http://www.boston.com/news/globe/ideas/articles/2003/10/19/pynchon_and_homer/
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Pynchon and Homer
By Joshua Glenn, Globe Staff, 10/19/2003
BACK IN JUNE, we expressed surprise that the famously reclusive novelist Thomas Pynchon had contributed a foreword to a new reissue of George Orwell's "Nineteen Eighty-Four." Just a few weeks later, however, the online diarist responsible for the website Ohdog.org reported another unexpected Pynchon sighting. While supervising a voiceover for a lipstick commercial in New York on July 24, the diarist, a TV editor, learned that a "chatty" Pynchon had been in the same studio that day recording a guest appearance for "The Simpsons."
This may have struck some Pynchon-philes as an unlikely story. After all, in his ongoing efforts to resist being co-opted by an all-absorbing System, Pynchon has not only eschewed interviews, bookstore signings, and publicity photos. He has also refused to permit any representation of his likeness to appear on the television screen. When a Pynchon sighting became a plot point in a 1994 episode of NBC's "The John Larroquette Show," the show's producers sent Pynchon the script for his approval; the novelist reportedly vetoed a final scene that called for an extra playing him to be filmed from behind, walking away.
So why "The Simpsons"? Perhaps Pynchon was flattered by a May 2002 episode in which Lisa Simpson is bowled over by a college girl carrying one of his more difficult books. LISA (awed): "Are you reading `Gravity's Rainbow'?" COLLEGE GIRL (snidely): "Well, rereading."
"Simpsons" writer and executive producer Al Jean confirmed in a recent interview with the entertainment website IGN.com that Pynchon will indeed play himself on a show in the new 15th season, which begins next month. In the episode in question, a novel by blue-coiffed homemaker Marge Simpson wins endorsements from Pynchon and airport-novel writer Tom Clancy, among others.
According to Al Jean, the cartoon version of Pynchon will be wearing a paper bag over his head.
© Copyright 2003 Globe Newspaper Company.
― jed_ (jed), Wednesday, 14 January 2004 22:45 (twenty years ago) link
― Leee Majors (Leee), Wednesday, 14 January 2004 22:54 (twenty years ago) link
http://ohdog.org/2003_07_20_archive.html#105909512453146716
― jed_ (jed), Wednesday, 14 January 2004 22:56 (twenty years ago) link
― andrew s, Wednesday, 14 January 2004 23:03 (twenty years ago) link
― gygax! (gygax!), Wednesday, 14 January 2004 23:08 (twenty years ago) link
― Leee Majors (Leee), Wednesday, 14 January 2004 23:13 (twenty years ago) link
― Casuistry (Chris P), Wednesday, 14 January 2004 23:25 (twenty years ago) link
"yep...he'll be on the next episode (FABF05 "Diartribe of a Mad Housewife) airing on the 25th. we recorded him a while ago in New York and gearing up to get him again for another episode."
― gygax! (gygax!), Wednesday, 14 January 2004 23:27 (twenty years ago) link
― Martin Skidmore (Martin Skidmore), Wednesday, 14 January 2004 23:30 (twenty years ago) link
― Fat Alberet (nordicskilla), Wednesday, 14 January 2004 23:31 (twenty years ago) link
― Katie Holmes (Leee), Wednesday, 14 January 2004 23:35 (twenty years ago) link
― tokyo rosemary (rosemary), Wednesday, 14 January 2004 23:59 (twenty years ago) link
Only if they do it on the S.F. Giants locker room.
― jaymc (jaymc), Thursday, 15 January 2004 00:03 (twenty years ago) link
― Fat Alberet (nordicskilla), Thursday, 15 January 2004 00:04 (twenty years ago) link
― gygax! (gygax!), Thursday, 15 January 2004 00:09 (twenty years ago) link
Carry Carrie on.
― Leee Majors (Leee), Thursday, 15 January 2004 07:11 (twenty years ago) link
― Julio Desouza (jdesouza), Thursday, 15 January 2004 12:22 (twenty years ago) link
― Leee Majors (Leee), Friday, 16 January 2004 05:46 (twenty years ago) link
― Julio Desouza (jdesouza), Friday, 16 January 2004 09:00 (twenty years ago) link
― Leee Majors (Leee), Monday, 26 January 2004 01:25 (twenty years ago) link
― sym (shmuel), Monday, 26 January 2004 04:39 (twenty years ago) link
― @d@ml (nordicskilla), Monday, 26 January 2004 04:45 (twenty years ago) link
― @d@ml (nordicskilla), Monday, 26 January 2004 04:46 (twenty years ago) link
― o. nate (onate), Monday, 26 January 2004 05:29 (twenty years ago) link
― sym (shmuel), Monday, 26 January 2004 05:30 (twenty years ago) link
It was very funny. The opening sequence almost made me pee my pants, and Ned-Flanders-in-Marge's-imagination what with his flowing locks seemed oddly reminiscent of another Ned entirely.
― nickalicious (nickalicious), Monday, 26 January 2004 14:07 (twenty years ago) link
http://www.geocities.com/turnipfish1/maison.txthttp://www.geocities.com/turnipfish1/cuisine.txthttp://www.geocities.com/turnipfish1/cuisine1.txthttp://www.geocities.com/turnipfish1/escalier.txthttp://www.geocities.com/turnipfish1/foyer.txthttp://www.geocities.com/turnipfish1/sallemanger.txthttp://www.geocities.com/turnipfish1/salon.txt
― Matt DC (Matt DC), Monday, 26 January 2004 14:10 (twenty years ago) link
― Huggy Dork (Kingfish), Monday, 26 January 2004 14:13 (twenty years ago) link
― stevem (blueski), Monday, 26 January 2004 14:24 (twenty years ago) link
― Huggy Dork (Kingfish), Monday, 26 January 2004 14:29 (twenty years ago) link
― nickalicious (nickalicious), Monday, 26 January 2004 14:32 (twenty years ago) link
Hmmm.
― Ned Raggett (Ned), Monday, 26 January 2004 16:13 (twenty years ago) link
― Leee Majors (Leee), Monday, 26 January 2004 18:40 (twenty years ago) link
― Jordan (Jordan), Monday, 26 January 2004 18:42 (twenty years ago) link
― Leee Majors (Leee), Monday, 26 January 2004 18:46 (twenty years ago) link
― nickalicious (nickalicious), Monday, 26 January 2004 19:53 (twenty years ago) link
― beekman, Monday, 26 January 2004 20:14 (twenty years ago) link
― Leee Majors (Leee), Saturday, 31 January 2004 18:19 (twenty years ago) link
― ModJ (ModJ), Saturday, 31 January 2004 18:42 (twenty years ago) link
― Leeeter van den Hoogenband (Leee), Wednesday, 17 November 2004 02:47 (nineteen years ago) link
― hockey family (Jody Beth Rosen), Wednesday, 17 November 2004 02:49 (nineteen years ago) link
http://www.nytimes.com/2014/11/23/books/review/gravitys-rainbow-read-by-george-guidall.html?_r=1
:O
― j., Saturday, 22 November 2014 03:28 (nine years ago) link
i really don't know how to feel about the writing there. it feels ostentatious and derivative.
so i googled the writer and realized he's associated with he of the pink shirt (http://www.nytimes.com/2013/04/14/opinion/sunday/the-trauma-of-the-pink-shirt.htmll) and maybe that justifies my feeling?
― a total laugh package (s.clover), Saturday, 22 November 2014 04:47 (nine years ago) link
why would you write about pynchon that way? it just reminds me that you're not as good a writer as pynchon, i mean...
― a total laugh package (s.clover), Saturday, 22 November 2014 04:48 (nine years ago) link
i never read it but is he not the celebrated author of 'c'?
― j., Saturday, 22 November 2014 04:53 (nine years ago) link
yes.
it doesn't seem too bad to me - one thing that his recent review of Ulysses in the LRB showed is that he's using his critical writing either as an expression of obsessions or a manifesto, that's to say an obsession with data and information, esp the form of writing or materials of communication, being a vehicle of transmutation, of translation in its widest sense - things suffering sea changes. (here "contrafluvial parsing" and "invasive transformation")
that feels a bit forced here - GR is copious and its images and the grotesquerie of its visions that sits in the way of "theory fiction". but I think he makes a good fist of it - it's clearly a piece by a fan reveling in the novel's plenty, which helps.
― Fizzles, Saturday, 22 November 2014 09:32 (nine years ago) link
Why wouldn't you write about Pynchon in that way if you could?
Not my way my whole way through but it makes me want to pick it up again.
I was trying to think of examples of "theory fiction". I suppose that is how he sees his own work, at the least.
― xyzzzz__, Saturday, 22 November 2014 11:18 (nine years ago) link