Pynchon Fatigue? - Gravity's Rainbow #3

The study on trauma mentioned in the video is Alan Gibbs' Contemporary American Trauma Narratives. You'll find it in the library of a college close to you, or you can get it on The Book Depository (yep I'm an affiliate):

The passages I quote in the video - pages are given from the Vintage 2013 edition; other editions will probably have to subtract a handful of pages.

p. 249:
But it is a curve each of them feels, unmistakably. It is the parabola. They must have guessed, once or twice—guessed and refused to believe—that everything, always, collectively, had been moving toward that purified shape latent in the sky, that shape of no surprise, no second chances, no return. Yet they do move forever under it, reserved for its own black-and-white bad news certainly as if it were the Rainbow, and they its children. . . .

pp. 284-5:
If any of the young engineers saw correspondence between the deep conservatism of Feedback and the kinds of lives they were coming to lead in the very process of embracing it, it got lost, or disguised [...]

p. 297:
The target property most often seemed to be strength—first among Plasticity's virtuous triad of Strength, Stability and Whiteness (Kraft, Standfestigkeit, Weiße: how often these were taken for Nazi graffiti, and indeed how indistinguishable they commonly were on the rain-brightened walls [...]

READING PROJECT'S SCHEDULE
All of these breaks, when they are not marked by the end of one of the novel's four parts, correspond to the last line or first line of a sub-chapter, so it shouldn't be too hard to locate them.
The page number on which each section ends is given. The letters close to the number indicate different editions.

VN: 2013 Vintage edition with multicolor silhouettes of rockets on the cover and red spine.
This edition has the SAME page layout as the 2000 Vintage edition with all the tiny characters and items drawn on the cover over a white field.

O: 1995 Vintage edition with collage of pin-ups, rockets and explosions on the cover.
This edition has the SAME page layout as the original 1973 Viking edition of the novel.

PD: 2005 Penguin Deluxe edition, black and white cover with the silhouette of a rocket.

Thanks to Richard and Hunter for the help with the page numbers!

- September 6th: Introduction.
- September 20th: 1/8: Frontispiece to "Their footprints filled with ice, and a little later they were taken out to sea." Page: VN 109; O 92; PD 94.
- October 4th: 2/8: From "In silence, hidden from her" to the end of part 1. Page: VN 211; O 177; PD 181.
- October 18th: 3/8: The entire part 2, Un Perm' au Casino Herman Goering. Page: VN 331; O 278; PD 283.
- November 1st: 4/8: From the beginning of part 3 to "hovering coyly over the pit of death..." Page: VN 455; O 383; PD 389.
- November 15th: 5/8: From "A soft night" to "So somebody has to tell you." Page: VN 561; O 472; PD 480.
- November 29th: 6/8: From "Halfway up the ladder" to the end of part 3. Page: VN 730; O 616; PD 629.
- December 13th: 7/8: From the beginning of Part 4 to "Streets." Page: VN 821; O 692; PD 706.
- December 27th: 8/8: From "Streets" to end of the book. Page: VN 902; O 760; PD 776.

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[ashgiri]

Pynchon is able to achieve a style where secondary and tertiary storylines becoming primary without contradicting the fact that they are “subplots.”

[mrl]

I thought Grigori was the main character

[nicolerosito]

Overall, part 2 has been the most enjoyable section I have read so far. I feel like the second half of part one was where I felt the most fatigue and really had to push myself to read. However, part 2 seemed easier to read, probably because it's more cohesive and switches perspective less frequently. I really enjoyed reading from Slothrop's perspective from a longer period of time.

[fitzroyroad]

Harold Bloom says in the introduction of the essays collection on Pynchon that he coordenated that Slothrop is the only thing that could put the book together, as a whole, it's the glue that stick all of those characters and plots togheter, not necessarily the protagonist.

[ironhills]

Two points:
1. The second person narrator is that voice inside your head.
2. When everyone and everything is part of a universal conspiracy, there can be no protagonists and no heroes, because no one can change anything.

[kobeoverby]

(Don’t know if anyone will read this as your series has been done for awhile) I find the most frustrating parts of the book the ones that fly completely over my head. In part 2 specifically the angel of Lübeck, the stuff with Peter Sachsa and Carol Eventyr, and the Schwarzkommando. I wonder if I’m not picking up on things that I should be or if my confusion is par for the course. However, I thought this part was a lot easier to follow than the first; I especially like the part with the tank. Another interesting point was the whole Frankenstein thing you mentioned and how part 2 follows a similar structure to that story. Slothrop (Frankenstein’s monster) travels to the alps (the same setting as Shelley’s novel) and discovers more things about his own identity and his *cough* rocket conditioned reflexes. It also reinforces the idea that it’s not Slothrop’s fault that he is the way he is which is similar to Frankenstein’s monster.

[wujNiedzwiedz]

Honestly, it didn't come to my mind to take Slothrop suspicions about about conspiracy theory as a result of his paranoia. It came to me that some situations happen only inside his head, but I was firmly convinced that some London people are using him to track rockets and that is ‘for real’. But now, it got more interesting. I have experienced similar mind-twist as in The Crying of Lot 49. It is an interesting moment for someone who reads GR for the first time.

The hardest part for me. But at the same time very interesting. My favourite moment was with Sherman tank. The scene was so disgusting that I found relief when tank came in.

[dimitrivanhoeymissen]

Just read this part. Enjoyed it alot. I found slothrop's decent into paranoia very engaging. The Pudding scene was very disturbing.

[MikeWiest]

Thank you very much for this series! It was very helpful to me while reading 📖

[ItsVyy]

Slothrop seems like a tragic character but ultimately a positive one. One of the scenes that best shows this is when he's in war ravaged Germany sitting by the fire and he sees a little girl come out of the darkness. Out of pity or some other motive he dances with her in the darkness. There are also many other scenes in part three where he goes out of his way to help people, like the villagers needing a Pig Mascot. He also genuinely loved Katje, Bianca and grieved for Tantivy

[spencer]

I started feeling fatigue around the same part. I wonder if it's because it's introducing a lot of new stuff after the resolution of the Roger and Jessica stuff (which I'd argue is the central focal point of part 1), so it feels like you're starting over with the intellectual experience of reading (the beginning) after you've been in emotional mode for the last 50 pages of part 1.

[tyroneslothrop]

I don't know why but the scene where he's describing an African american ice skating outside the insane asylum (or i think that's where it was) always stuck with me even after i finished reading the book. The imagery of that gave me chills for some odd reason

[InamortasFury]

I got stuck on pages 90-145'ish, they seemed to take me forever to read, up from 6 mins. a page to 12-15; that combined with the paranoia pages have me about 50 pages behind in this week. I just couldn't keep up with my reading schedule. Homework to get caught up for Nov. 1st. I find myself looking forward to parts about Roger and Jessica they seem to flow the easiest for me.

[ItsVyy]

One thing I loved about the novel was its metaphorical pairing of War with Sex and Sadism. In the beginning of the novel the war is a distant and remote event only sometimes landing down the street or a double-blast in the night, and the extent which the novel shows its Sadistic representation of everything wrong with science, Blicero, is small, only 15 or so pages of really disturbing material of that nature.

After Katje leaves Slothrop the encounter with General Pudding concedes with him leaving the Casino and getting closer to the war. Once Part 3 begins and the effects of the war can be scene everywhere the amount of Sadistic or masochistic situations that are presented increase, from Slothrop's relationship with Bianca's mother (I forgot the name) to the scenes on the Anubis etc.

Even at the end of the novel, the last act of war presented in the novel is blended with a kind of masochistic sacrifice by Blicero. I think Pynchon presented these in tandem to show both human depravity in war (and to accentuate it), as well as to introduce an element of chaos that a normal war story alone wouldn't be enough to convey.

[spencer]

I agree that Slothrop is the main character. Every digression is ultimately about him. All the exchanges about science are meant to explain or elaborate on Slothrop's conditioning and his "ability." My fav character is Katje but Slothrop is the protagonist. He drives the plot with his desire to figure out

[aknefeeser]

I think slothrop isn't a main character but like the rockets serves as a medium (or rather a glue-that saves the book from shred to pieces).Even in the end, I think the book's own self-deconstructing really starts when Slothrop disappears.Also, toward the end he became the antithesis and the antagonist of the story, where mexico became the protagonist I think

[davidlean]

Yep, I was enjoying the challenge during the first part, but there were occasions during this section I nearly gave up. That scene where Slothrope is in Zurich, sitting at cafes and the text goes into that wild musical number, I loved it, but at the same time, I couldn't made head nor tail of it! There are a few points in this section like that for me. The scene where Tyrone imagines his ancestors traveling across the Atlantic as a film in reverse...again, a beautiful image, but at the same time whaddafok?! I like that though, the flights of fantasy. The mad drinking game in the Casino though, that was awesome! It was like the wildest scene in The Great Gatsby, but turned all the way up to 11!

ps, great observation about PTSD. Pudding is cursed by it too, which makes it even more sinister that Pointsman would use the knowledge in his scheme involving Katja, the scheme that insures his funding remains in place.

[ianp]

I am following your videos some time after you did the read along but hey! I was one of the readers who found part 2 an easier experience- I think because of the more consistent perspective and time. My Pynchon fatigue kicks in with the songs - I know they are in many of his novels and to me they are like ad breaks when watching a tense film - they completely pull you out. Maybe that is the author's point - he knows it will be a struggle and wants to give you a break?!

[PedroDias-hjjy]

Definetly feeling the Pynchon Fatigue...Chapter 1 was much easier for me, specially the first parts, now it's becoming denser, new characters are introduced, some come back and I don't see the relevance on some of them, so I just roll with it and check out the sumaries (Course Hero is a good page for that…)

Yet there are always beautiful bits of writing, even the part where he tries the Old Woman's Candies, the way he describes it is amazing, really shows how you can express yourself artistically through the writing itself and not only through the narrative...

[vins]

As l said in another comment (which l cannot re-write here at the moment): l didn't say that the conspiracy is not real, l only said that, in a sense, Slothrop is not the protagonist of the story. Anyway, l think every interpretation must be taken with... a Pynchon salt!