/lit/ - Literature

>>16101240
M&D is an amazing book and showcases perfectly Pynchon's maturation from an already extraordinarily talented writer. It is a story fundamentally about how history is recorded and retold and the problems that arise from that task. Similar to how in GR the reader is expected to reconstruct some semblance of meaning in a dense field of symbols, M&D expects you to reconstruct a historical truth from layers of folklore, exaggerations, lies, misrepresentations, blatant anachronisms and the ideological baggage of those who are recording it. It does all this while presenting an incredibly emotionally resonant story of male friendship, bringing into question the limits of Enlightenment Rationality, as well as trading his typical paranoiac conspiracy theorising in terms of mysticism in a totally convincing way that seems to reframe his entire oeuvre before M&D. It's all incredibly subtle, funny, and heartwarming. One of the greatest novels of all time.