/lit/ - Literature

b-b-bump

Well i just read Crying Of Lot 49 (my first one of his) and I thought it was lazy, trite and mostly charmless. So I guess not that one.

If you want to read something confounding and dense read his earlier work.

If you want to read something dense and comedic read his later work.

I started with V., I only read it really so I could go on to Gravity's rainbow, it was pretty good but he is sometimes too digressive for me, I still haven't read Gravity's Rainbow but it's maturing on my shelf.

it seems that most people think that Gravity's Rainbow is his best work, but needs an introduction before reading it. I am inclined to read The Crying of Lot 49 just due to the comparatively shorter length.

I just started reading Gravity's Rainbow for a class and it's been a little hard on my feeble brain so far. There's a lot of really juvenile humor in it though, which is great if you like this website.

I've read 4 books by Pynchon, and didn't like any of them much. V was boring. Vineland was kind of erratic. The Crying of Lot 49 was boring. Gravity's Rainbow was too hard to understand.

There are better postmodern writers out there. DFW, Roberto Bolano, Mark Z Danielski.

>>1464280
>David Foster Wallace
>Postmodern

>>1464280
>Danielewski
>better than Pynchon

Start wherever the fuck you want. Anything you read by him will be as erratic and and as much of a spin as the other.

>>1464280
>DFW, Roberto Bolano, Mark Z Danielski.
>Those writers
>postmodern
>Those writers
>good

>>1464092
Grab Slow Learner, and read it first. It's a collection of his six short stories including an essay, by Pynchon, where he explains how the stories aren't as effective as his novels are. Good read.

Regrading his novels: >>1464107 is pretty much right.

My first Pynchon novel was Mason & Dixon, and I fell in love with it. I'd start there, only because it prepares you for the exhaustive research that his older novels dump on you, but it has a lovable, charming comedic presence that is even absent in most of ATD and IV.

Slow Learner then M&D= good intro.

The Crying of Lot 49 is great once you get through the scene in the hotel room that goes on forever towards the beginning.

What genre is Mr Wallace, then?

>>1464838
these faggots are wrong.

DFW even calls himself postmodern.

Inherent Vice is my favorite, OP.

>>1464838
He is definitely postmodern. No clue what they're trying to say about that.