I like to think that it reads as revelation. And the revelation is this: from the moment homo sapiens fashioned the first tool to the moment we are finally and completely extinguished, we are fated to be governed by those who control technology. An essay from Death And Taxes mag.

Start of a Duel (Buried in The Sun)

chavenet — Sun, 10 Feb 2013 11:42:40 -0800

For years, rumors have swirled about a picture of Richard Fariña and Thomas Pynchon dueling in a cemetery. We heard about this rumor, dug around, and found that the picture is hidden in plain site on the Internet.

--o---<<|

Fizz — Sat, 05 Jan 2013 08:39:51 -0800

Happy Thomas Pynchon rumor day! [LAtimes.com] "What's that, you say? America's most reclusive author, Thomas Pynchon, appeared in the news Friday -- not once but twice? Why, yes, yes, he has, surfacing in two unconnected rumours. Conspiracy? Pynchonian? Maybe we should henceforth designate Jan. 4 as Thomas Pynchon Rumor Day." "Rumor 1: Pynchon has a new novel coming this fall titled "Bleeding Edge." Rumor 2: Pynchon "may be working" on the film adaptation of his novel "Inherent Vice" with director Paul Thomas Anderson."

"It may be easier to be private than anyone thinks," Patton says.

the man of twists and turns — Mon, 04 Jun 2012 20:37:12 -0800

Meet Your Neighbor, Thomas Pynchon, From the November 11, 1996 issue of New York Magazine.

We Pledge Allegiance to King Ludd

outlandishmarxist — Tue, 17 Aug 2010 15:20:03 -0800

Is It Okay to Be a Luddite? Thomas Pynchon wants to know. In an essay from 1984, Pynchon responds to the 25th Anniversary of C.P. Snow's "The Two Cultures and the Scientific Revolution." The term, "luddite," has come to be used as a term of opprobrium for anyone who opposes technology or, even more inappropriately, for people who don't understand technology. The real Luddites, however, consisted of groups of artisans out to defend their trades from machines that directly competed with them. Pynchon sets out to defend Luddism, in both its 18th century and 20th century variants: Ned Lud's anger was not directed at the machines, not exactly. I like to think of it more as the controlled, martial-arts type anger of the dedicated Badass. ... The knitting machines which provoked the first Luddite disturbances had been putting people out of work for well over two centuries. Everybody saw this happening -- it became part of daily life. They also saw the machines coming more and more to be the property of men who did not work, only owned and hired. It took no German philosopher, then or later, to point out what this did, had been doing, to wages and jobs. Public feeling about the machines could never have been simple unreasoning horror, but likely something more complex: the love/hate that grows up between humans and machinery -- especially when it's been around for a while -- not to mention serious resentment toward at least two multiplications of effect that were seen as unfair and threatening. One was the concentration of capital that each machine represented, and the other was the ability of each machine to put a certain number of humans out of work -- to be "worth" that many human souls. What gave King Ludd his special Bad charisma, took him from local hero to nationwide public enemy, was that he went up against these amplified, multiplied, more than human opponents and prevailed. (It's also worth pointing to this little gem from the end of the essay: If our world survives, the next great challenge to watch out for will come -- you heard it here first -- when the curves of research and development in artificial intelligence, molecular biology and robotics all converge.)

Pynchon Paper Dolls

OmieWise — Fri, 27 Oct 2006 08:26:46 -0800

Thomas Pynchon Paper Dolls Something light because, yes, it's the run-up to the November 21st release of Against the Day, the new 1000 page doorstop from Thomas Pynchon. The Modern Word is using the time to update their already vast Pynchon site. Good luck. (A whole lot of other paper dolls previously.)

Literary Labors of Love and Linkage

y2karl — Fri, 26 Mar 2004 00:51:23 -0800

What really knocks me out is a book that, when you're all done reading it, you wish the author that wrote it was a terrific friend of yours and you could call him up on the phone whenever you felt like it. That doesn't happen much, though.

Holden Caulfield in Catcher In The Rye

J.D. Salinger did not quite agree but then, if you can't hang out with his secretive self, or any other chosen literary icon, you can build her or him a fitting shrine or two or three. It's not quite Smoking Dope with Thomas Pynchon but...

"Orwellian, Dude!"

Bletch — Sat, 03 May 2003 16:35:40 -0800

"Orwellian, Dude!" Elusive, legendary author Thomas Pynchon resurfaces to intoduce a new edition of Orwell's Nineteen Eighty-Four with a critical eye on the present. And finds optimism in the appendix.