DeLillo vs. Pynchon

[ryansartor]

Which writer do you guys prefer: Don DeLillo or Thomas Pynchon?

I prefer DeLillo myself, but I haven't read enough Pynchon for a fair comparison.

[Ojingeo]

Delillo by a huge margin. I don't really know why the two are compared so much. I guess because they are the major "pomo" writers. But Delillo, at his best, seems to actually care for his characters.

[masterofsparks]

I suppose they're similar for me in that I want to like both of them but just can't make myself enjoy their stuff.

I do like a couple of things by each (Pynchon's "easier" stuff like The Crying of Lot 49 and Inherent Vice, DeLillo's "Pafko At the Wall" piece that was eventually turned into the opening chapter of Underworld). I suppose I'd give the edge to Pynchon just because he at least attempts to have a sense of humor.

[Christina]

I was hoping this was a boxing match.

[masterofsparks]

I was hoping this was a boxing match.

Or a question of which one Orson Welles should play.

[B_Buster]

I suppose I'd give the edge to Pynchon just because he at least attempts to have a sense of humor.

You might want to try DeLillo's End Zone, one of the funniest books around.

[B_Buster]

But Delillo, at his best, seems to actually care for his characters.

You might want to read Pynchon's Mason & Dixon.

[Wes]

I was hoping this was a boxing match.

Pynchon's got military experience and the element of surprise, he'd wreck DeLillo.

[ryansartor]

I suppose I'd give the edge to Pynchon just because he at least attempts to have a sense of humor.

You might want to try DeLillo's End Zone, one of the funniest books around.

Yeah, End Zone is so good and funny. Great Jones Street is really funny, too. But not as funny as End Zone.

[Rick in Salt Lake]

I was hoping this was a boxing match.

Pynchon's got military experience and the element of surprise, he'd wreck DeLillo.

No shit. Since the last known photo of Pynch was decades ago he could just walk up to DeLilo, tell him "Roger Mexico sent me", and cold cock him...

[Greggulator]

Philip Roth is the correct answer.

In all seriousness: I can't get through anything by Pynchon. I really love White Noise. I had to read it in a college class called "American Dreams, American Nightmares" which was taught by a 72-year-old Catholic Priest. It was sort of surreal to hear an older priest lecture about post-modernist American life but really awesome. He ended up becoming a really close friend of mine as a result.

[Rick in Salt Lake]

[

In all seriousness: I can't get through anything by Pynchon.

Umm... Yeah, he can be hard to get into. It took me three attempts to finally work through "Gravity's Rainbow", and you need some occult refernces and all sorts of shit to really get what's going on... Plus Pynchon is by no means nice to his charaters, interested in his charaters, and one might argue whether many of them are characters as flesh out people or just symbols of other, larger things... I (think I) kinda get what you mean, but I'm wondering what Pynchon you've read. But for some reason I still think of the scene in "Gravity's Rainbow" where Slothrop (in accordance with the poisson distribution) is trying to get laid by eating wind gums. I don't know why I find that funny. I've never had them...


On the other hand the encound by (am I correct?) Brigadier General Pudding and the... uh, let's say squat, is not so funny...

[cavorting with nudists]

I really, really love The Crying of Lot 49. This plus the fact that I liked reading about Gravity's Rainbow made me feel like I should love Gravity's Rainbow until I finally gave up on it after the third attempt. I like the idea of it a lot, I'm just not smart enough.  Sad coda: I tried Inherent Vice and gave up on it not because I couldn't follow it but because I thought it was just stupid.

[Rick in Salt Lake]

I like the idea of it a lot, I'm just not smart enough.

Nah, you're smart enough. You just need a bit of help (http://www.amazon.com/Gravitys-Rainbow-Companion-Contexts-Pynchons/dp/0820328073/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1315794034&sr=8-1 and http://www.amazon.com/Pictures-Showing-Happens-Pynchons-Gravitys/dp/0977312798/ref=sr_1_3?ie=UTF8&qid=1315794034&sr=8-3.) Seriously, you can do it. He's not like reading "Gilgamesh" from shattered clay tablets... But it helps to have a slight background in things like the poisson distribution to see the similarities between Slothrop's sexuality and the V2 rocket landings. It's a major point of the novel...

Part of reading "Gravity's Rainbow" is getting how Pynchon uses various imagery and associations and constantly bounces them off each other (i.e.: the gorilla imagery; the bananas; the phallic imagery; erections; Imipolex G, the mysterious erectile material; the cock-like appearance of the  V-2 rocket; IG Farben; (another "i.g." which occur throughout the novel) a toy gorilla, the banana milkshakes early in the novel, Pynchon's fascination with King Kong.. The occult symbolism, the sacrifice near the novel's end, and the sorta sacrifice of the reader as the V-2 lands on them)-- yeah, I think that stuff is more important than the technical shit in it.... Then there are the Orpheus connections with Slothrop and his eventual scattering... It's a bit of tough going, but you can do it...

I tried Inherent Vice and gave up on it not because I couldn't follow it but because I thought it was just stupid.

 Could be. They can't all be winners. I have a copy of "Inherent Vice", I just haven't gotten to it. I know Pynchon has suggested a musical soundtrack to it, however...

[JonFromMaplewood]

I loved Libra and Underworld.  I have never made it through a Thomas Pynchon book.

What I really love about Delillo is the way he writes dialogue.  He has a great ear for it.  The best example I can think of is the middle-aged married couple in Underworld. They engage in conversation but both parties are talking about different things as if they do not hear each other at all...completely orthogonal topics interwoven into an exchange.  So often I feel that conversations in real life between married people turn into exactly this.  I've heard it in my own marriage and I have overheard it in others.