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174 reviews for:
Thomas pynchon's Against the day: A Deleuzian reading of pynchon's language.
Thomas Pynchon
4.19 AVERAGE
174 reviews for:
Thomas pynchon's Against the day: A Deleuzian reading of pynchon's language.
Thomas Pynchon
4.19 AVERAGE
challenging
emotional
funny
mysterious
reflective
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
Pynchon's Against the Day is a sprawling work (1085 pages) that circles the globe (and enters it (oh hollow earth theorists you zany folk)) to come to a Pynchonesque conclusion. If you've read Pynchon you know what I mean. If you haven't shame on you and start. This is not the one I recommend starting with though. While quite good 1085 pages is a lot.
Finally. It’s impossible to give a star rating to something so daunting, ambitious, fun, and difficult, but I’ll say that for as long as this took to get through, it was more readable than I was anticipating. Pynchon is just a joy to sit with on a sentence to sentence level, and while there are sections here I enjoyed more than others, and stretches that left me confused about the sprawling narrative, I mostly enjoyed the experience. Reading difficult works can be truly pleasurable.
I’m setting this aside at the halfway point. Pynchon’s novels at their best can seem like revelation; this is pure pastiche, with all the (ahem) gravity dispensed with, leaving only the humor, which falls flat more than not. Moments of brilliance are too rare in this overstuffed monstrosity.
So Pynchonian a Pynchon book that it was almost impossible for me to dislike it. I wish there'd been more Chums of Chance, though.
Ever had that feeling of triumph when you finish a something that has taken you a long time to achieve. Well I felt that way when I read the last line of Pynchon’s latest novel ‘Against the Day’ I had bough the book in October and had been carting it around with me until yesterday (Jan 15th) To be honest whenever I finish a Pynchon novel I feel this way.
Do not get me wrong I ADORE Pynchon. His plot’s , use of slapstick and the dazzling language. The fact that no one beat him at his game still shows what a powerful writer he is. Saying that as Pynchon is now past 70 and his age is showing in his novels. There are both pros and cons to this and it is all in Against the Day.
As many critics have rightly noted this is Pynchon’s most accessible novel. It is very readable (by his standards of course) and plots are more linear and digressions less frequent. Like all of his novels the main focus is on man’s want to destroy and create the world he lives in and infused with this plot are revenge fuelled unionists, mathematical cults, a bunch of arial adventurers, a psychic detective and dozens of more characters, all interacting with each other and travelling to different lands, each on a search for self fulfillment and all taking place between the years 1890 – 1920. It is also his longest book, running at 1220 pages and, trust me he makes every use of it.
So far so Pynchon.
However one thing that is evidentally missing if the manic humour that pervades his novels. Other than the mayonnaise scene and a few minisicule bits here and there, the cartooney exaggeration of lore has nearly disappeared. This does not mean that ‘Against the Day’ dry in any way however that Pynchonian spark is simply not present. As a fan I was a teensy bit disappointed but if a person approached me asking which Pynchon novel would be the best to start with I would point him towards ATD as it is indeed suitable to for those who want to work through his books.
However I am extremely glad I read it for some strange reason I feel more complete (literature-wise) when I read his novels. Maybe because I constanly check wikipedia (in the past it was the dusty set of encyclopedias that reast on my shelf) learn something new with each segment and feel brainy? I honestly don’t know but Against the Day does certainly demand you to read it.
Do not get me wrong I ADORE Pynchon. His plot’s , use of slapstick and the dazzling language. The fact that no one beat him at his game still shows what a powerful writer he is. Saying that as Pynchon is now past 70 and his age is showing in his novels. There are both pros and cons to this and it is all in Against the Day.
As many critics have rightly noted this is Pynchon’s most accessible novel. It is very readable (by his standards of course) and plots are more linear and digressions less frequent. Like all of his novels the main focus is on man’s want to destroy and create the world he lives in and infused with this plot are revenge fuelled unionists, mathematical cults, a bunch of arial adventurers, a psychic detective and dozens of more characters, all interacting with each other and travelling to different lands, each on a search for self fulfillment and all taking place between the years 1890 – 1920. It is also his longest book, running at 1220 pages and, trust me he makes every use of it.
So far so Pynchon.
However one thing that is evidentally missing if the manic humour that pervades his novels. Other than the mayonnaise scene and a few minisicule bits here and there, the cartooney exaggeration of lore has nearly disappeared. This does not mean that ‘Against the Day’ dry in any way however that Pynchonian spark is simply not present. As a fan I was a teensy bit disappointed but if a person approached me asking which Pynchon novel would be the best to start with I would point him towards ATD as it is indeed suitable to for those who want to work through his books.
However I am extremely glad I read it for some strange reason I feel more complete (literature-wise) when I read his novels. Maybe because I constanly check wikipedia (in the past it was the dusty set of encyclopedias that reast on my shelf) learn something new with each segment and feel brainy? I honestly don’t know but Against the Day does certainly demand you to read it.
I listened to 75% of it on Audible. I'm starting to think that Gravity's Rainbow is the best book ever written by someone who went on to publish thousands of pages that can't quite keep up with his best work.
Contraluz es una novela compleja, en la que Pynchon entremezcla un gran número de estilos, de personajes y de tramas. No es fácil de seguir, requiere máxima atención para conocer y ubicar a todos los personajes y para para no perderse en los frecuentes cambios de trama, ya que no tiene un hilo principial sino varios secundarios entrelazados. Incluso no tiene un final definitivo, sino varios pequeños cierres histórico-temporales.
Contiene además abundantes referencias que muestran sus vastos conocimientos en materias como la historia y las ciencias. Por deformación profesional me he fijado especialmente en las frecuentes menciones a las matemáticas, que se dan sobre todo durante las apariciones de dos de los (muchos) personajes relevantes, Kit Traverse y Yashmeen Halfcourt, que son precisamente estudiantes de esta disciplina. Esto me ha hecho focalizar parte de mi atención en ellas, intentando relacionarlas y enlazarlas con el resto de la historia: en ocasiones fui capaz de entrever vínculos y nexos, otras veces no parecían tener un significado concreto y en un buen puñado me vi perdido ante parágrafos que ni matemáticamente tenían mucho sentido ni yo conseguía entender el porqué de su aparición en la novela. Y aunque la parte matemática era la que mayor interés me captaba, con el resto de referencias me pasaba igual, variando cada poco mi percepción: de verme lleno de incompresión y estupor a quedar embelesado y maravillado, ya que por momentos es imaginativa, sugerente, extraordinaria, seductora.
Vamos, que me quedo con sensaciones ambivalentes, y no tengo claro, siendo este el primer libro de Pynchon que leo, si quiero dar una oportunidad a otros libros suyos. Seguramente deje pasar un tiempo para que esta lectura repose en mi cabeza, y quizás en algún momento futuro me anime a retomar a este singular autor.
Contiene además abundantes referencias que muestran sus vastos conocimientos en materias como la historia y las ciencias. Por deformación profesional me he fijado especialmente en las frecuentes menciones a las matemáticas, que se dan sobre todo durante las apariciones de dos de los (muchos) personajes relevantes, Kit Traverse y Yashmeen Halfcourt, que son precisamente estudiantes de esta disciplina. Esto me ha hecho focalizar parte de mi atención en ellas, intentando relacionarlas y enlazarlas con el resto de la historia: en ocasiones fui capaz de entrever vínculos y nexos, otras veces no parecían tener un significado concreto y en un buen puñado me vi perdido ante parágrafos que ni matemáticamente tenían mucho sentido ni yo conseguía entender el porqué de su aparición en la novela. Y aunque la parte matemática era la que mayor interés me captaba, con el resto de referencias me pasaba igual, variando cada poco mi percepción: de verme lleno de incompresión y estupor a quedar embelesado y maravillado, ya que por momentos es imaginativa, sugerente, extraordinaria, seductora.
Vamos, que me quedo con sensaciones ambivalentes, y no tengo claro, siendo este el primer libro de Pynchon que leo, si quiero dar una oportunidad a otros libros suyos. Seguramente deje pasar un tiempo para que esta lectura repose en mi cabeza, y quizás en algún momento futuro me anime a retomar a este singular autor.
AtD blasted me away with its scale and swath(e). The fact that he was able to keep that giant mega-ball rolling, doubling, wrapping it all up at the end still amazes me. I've said this other places, but GR is Pynchon's most important novel (to date), M&D is my favorite (oh, the ending Sir, the ending), but AtD is his BEST. Pynchon absolutely doubles down on his paranoia, his doubling, his funk and sizzle. He circumnavigates the globe detailing, explaining, entertaining, and just riffing on whatever he wants to play with.
I'm definitely gonna need to read this again (and again) to make sense of it all, but my god, it's real good. It's so good. Man!