.jpg) Cover of first edition | |
| Author | Thomas Pynchon |
|---|---|
| Genre | Postmodern novel,paranoid fiction |
| Published | April 27, 1966 (1966-04-27) (J. B. Lippincott & Co.) |
| Publication place | United States |
| Pages | 183 |
The Crying of Lot 49 is a novel by the American authorThomas Pynchon. It was published byJ. B. Lippincott & Co. on April 27, 1966.[1] The shortest of Pynchon's novels, the plot follows Oedipa Maas, a young Californian woman who begins to embrace aconspiracy theory as she possibly unearths a centuries-old feud between two mail distribution companies. One of these companies,Thurn and Taxis, actually existed; operating from 1806 to 1867, Thurn and Taxis was the first private firm to distribute postal mail. Like most of Pynchon's writing,The Crying of Lot 49 is often described aspostmodernist literature.Time magazine included the book in itslist of the 100 best English-language novels from 1923 to 2005.[2]
In the mid-1960s, Oedipa Maas lives a fairly comfortable life in a northern Californian village, despite her lackluster marriage with Mucho Maas, a rudderlessradio jockey andephebophile, and her sessions with Dr. Hilarius, an unhinged Germanpsychotherapist who tries to medicate his patients withLSD. One day, Oedipa learns of the death of an ex-lover, Pierce Inverarity, an incredibly wealthy and powerful real-estate mogul from the Los Angeles area, who has nominated her as theexecutor of his estate. Oedipa goes to meet Inverarity's lawyer, a formerchild actor named Metzger, and they begin an affair, which fascinates a local teenage rock band, the Paranoids, who begin following the pairvoyeuristically. At a bar, Oedipa notices the graffiti symbol of amutedpost horn with the label "W.A.S.T.E." and she chats with Mike Fallopian, aright-wing historian and critic of the postal system, who claims to use a secret postal service.
It emerges that Inverarity hadMafia connections, illicitly attempting to sell the bones of forgotten U.S.World War II soldiers for use ascharcoal to a cigarette company. One of the Paranoids' friends mentions that this strongly reminds her of aJacobeanrevenge play she recently saw calledThe Courier's Tragedy. Intrigued by the coincidence, Oedipa and Metzger attend a performance of the play, which briefly mentions the name "Tristero". After the show, Oedipa approaches the play's director and star, Randolph Driblette, who deflects her questions about the mention of the unusual name. After seeing a man scribbling the post horn symbol, Oedipa reconnects with Mike Fallopian, who tells her he suspects a conspiracy. This is supported whenwatermarks of the muted horn symbol are discovered hidden on Inverarity's private stamp collection. The symbol appears to be a muted variant of thecoat of arms ofThurn and Taxis, a 19th-century European postal monopoly that suppressed all opposition, including Trystero (or Tristero), a competing postal service that was defeated but possibly driven underground. Based on the symbolism of the mute, Oedipa thinks that Trystero exists as a counterculturalsecret society with unknown goals.
She researches an older censored edition ofThe Courier's Tragedy, which confirms that Driblette indeed made a conscious choice to insert the "Tristero" line. She seeks answers through a machine claimed to have psychic abilities but the experience is awkward and unsuccessful. As she feverishly wanders theBay Area, the muted post horn symbol appears in many random places. Finally, a nameless man at agay bar tells her that the symbol simply represents an anonymoussupport group for people withbroken hearts. Oedipa witnesses people referring to and using mailboxes disguised as regular waste bins marked with "W.A.S.T.E." (later suggested to be anacronym for "We Await Silent Tristero's Empire"). Even so, Oedipa sinks intoparanoia, wondering if Trystero exists or if she is merely overthinking a series of false connections.
Fearing for her sanity, Oedipa makes an impromptu visit to Dr. Hilarius, only to find him having lost his own mind, firing a gun randomly and raving madly about his days as a Nazimedical intern atBuchenwald. She helps the police subdue him, only to return home to find that her husband Mucho has lost his mind in his own way, having become addicted to LSD. Oedipa consults an English professor aboutThe Courier's Tragedy, learns that Randolph Driblette has mysteriously committed suicide, and is left pondering whether Trystero is simply a prolonged hallucination, a historical plot, or an elaborate practical joke that Inverarity arranged for her before his death. Oedipa goes to an auction of Inverarity's possessions and waits on the bidding of lot 49, which contains the stamp collection with the muted horn symbol. Having learned that a particular bidder is interested in the stamps, she hopes to discover if this person will be a representative of the Trystero secret society.
Critics have read the book as both an "exemplarypostmodern text" and aparody of postmodernism.[3][4] Contemporary reviews were mixed, with many critics comparing it unfavourably to Pynchon's first novelV.. A reviewer inTime described the novel as "a metaphysical thriller in the form of a pornographic comic strip".[5] In a positiveThe New York Times review, Richard Poirier wrote "Pynchon's technical virtuosity, his adaptations of the apocalyptic-satiric modes of Melville, Conrad, and Joyce, of Faulkner, Nathanael West, and Nabokov, the saturnalian inventiveness he shares with contemporaries like John Barth and Joseph Heller, his security with philosophical and psychological concepts, his anthropological intimacy with the off-beat – these evidences of extraordinary talent in the first novel continue to display themselves in the second".[6]
Pynchon described, in the prologue to his 1984 collectionSlow Learner, an "up-and-down shape of my learning curve" as a writer and specifically does not believe he maintained a "positive or professional direction" in the writing ofThe Crying of Lot 49, "which was marketed as a 'novel', and in which I seem to have forgotten most of what I thought I'd learned up until then".[7]
As ever with Pynchon's writing, the labyrinthine plots offer myriad cultural references. Knowing these references allows for a much richer reading of the work. J. Kerry Grant wroteA Companion to the Crying of Lot 49 to catalogue these references but it is neither definitive nor complete.[8]
After being prompted to by Stanley Koteks, Oedipa seeks out John Nefastis and his invention coined the 'Nefastis Machine'. This machine attempts to serve as aperpetual motion machine, utilizing the theory ofMaxwell's demon to sort molecules within a closed chamber.[9] Nefastis explains that a telepathic operator or 'sensitive' is necessary to work the invention by looking into a photo ofJames Clerk Maxwell.[10]
Despite Nefastis' attempt at invention, thesecond law of thermodynamics and its statement regardingentropy cannot be disproven, as the system gains entropy by way of measurement by the demon.[11][12] This alludes to a famous retort of Maxwell's demon bySzilard andBrillouin which sought to establish congruence between entropy ininformation theory andthermodynamics.[13] Scholars have pointed to the entropic nature and indeterminacy of the novel as a symbol which invalidates the demon's existence.[14][13]
Oedipa's role withinThe Crying of Lot 49 can be likened toMaxwell's demon—a force which seeks to reverse the flow of entropy on the town of San Narciso.[14] Just as the demon is hypothesized to sort unpredictable, random molecules to create order from disorder, Oedipa seeks to make sense of the mystery of Trystero.[14] San Narciso as a city is often described as 'still' or 'silent'; a place where life has stagnated, one cultural microcosm of many within the United States.[14][12] The concept of Trystero acts as a promise to reverse the entropic regress that America has fallen into, as an 'anarchist miracle'.[9][13]
The connection betweenOedipus and the protagonist ofThe Crying of Lot 49, Oedipa Maas, tends to align with one of two interpretations within literature: that of theSophoclean tragedyOedipus Rex, and that of theOedipus Complex, a psychoanalytical theory pioneered bySigmund Freud.[14] Comparing the novel withOedipus Rex, some scholars argue that both Oedipus and Oedipa serve as solvers of riddles—Oedipus in answering theSphinx's riddle and Oedipa in attempting to uncover the mystery behind Trystero. However, critics of this interpretation claim that these riddles share little topical symmetry.[14]
Supporters of the Freudian interpretation tend to point towards Pynchon's heavy borrowing of Greek literature and extensive use of allusions as part of the cyclic, incestuous nature of recycling within literature.[14] Alternatively, the homogeneity of society around San Narciso as a result of the convergence ofentropy has also been pointed to as having an incestuous nature.[14]
Upon arrival in San Narciso, Oedipa stops to check in at the Echo Courts Motel, which sports a painted sheet metal likeness of the nymphEcho from Ovid'sMetamorphoses.[14] This figure of Echo is holding a flower, suggested to beNarcissus poeticus, alike to the flower Narcissus turns into within the myth ofEcho and Narcissus.[14] Additionally, the pool at Echo Courts Motel is described as flat-surfaced, possibly symbolizing the pool in which Narcissus fell in love with his own reflection.[14]
Scholars have drawn parallels between Oedipa and both Narcissus and Echo.[14] Oedipa is initially suggested to bear a self-proclaimed resemblance to Echo, and it has been suggested the longing for answers regarding Trystero mirrors Echo's desire of Narcissus.[14] Oedipa also recurringly encounters mirrors throughout the novel, initially failing to find herself in the bathroom mirror at Echo Courts, which could point to the beginning of her paranoia. She additionally recounts a dream in which she is making love to her husband at the motel, only to awake to herself staring back at her through a mirror, an act of self-love by way of a mirror, alluding to the fate of Narcissus withinMetamorphoses.[14]
Pynchon devotes a significant part of the book to a play-within-a-book, a detailed description of a performance of an imaginaryJacobeanrevenge play, involving intrigues between Thurn und Taxis and Trystero.[15] Like "The Mousetrap", based on "The Murder of Gonzago" thatWilliam Shakespeare placed withinHamlet, the events and atmosphere ofThe Courier's Tragedy (by the fictional Richard Wharfinger) mirror those transpiring around them. In many aspects it resembles a typical revenge play, such asThe Spanish Tragedy byThomas Kyd,Hamlet by Shakespeare and plays byJohn Webster andCyril Tourneur.
The Crying of Lot 49 was published shortly afterBeatlemania and the "British invasion" that took place in the United States and other Western countries. Internal context clues indicate that the novel is set in the summer of 1964, the year in whichA Hard Day's Night was released. Pynchon makes a wide variety of Beatles allusions. Most prominent are the Paranoids, a band composed of cheerfulmarijuana smokers whose lead singer, Miles, is a high-school dropout described as having a "Beatle haircut". The Paranoids all speak with American accents but sing in English ones; at one point, a guitar player is forced to relinquish control of a car to his girlfriend because he cannot see through his hair. It is not clear whether Pynchon was aware of the Beatles' nickname for themselves, "Los Para Noias"; since the novel is replete with other references to paranoia, Pynchon may have chosen the band's name for other reasons.[16]
Pynchon refers to a rock song, "I Want to Kiss Your Feet", an adulteration of "I Want to Hold Your Hand". The song's artist, Sick Dick and the Volkswagens, evokes the names of such historical rock groups asthe El Dorados,the Edsels,the Cadillacs and the Jaguars (as well as an early name the Beatles themselves used, "Long John and the Silver Beetles"). "Sick Dick" may also refer to Richard Wharfinger, author of "that ill, illJacobean revenge play" known asThe Courier's Tragedy.[8] The song's title also keeps up a recurring sequence of allusions toSaint Narcissus, a 3rd-century bishop ofJerusalem.
Late in the novel, Oedipa's husband, Mucho Maas, a disc jockey at Kinneret radio stationKCUF, describes his experience of discovering the Beatles. Mucho refers to their early song "She Loves You", as well as hinting at the areas the Beatles were later to explore. Pynchon wrote,
Whenever I put the headset on now," he'd continued, "I really do understand what I find there. When those kids sing about 'She loves you,' yeah well, you know, she does, she's any number of people, all over the world, back through time, different colors, sizes, ages, shapes, distances from death, but she loves. And the 'you' is everybody. And herself. Oedipa, the human voice, you know, it's a flipping miracle." His eyes brimming, reflecting the color of beer. "Baby," she said, helpless, knowing of nothing she could do for this, and afraid for him. He put a little clear plastic bottle on the table between them. She stared at the pills in it, and then understood. "That'sLSD?" she said.
Pynchon, likeKurt Vonnegut, was a student atCornell University, where he probably at leastauditedVladimir Nabokov's Literature 312 class. (Nabokov had no recollection of him but Nabokov's wife Véra recalls grading Pynchon's examination papers, thanks only to his handwriting, "half printing, half script".)[17] The year before Pynchon graduated, Nabokov's novelLolita was published in the United States.Lolita introduced the word "nymphet" to describe a girl between the ages of nine and fourteen, sexually attractive to thehebephilic main character,Humbert Humbert and it was also used inthe novel's adaptation to cinema in 1962 byStanley Kubrick. In the following years, mainstream usage altered the word's meaning to apply to older girls. Perhaps appropriately, Pynchon provides an early example of the modern "nymphet" usage entering theliterary canon. Serge, the Paranoids' teenage counter-tenor, loses his girlfriend to a middle-aged lawyer. At one point he expresses hisangst in song:
Early inThe Crying of Lot 49, Oedipa recalls a trip to an art museum in Mexico with Inverarity, during which she encountered a painting,Bordando el Manto Terrestre ("Embroidering the Earth’s Mantle") byRemedios Varo.[18] The 1961 painting shows eight women inside a tower, where they are presumably held captive. Six maidens are weaving a tapestry that flows out of the windows and seems to constitute the world outside of the tower. Oedipa's reaction to the tapestry gives us some insight into her difficulty in determining what is real and what is a fiction created by Inverarity for her benefit,
She had looked down at her feet and known, then, because of a painting, that what she stood on had only been woven together a couple thousand miles away in her own tower, was only by accident known as Mexico, and so Pierce had taken her away from nothing, there'd been no escape.
On April 27 Lippincott will introduce the new novel by Thomas Pynchon ...'The Crying of Lot 49' ...
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