/lit/ - Literature

>>12541995
what happen to slothrop, bros?

>>12542084
Enzian used him as the living Imipolex-G guidance system for his 00001 rocket.

>>12541995
Most hardcover reissues tend to be cheaply done just to boost sales and leave you with a copy that is not much better, if not worse than a good quality paper back. Personally while I like a good hardcover book, I do not care as long as the binding is well done.

Pynchon's books are still not hard to find in first editions for cheap, just need to haunt the used books stores and garage sales.

>>12542084
He's forgotten, just as we all are

>>12542084
He entered the body of a doofy looking sailor and became an author in real life.

>>12542163
wait, that actually makes sense

Why does this book feel so juvenile and pretentious?

>>12542786
It reflects the mind of the reader

>>12542789
Oh kill him haha
But forreal this thing reads like a roided-up sci-fi novel and it’s driving idea that we’ve made some type of religion out of warheads is idiotic on so many levels

>>12542196
>gravity's rainbow 1st ed
>cheap
your fuckin silly bruv

>>12542754
It was pretty much my initial interpretation of the ending when I finished reading a few weeks ago. I'm surprised I haven't seen anyone else post it in the GR discussion threads I've been in/lurked since then.

>>12542841
How is it idiotic?

>>12542884
What’s the difference between racing to develop weapons of war and religious esotericism? Man, I don’t know, you really stumped me.

>>12542857
I just got a perfect condition first edition of The Man In High Castle for $15, plenty of the small non-trendy used book shopes do not bother researching every book they put on the shelf. We have one run by a church that is for raising money for homeless folks, everything they put on the shelves is donationed and they research nothing, fucking goldmine but the hipsters avoid it because it is in a church.

If you put in the time you will be rewarded, but you have to make regular visits.

>>12542786
It reflects the mind of the author

>>12542927
What is God in the postmodern age if not the nuclear bomb? Always looming past the horizon, unseen but believed in by all, ensuring humanity's destruction unless it keeps itself in check?

>>12542944
you are right. ive seen a mint copy of GR for sale for like 40 bucks in a local book store but it was before i had any idea how expensive it was. thats also how i got my copy of women and men.

>>12542944
Again
>gravity's rainbow 1st ed
>cheap
they go online for upwards of £800-900. Even if these places don't research them, I'd argue that anyone who owns it and knows its value isn't gonna donate it.

>>12542786
Its not pretentious but it is juvenile. Pynchon is the Seth MacFarlane of literature, a fact /lit/ recognized in 2014... And That's A Good Thing!

>>12542084
None of the above are right, he has a moment of mystical epiphany, and becomes one with All. It makes sense because occultism and mysticism are a big deal in that book, and what happens to Slothrop is arguably him achieving the magnum opus of reunification with his creator. The Fool going through the major arcana and getting to god.

>>12543034

>>12543041
Nice reprint of TCoL49

I'm amazed that of all the Pynchon books I've read, the one I liked the least was his shortest, especially given how much of a rambling wacko he is.

>>12543034
this

>>12542960
Yeah... see, this is why the book is retarded

>>12543152
>What did he mean by this?
the post

>>12543051
>I didnt like tcol49
t. non drug using person who has never seen the underbelly of the world

>>12543190
I read it like it was Maas' journey into irrelevancy, the most poignant part of the book was when she goes onto the school campus and thinks about how her own intellectual enrichment there makes her irrelevant to the students who attend in the present, because everything becomes dated and old and used up. Metzger leaves her for a teenager, Mucho essentially goes insane in order to alleviate his own depression, and Inverarity controls the whole show and makes her realize she was never anything to anybody but a wife and a lover. All the bits about the postal service are really just her connecting dots that correlate but are not causally linked. There is no grand responsibility for her, she's just a poser in a man's time period. It's pretty tragic but the writing is just amateurish for Pynchon and it seemed like he wasn't in as relatively strong control of his prose as with later works. Bleeding Edge felt like a better proof of concept of a similar kind of story.

>>12543166
Call me when Pynchon isn’t using the theory of spontaneous simultude for his masterpiece.

>>12543223
Yes well again I would like to refer you to the post you just replied to.

>>12543243
You shouldn't read on acid.

>>12543258
"Doing acid" a couple of time is not the same as being a part of the seedy underbelly of America that crosses lines between rich hippies, nazis and bums. I've lived that life, I like the book a lot. I see the symbol as both a quest for meaning that means nothing, and a tenuous connection between all of societies outcasts that may not exist (but it does). And yes I do have the horn tattooed, and no you may not see it ;^) now hit me with those cringe comments senpai

>>12543302
>yes I do have the horn tattooed

That's a pretty based tattoo, not even gonna meme on you. Except to say you better show me that shit

>>12543309

>>12543389
Everything about this picture screams taste. Thanks.

>>12543036
this is an obvious non-answer, but okay

>>12543389
Timestamp, faggot. Timestamp.

>>12543389
>>12543401
samefag.
Tatt is too big and TcOL49 is his worst book
It's equivalent writing "i am a pseud" in bold on your arm.

>>12543428
You're being dismissive because you don't like his answer. A lot of Pynchon's work attempts to pick away at the seams of the mystical, it runs through basically everything he writes, and almost all of his endings have a strange quality of not really "ending" because the book wants to leave you reeling with questions.

>>12543441
I'm saying that it's obvious.
There is a deeper line of reading than that.

>>12543446
Burden of proof

>>12543302
it's not a horn, it's a broom riding on a yoyo

>>12543459
Slothrop represents something.
All you're doing is summing up the plot which you could just as easily do from reading the wiki page.

>>12543434
Shut the front door, anon, it's getting cold in here

>>12543432

>>12543434
>pic related
Nah. I haven't had a computer since I spilled wine on my chromebook while falling asleep 4 months ago. And before that my laptop shit the bed and "got the stairs" a couple of year prior. So you can be sure I'm not using two devices. I only have a phone for 4chan, schizotube and music bluetooth casting

>>12543033
Internet is the most expensive place to buy such things, you do not spend much time in used book stores, do you.

>>12543434
>pic related
Nah. I haven't had a computer since I spilled wine on my chromebook while falling asleep 4 months ago. And before that my laptop shit the bed and "got the stairs" a couple of year prior. So you can be sure I'm not using two devices. I only have a phone for 4chan, schizotube and music bluetooth casting. As pynchon asked, is it okay to be a luddite?

>>12543477
Cool dog. I want to give it pets

>>12543531
Well in that case I can rest comfortably knowing that your poor sense of "taste" is reflective of your clumsy, aloof nature.
No harm done.

>>12543542
Yawn, the post. How about you go back to posting threads about the guy who wrote Witcher lore.

>>12543539
>why yes anon I do enjoy David Foster Wallace

>>12543477
I hope you regret that when you're older.
Cute dog though

>>12543826
Will never happen. Tattoos are way too common now for it to ever be a fox pass, so it doesn't matter.

>>12543844
>fox pass

Whether or not that was intentional, I like you

>>12543477
>dog
>shitty tat
>attentionwhoring
sup reddit

>>12543898
>>dog
>sup reddit

Really reaching there, aintcha

shit book

>>12543917
Haha, great reference, I see you've read it

>>12543898
lol

>>12543464
The guy who responded to you wasn’t me, and while I agree that there are a shit ton of readings to be had of Tyrone’s fate, the mystical reunion with God is a good answer to “what happened to slothrop?” As far as what I think Pinecone was trying to convey with said message, I’d probably have to do a lot more occultic reading and reread Gravity’s Rainbow

>>12544026
at least you can go back where you belong

>>12542873
Care to elaborate? I'm genuinely interested.

>>12541995
Scipip shit

>>12542084
He becomes preterite, but the legends he inhabited live on in the Zone.

>>12544550
We see with Gottfried at the end of the novel that the 00000 has a guidance system designed to utilize both Imipolex-G and a human component.

Information alluded to throughout (plus all the references to Plastic Man in case it wasn't obvious enough) hints pretty strongly that Jamf "cheated" at giving Slothrop baby boners in the presence of Imipolex-G by somehow incorporating the miracle plastic into his body chemistry (hence his inability to be "deprogrammed" afterwards, and his seemingly aphrodisiacproperties on women. See Margherita's story about the Imipolex orgy for more on that.)

Enzian tracked him down, strapped him into the 00001, and lit that sucker up. The legends of Slothrop all over the Zone are because he was blown into atmospheric particles, saturating the area, and the combination of Imipolex in his chemical composition and his natural psychic sensitivity spread his consciousness around the Zone as well.

This is just my initial interpretation after finishing the book for the first time a couple weeks ago, I'll probably look some into other interpretations and give it another read-through towards the end of the year to see if my understanding changes at all, but it seemed like that was sort of the logical point for all the plot threads to reconnect.

>>12543526
I only buy used books or take them out at libraries. Internet value is not indicative of the prices you'll find at second-hand shops or car boot sales, true, but you seem to be repeatedly ignoring the fact that anyone who owns a 1st edition copy of gravity's rainbow is not gonna donate it. I don't know why this is such a hard thing to grasp