/lit/ - Literature

Is it fine for someone new to high literature to jump into the deep end?

I have at least 3 of these books now that I bought at thrift shops, all hardbound and in perfect condition, and I'm tempted to start reading one.

Thoughts on this? I think it's Pynchon's masterpiece. Gravity's Rainbow, Against the Day and V are some of my favorite novels however they do not come close at all to Mason & Dixon.

How do I into Pynchon

How is this book different from GR?

Best novels of the 90s?

Hello /lit/,

I am looking to read my first Pynchon book fairly soon, and am wondering which one to begin with. I already own Gravity's Rainbow (which I am not going to read first) and The Crying of Lot 49. I was reading a synopsis of Mason and Dixon and it sounds like it would hold more interest for me than either of the two I already own, purely for the premise.

Should I attempt to read Mason and Dixon first, or is The Crying of Lot 49 an easier way to begin with Pynchon? Or indeed, are there any other Pynchon books to be recommended as a starting point?

The patrician version would be Pynchon's Mason & Dixon.

Only cause it was published a year earlier or a year later and it is the best Pynchon novel and the greatest American novel. It also has Pynchon doing real characters and it is his most affecting novel. The ending will make you cry. DFW complained that Pynchon was too cold and couldn't make real characters.

At least Pynchon didn't write the character of Kate Gombert and kill her off in the worst way possible.

DFW sucks.

>sure they are a nice treat, but the real meat of a book is its ideas, themes and story.

Read books with better prose??

>..name for me a work of visual art or a piece of music or a book that will still be as much as part of life, cultural life, 200 years from now as Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice is today

Okay.

>>2240163
*else*?

Mason & Dixon is far superior. Better characters, emotionally affecting, he spent the longest writing it...dedicates it to his son. My guess is it's his own favourite of his works and it should be your favourite as well.

Infinitely superior.

American literature and history in a nutshell:

Mason & Dixon - Thomas Pinecone

The best post-modernist novel of all time. Pynchon worked longest on this novel and it's his best and most moving. If you didn't like Pynchon because his representation of characters seems cold and caricatured and not quite three-dimensional, this is the book for you.

Ending had me in tears.

prepare yourself

no kidding

Has anyone else here read this?

I thought it was great; charmingly cerebral yet endlessly sentimental. It isn't as technically proficient as GR, but I was very entertained and moved at the end. Pynchon's ruminations on time and history are profound, many of the characters and events are hilarious. Most of all though, I think it is a terrific bromance and a moving tale.

Thoughts, /lit/?

I just found a 1st edition of this at a thrift store...Any thoughts.

The best novel is obviously Mason & Dixon. No other author could even begin to compete. All other works are laughable and breezy in comparison. They are just the fragile stretches of lackluster minds groping hopelessly for readership/authorship in a frighteningly barbaric world of uncertainties.

Second best is Zadie Smith. White Teeth is great. It's historically piercing and scientifically distressing with out being all post-post about it.