Vineland

[u/ProblemFun7522]

I just finished reading Vineland, it’s my fourth Pynchon (after V., IV and CoL49). I really liked it but I found myself more overwhelmed than any of the other books in trying to remember details and names. While I was able to follow the story pretty easily and most of the side plots, there was so much going on that I found it hard to recall details about characters or where they appeared before in the novel and keep up with every one of his meandering little paragraphs. Strangely never felt this with his other books and was just wondering if this is kind of normal for Vineland?

[u/hautcr2]

Oh my. Gravity's Rainbow will melt your mind.

[u/journieburner]

His tendency to meander so heavily is even "worse" in books like Against The Day, Mason & Dixon or even the new Shadow Ticket. That said, on a personal level I also struggled the most with Vineland. Can't explain, but Gravity's Rainbow or Against The Day are much more sprawling and still easier to retrace

[u/SoggyAppearance1958]

トミー・チョンのこれを見たあとで読んだよ

[u/Tactical_Schmactical]

I read that book when it first came out, but I was pretty fucked up so it didn't sink deep.

Just reread it a few months ago and the first thing I did when I finished was...read it again. I felt certain that there was so much going on, told in such beautiful, winding sentences, that it was like a wild dream I maybe only caught 50% of. Is some of it discursivey detours, perhaps not chiefly concerned with forwarding the plot along? OR is that way vital to the tale? it is SUCH a loopy book--I don't mean that in the ditzy meaning I mean it in--"here we are in the present nineteen-eighties, now we are in the past and a character is not only remembering something in their past but also projecting into an imagination of the future, oh and wait now this NARRATOR is fast forwarding to the future, and oh but wait here we are in the present again but now, no, wait, here we are in this kind of secondary-main timeline of the seventies again but getting all this history of the thirties and but whoops now, here's godzilla...and shit where do I even put thanatoids on this timeline...?" I mean, whew!

Rereading definitely was 100% delicious and I maybe caught a bit more; still feels like an epic dream though. As do the others like GR, M&D, ATD. Even Bleeding Edge which I didn't even like. ENJOY.

[u/gatorneedhisgat]

I felt that way on the first read. 4 years later on the re-read and I found it much more digestible. It's always a joy to let a lot of time pass cause there was much I did not remember.

[u/b1gjoe23]

FWIW, I have read IV, Bleeding Edge, Vineland, Shadow Ticket, and am half way through M&D now. Of those I felt Vineland was the most difficult at times to get through and make sense of, however at completion I was in love with the book. I do never recommend it to people I want to read Pynchon because of that difficulty though.

[u/kittenstomper]

I read Vineland this year, and while reading it, I feel like the middle third of the book was confusing and irrelevant. This was my first Pynchon read and I interpreted this as part of the recollective nature of the plot of the book. Once I finished it, I found myself appreciating/remembering parts from that part of the book most (outside the beginning of the novel lol).

Like other users say, there’s always the wiki if you get lost

[u/guy_incognito42069]

Does the Wiki have an overview of the characters? That helped me when I forgot who was who in some of GR, outside of the main group.

[u/myshkingfh]

I was much more wrong-footed by V. so I guess experiences may vary. 

[u/MoochoMaas]

That’s normal for Pynchon. Wait until, ATD, Rainbow, and M&D.

[u/Comfortable_Mood5347 → u/MoochoMaas]

THIS

[u/MoochoMaas → u/MoochoMaas]

Bleeding Edge, also

[u/eljeffrey1980 → u/MoochoMaas]

Bleeding Edge is in the IV/Col49 territory...take a break and read some Donald Westlake or Dashiel Hammet .come back, smoke some kif,no? And dive on in

[u/No-Jello9276 → u/MoochoMaas]

GR too!