Robert Taylor, 84; critic was man of letters, connections Oct 27, 2009
More than three decades later, colleagues continued to marvel at his ability to write a highly creditable review of Thomas Pynchon s famously dense 750-page novel Gravity s Rainbow in 585 words. As book reviewer, Bob had a perfect stroke, like a great golfer or tennis player, former Globe book editor David Mehegan said. (Boston Globe)
Normal service has been interrupted due to vacation Oct 21, 2009
Am three-fourths of the way through Inherent Vice by Thomas Pynchon. Next up: Beats me. (Atlanta Journal-Constitution -- Sports)
Return of the Cosmic Banditos Oct 7, 2009
If you're a fan of Hunter S. Thompson, Thomas Pynchon, or any other author that has ever claimed a counter culture stake in the sand, this might be up your ally. It's the readable equivalent of a really heavy bender. (Suite101.com)
Page by Page Sep 30, 2009
New bestsellers added this week include The Girl Who Played with Fire by Stieg Larsson; Twenties Girl by Sophie Kinsella; Hot Pursuit by Suzanne Brockmann; Inherent Vice by Thomas Pynchon; Bad Moon Rising by Sherrilyn Kenyon; Rules of Vengeance by Christopher Reich; The Traffickers by W.E.B. Griffin; and That Old Cape Magic by Richard Russo. Though reading is always important, communication is just as important. (McKinney Courier-Gazette, TX)
Literature: A reader’s feast, but why? Sep 23, 2009
But it s hard to imagine that writers as diverse as Richard Russo, E.L. Doctorow, Thomas Pynchon, and Pat Conroy are responding to either motivation. No, this extraordinary confluence of big names may just be a coincidence - a random harmonic convergence. (Boston Globe)
Author Hopes 'genius Grant' Will Shine On Haiti Sep 23, 2009
Previous authors to win the MacArthur grant include Thomas Pynchon, David Foster Wallace and Andrea Barrett. Paul Farmer, the recently named U.N. deputy special envoy for Haiti, was picked in 1993 in large part for his work as a physician in Haiti. (CBS News -- World)
Thomas Pynchon’s new novel may whet some appetites Sep 23, 2009
Thomas Pynchon s new novel may whet some appetites - The Boston Globe ... The most potent smell in Thomas Pynchon s new novel comes from joints, and not the kind found in butcher shops. (Boston Globe)
In Pynchon’s tales, music is the backbeat Sep 20, 2009
Thomas Pynchon s novels are like a giant jukebox just waiting to happen. Some of the songs are real, some are imaginary. (Boston Globe)
Short Cuts, Michael Wood, London Review of Books Sep 17, 2009
The Amazing Thomas Pynchon. Michael Wood devours James Meeks new novel. (Harper's Magazine)
Fall feast for fiction lovers Sep 13, 2009
Thomas Pynchon, Pat Conroy, and E.L. Doctorow have all published recently. It s enough to make a voracious reader swoon. (Boston Globe)
Campy gore, stoner noir provide guilty pleasure Sep 6, 2009
Think of Inherent Vice as Thomas Pynchon Lite ... INHERENT VICE By Thomas Pynchon Penguin Audio, unabridged fiction, 12 CDs, 15 hours, $39. (Boston Globe)
Interview with Award Winning Writer... Sep 5, 2009
A. Charles Dickens, Joan Didion, Iain Banks, Kurt Vonnegut Jr., F. Scott Fitzgerald, Charles M. Schulz, Stephen King, Thomas Pynchon, Elmore Leonard, Prentice J. Ovoid, Janet Hobhouse, John Updike; I could go on forever but I won t bore you any further. Also Prentice J. Ovoid isn t real, I just made him up. (Suite101.com)
Invaluable insight on how to find right college Sep 1, 2009
Aside from being the alma mater of Thomas Pynchon, Oyster Bay High is no more than a reasonably good public school "with kids from all backgrounds," Marcus says. Its edge is Smith, a man keenly aware of every aspect and angle of the application process and deeply committed to his students. (Honolulu Advertiser)
Good Books Dont Have to Be Hard, Lev Grossman, The Wall Street Journal Sep 1, 2009
Look at Thomas Pynchon in "Inherent Vice" he has swapped his usual cumbersome verbal calisthenics for the more maneuverable chassis of a hard-boiled detective novel. This is the future of fiction. (Harper's Magazine)
Best Sellers Aug 23, 2009
Inherent Vice, Thomas Pynchon, Penguin Press, 27. 95. (Albany Democrat-Herald, OR)
Richard Poirier; literary critic and writer who founded Library of America Aug 22, 2009
He also wrote about the impact of Vietnam on the culture and the significance of the 1960s revolution, and he once compared Bette Midler s command of parody to that of the writers Mailer, Ralph Ginzburg, and Thomas Pynchon. In a 1968 essay in the Atlantic Monthly, he asserted that the nation was at war with its restive young. (Boston Globe)
Jihad bling bling Aug 14, 2009
The beach, near the salt banks of Saintes-Maries-de-la-Mer, sports a motley crew of gypsies, bikers, dopers, losers, fake rastas, anarchists, trailer park trashers and nudists as if they all had sprung up from Inherent Vice, by Thomas Pynchon, the definitive novel of the summer of 2009. Nostradamus - who was born in Saint-Remy-de-Provence in 1503 - didn't bother to predict the arrival of jihad bling bling. (Asia Times Online)
The disappearance of August Aug 11, 2009
Now literary bigfeet like Richard Russo, E.L Doctorow, Tracy Kidder, Thomas Pynchon, and Pat Conroy are flocking to the shelves. The fall is so crowded and intimidating, explains literary agent Esmond Harmsworth. (Boston Globe)
INHERENT VICE Aug 9, 2009
In the three novels that made his reputation -- "V.," "The Crying of Lot 49" and the National Book Award winner "Gravity's Rainbow" -- Thomas Pynchon used his electric imagination to whip paranoid conspiracies into a froth that bubbled with dread and comedy. Now it's four books later and his fictive powers suggest not tour de force but Tourette's. (New York Post -- Opinions)
Has Thomas Pynchon Given Up on Being a Serious Novelist? Aug 4, 2009
Thomas Pynchon's Inherent Vice ... "In this lively yarn, Thomas Pynchon, working in an unaccustomed genre, provides a classic illustration of the principle that if you can remember the sixties, you weren't there or if you were there, then you or, wait, is it " Once again, for his seventh novel, , it sounds as if the author has furnished his own jacket copy, exploiting the doper humor that's often been part of his signature. (Slate)
Wilder Women Aug 3, 2009
Rose and Laura Wilder and the Little House stories : The New Yorker. Bulletin, Fremont Older, John Miller, Becoming Laura Ingalls Wilder , Biographies, Pamela Smith Hill, Laura Ingalls Wilder: A Life , Pioneers, Saturday Evening Post, (Pres. (New Yorker)
Entertainment Weekly's Picks of the Week Aug 3, 2009
New Thomas Pynchon novel is a detective tale with heart ... "Infinite Vice" by Thomas Pynchon (out Tuesday) ... The name "Thomas Pynchon" usually evokes thoughts of a reclusive genius who every few years blesses M.F.A. hipsters and Mensa applicants with intricately layered postmodern behemoths. (CNN -- Showbiz)
Anthony Lane: “Cold Souls” and “Not Quite Hollywood.” Aug 3, 2009
Coyote v. Acme; Thomas Pynchon. wants to see Bill Clinton unleashed. (New Yorker)
Pynchon’s ‘Inherent Vice’ delivers manic requiem for ’60s-’70s Aug 2, 2009
In a way, I suppose, you could say that Thomas Pynchon has gone on holiday to write a playful private eye story ... INHERENT VICE By Thomas Pynchon Penguin, 369 pp. (Boston Globe)
Thomas Pynchon's Magical Mystery Tour Aug 1, 2009
Thomas Pynchon's Inherent Vice: A Magical Mystery Tour - TIME ... After the vast tundra of his last book, Against the Day, which was a thousand-plus pages, with more than a hundred or so scurrying characters and a shape-shifting plot that went everywhere and nowhere, Thomas Pynchon has decided to give his fan base a break. (Time.com)
Joan Acocella: Should we hate Judas Iscariot? Jul 30, 2009
Thomas Pynchon; Michael Savage. The British leave Iraq. (New Yorker)
A Cappella Books opening at midnight for Thomas Pynchon (not Harry Potter) Jul 29, 2009
Tonight, this weekend, May 5th. Tonight, this weekend, May 5th. (Atlanta Journal-Constitution -- Living)
Louis Menand: Pynchon’s stoned detective. Jul 29, 2009
Thomas Pynchon's Inherent Vice review : The New Yorker ... Lew Archer is Ross Macdonald s private eye; Mike Hammer is Mickey Spillane s. Thomas Pynchon s is named Larry (Doc) Sportello. (New Yorker)
A touch of class Jul 5, 2009
If someone's ever looked down their nose at you for expressing a preference for Britney over Bach or Tom Clancy over Thomas Pynchon you'll know what he's on about. The Work of Nations: Preparing Ourselves for 21st-Century Capitalism, by Robert B. Reich, A.A. Knopf, 1991. (The Age, Australia -- Features)
interview with Michael Moorcock Jun 19, 2009
"? Pretty much now. There might be a little bit of tweaking in future, but nothing special. In fact I've done the reverse with the current Del Rey Elric books where I've republished them in their original order. At least where fantasy books are concerned. But I suspect if I ever had the time I'd do some revision on the Pyat books and maybe a little on Mother London. Which artist has best depicted your idea of Elric? I'm partial to Micheal Whelan. I love Whelan's stuff but his Elric's just a... (Harper's Magazine)
Save the Salinger Archives! Jun 6, 2009
It reminds me of radio talker John Calvin Batchelor's brilliant stunt: a mock-scholarly speculative essay published in the mid-'70s considering whether Salinger was Thomas Pynchon, who would then have been not a recluse but a pseudonym. . (Slate)
Stay cool and delve into a good book this summer Jun 4, 2009
"Inherent Vice," Thomas Pynchon. Another National Book Award winner blends noir and the psychedelic 60s. (La Crosse Tribune, WI)
Summer Arts Preview May 18, 2009
Thomas Pynchon returns with Inherent Vice, Hayao Miyazaki is back with Ponyo, Willie Nelson resumes with The Nearness of You, and more ... TIME's top critics survey this summer's not-to-be-missed arts events from Bruno to Lil Wayne, from Harry Potter to Thomas Pynchon. (Time.com)
Ian M. Banks May 3, 2009
George Lucas, Alistair MacLean, Ken MacLeod, The Marx Brothers, Herman Melville, Sid Meier, Spike Milligan, Alan Moore (Watchmen and The Voice of the Fire), New Worlds magazine in its quarterly paperback incarnation between 1971 and 1975, Mervyn Peake (the Ghormenghast trilogy), various Plays For Today on BBC TV during the sixties (the only one I can remember the title of was, I think, called The Last Train Through the Harecastle Tunnel ) plus lots of TV in general - especially series like The... (Suite101.com)
'Harry Potter' among those missing from e-library Apr 30, 2009
No e-books are available from such living authors as Thomas Pynchon, Guenter Grass and Cynthia Ozick, or from the late Studs Terkel, Roberto Bolano and Saul Bellow. Only a handful, or less, have come out from Paul Bowles, Hunter S. Thompson and James Baldwin. (USA Today -- Tech)
Olbermann's Plastic Ivy Mar 13, 2009
Among the graduates of the Ivy League Cornell are Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Thomas Pynchon, Paul Wolfowitz, E.B. White, Sanford I. Weill, Floyd Abrams, Kurt Vonnegut, Douglas Ginsburg, Janet Reno, Henry Heimlich and Harold Bloom. Graduates of the ag school include David LeNeveu of the Anaheim Ducks, Mitch Carefoot of the Phoenix RoadRunners, Darren Eliot, former professional hockey player, and Joe Nieuwendyk, multiple Stanley Cup winner. (Human Events Online)
The Importance of Word Choice Feb 22, 2009
Fantods appear also in Mark Twain's work and in that of Thomas Pynchon: "...it was always easy, in open and lonely places, to be visited by Panic wilderness fear, but these are the urban fantods here, that come to get you when you are lost or isolated inside the way time is passing" ... (Thomas Pynchon: The Art of Allusion. (Suite101.com)
