Did you guys know that Thomas Pynchon is a former racist?
He admits to it and other prejudices in his shocking introduction to Slow Learner. How are we to reconcile the racial hatred of Thomas Pynchon with the goofy persona he's crafted for himself? Is this why he hides from the public -- out of shame?
This is some seriously gross and concerning stuff.
While I hate Thomas Pynchon I wouldn't classify it as racial hatred, but rather as personal hatred. Perhaps even literary hatred.
>>7376582
>Modern readers will be, at least, put off by an unacceptable level of racist, sexist and proto-Fascist talk throughout this story. I wish I could say that this is only Pig Bodine's voice, but, sad to say, it was also my own at the time. The best I can say for it now is that, for its time, it is probably authentic enough. John Kennedy's role model James Bond was about to make his name by kicking third-world people around, another extension of the boy's adventure tales a lot of us grew up reading. There had prevailed for a while a set of assumptions and distinctions, unvoiced and unquestioned, best captured years later in the '70's television character Archie Bunker.
>It may yet turn out that racial differences are not as basic as questions of money and power, but have served a useful purpose, often in the interest of those who deplore them most, in keeping us divided and so relatively poor and powerless. This having been said, however, the narrative voice in this story here remains that of a smart-assed jerk who didn't know any better, and I apologize for it.
No it's not disconcerting because he admits to it and has changed. Nearly everyone starts out racist.
>>7376582
Eh, everybody is a little bit racist. And if he's a former racist, then I don't see why anybody should give him shit for it. It's something he's already come to see as wrong and has abandoned.
It's very dull-witted to assault people for things that are no longer relevant.
Shit nigga, we better knock him outta the /lit/ canon pronto, put Butler on the meme tree logis, who's with me
>>7376582
Am i the only one around here that wouldnt be bothered if the author I was reading is or was a racist
>>7376582
Nobody cares because Pynchon's positions in all of his more mature work are so obviously different from his edgy kid phase. Only histrionic tumblrites (who don't read Pynchon anyway outside of Lot 49 for class) act like having an edgy teen phase is an unforgivable offense.
>>7376624
I assume everybody has at least one fault I don't like. Also I think there's a disconnect between creator and creation. For example, I hate Dali's paintings, but Dali was a pretty cool guy. And vice versa, just because someone's an asshole doesn't mean he can't create things I like.
>>7376628
HA! I also almost wrote tumblrite too, but I corrected myself. Mostly because I'm wondering if there was a group of people who were like that before, or is it new because -the internet sees all- kind of thing?
>responding to a b8 thread
>not ignoring/saging
>caring about racism
>>7376636
There were but only in settings where they could gain social standing through their outrage. That was a pretty limited number of spaces before the internet let the outrage-contests reach global Olympic levels.
The knowledge of his past prejudices certainly forces us to reconsider some of his more inflammatory writing, especially in his novel Gravity's Rainbow. Take for example this passage:
"If Slothrop follows that harp down the toilet it'll have to be headfirst, which is not so good, cause it leaves his ass up in the air helpless, and with Negroes around that's just what a fella doesn't want, his face down in some fetid unknown darkness and brown fingers, strong and sure, all at once undoing his belt, unbuttoning his fly, strong hands holding his legs apart—and he feels the cold Lysol air on his thighs as down come the boxer shorts too, now, with the colorful bass lures and trout flies on them. He struggles to work himself farther into the toilet hole as dimly, up through the smelly water, comes the sound of a whole dark gang of awful Negroes come yelling happily into the white men's room, converging on poor wriggling Slothrop, jiving around the way they do singing, "Slip the talcum to me, Malcolm!" And the voice that replies is who but that Red, the shoeshine boy who's slicked up Slothrop's black patents a dozen times down on his knees jes poppin' dat rag to beat the band . . . now Red the very tall, skinny, extravagantly conked redhead Negro shoeshine boy who's just been "Red" to all the Harvard fellas—"Say Red, any of those Sheiks in the drawer?" "How 'bout another luck-changin' phone number there, Red?"—this Negro whose true name now halfway down the toilet comes at last to Slothrop's hearing—as a thick finger with a gob of very slippery jelly or cream comes sliding down the crack now toward his asshole, chevroning the hairs along like topo lines up a river valley—the true name is Malcolm, and all the black cocks know him, Malcolm, have known him all along—Red Malcolm the Unthinkable Nihilist sez, "Good golly he sure is all asshole ain't he?" Jeepers Slothrop, what a position for you to be in! Even though he has succeeded in getting far enough down now so that only his legs protrude and his buttocks heave and wallow just under the level of the water like pallid domes of ice. Water splashes, cold as the rain outside, up the walls of the white bowl. "Grab him 'fo' he gits away!" "Yowzah!" Distant hands clutch after his calves and ankles, snap his garters and tug at the argyle sox Mom knitted for him to go to Harvard in, but these insulate so well, or he has progressed so far down the toilet by now, that he can hardly feel the hands at all. ...
Then he has shaken them off, left the last Negro touch back up there and is free, slick as a fish, with his virgin asshole preserved. Now some folks might say whew, thank God for that, and others moaning a little, aw shucks, but Slothrop doesn't say much of anything cause he didn't feel much of anything. A-and there's still no sign of his lost harp."
>>7376679
Now traditionally this passage is thought to represent white America's fear of black independence and the black civil rights movement. But what if, as the introduction to Slow Learner suggests, this fear is not simply a white American fear but a personal fear that Pynchon himself experienced and then translated to literature when writing this passage in a drug-fueled haze? It's hardly an extreme position to take, considering the psychological detail and deep anxiety that is given to this passage. It's also worth noting that it's experienced by the typical Pynchonian protagonist himself rather than by a safe antagonist figure like Major Marvy or Blicero. Is Pynchon explicating on his own racial anxieties here? I think that it's certainly possible and bears examination
>>7376641
r u new? Bait threads are among the most popular ones here.
I know this is /lit/ and everyone here's exceptionally well read, but pick up some Flannery or Mark Twain if you want to see some real dicey racial language. Both are considered masters ... hell Twain is an icon here. Pinecone has never struck me as capable of hating people based on race
>>7376582
we allah go through that stage
>>7376679
hmm interesting post
Didn't he write a fierce essay on the Watts riots, condemning everyday racism? Prior to his major works?
