Is there an equation or method by which you can predict how tangled a cord can become? Maybe based on variables like number of cords, length of each cord, and if one end of the chord is fixed, and so on? By ‘how tangled’ maybe the number of knots formed: is it a unknot, 1-knot, 3-knot…
On page 32 Orin quotes to hal the first lyric to I Want To Tell You (my personal favourite revolver track)
Hal then quotes to Orin the next line: I don’t mind, I could wait forever [I’ve got time].
Then on page 927 the reader is following the character Don Gately as he is unable to speak while hospitalised. There is a reference to some elusive ‘Dr Robert’ perhaps referencing another Revolver song, Dr Robert.
Infinite Jest is a very psychedelic novel with themes surrounding the nature of communication so it’s no surprise to see Wallace give a cool nod to it here, so deep into a work of fiction.
Thought I’d blog my initial thoughts as I read this gargantuan novel. Just finished the second chapter and now I’m up to page 23.
We get introduced to the Chums of Chance aboard the massive blimp, The Inconvenience. The COC seem to be a roving band of air-fairing nomads*:* We have Randolph St Cosmo (Captain), Darby Suckling (baby of the crew), Lindsay Noseworth (2nd-in-command), Miles Blundell (Handyman Apprentice), Chick Counterfly (newest member) and Pugnax (a literate rescue dog). This immediately sprung to mind Scooby Doo, but I have no clue as to the true inspiration. Throughout this first chapter we get a peak at the idiosyncrasies of each member, and the chemistry between them aboard Inconvenience. My favourite moment is Randolph explaining the drop in temperature with altitude to Chick:
“Here it is in a nutshell,” Randolph confided later. “Going up is like going north.”
“But,” it occurred to Chick, “if you keep going far enough north, eventually you pass over the Pole, and then you’re heading south again.”
“Yes.”
“So… if you went high enough, you’d be going down again?”
“Shh!”
“Approaching the surface of another planet, maybe?”
“Not exactly. No. Another ‘surface’, but an Earthly one. Often to our regret, all to Earthly. More than that, I am reluctant—“
“These are mysteries of the profession,” Chick supposed.
“You’ll see. In time, of course.” (p. 10)
This is rather elusive to me—and seems like foreshadowing, perhaps (?). I look forward to see, in time.
Chapter two follows how the CoC eventually land in Chicago for the 1893 World Fair, but not before nearly crashing into the ground due to a mechanical blunder by Blundell. Here we get a look at the lads on the ground, how they sing songs, cook food; they partake in culture. We get a little peak into Chick’s backstory from the American South. Then it ends with the CoC running into another group of air nomads, the Bindlestiffs of the Blue AC. My favourite moment is when Darby kisses Penny, I laughed at the cuteness of it.
Pynchon also uses a lot of cool words in these first pages; my favourite thus far:
Olfactory
Absquatulated
Astern
Effluvia
Lackadaisically
Insouciance
Adroitly
My thoughts after only 23 pages in is that I love the characterisation so far, and I can see that, with the rapid pace fire of introductions to characters, this is going to be another post modern maximalist rollercoaster. I don’t really have any grand ideas of themes running around in my head atp, just going to enjoy the ride for now!
The amount of connections I made and info that I’ve retained the second time around is absolutely insane. This novel is now one of my favourites of all time, up there with The Brothers Karamazov. It’s a shame that this book has such a strange negative connotation to it, given the thoughtfulness and effort poured into it. I’m going to miss following the characters so much now that it is all over (although the ending leaves so much open).
From Hal’s figurance to Mario’s Christlike holiness, from Gately’s heroism to Lyle’s nuggets of Wisdom, from Kate Gompert’s description of depression to Lucien getting a boom down his throat, this novel is a psychedelic trip minus the DMZ 🍄
I’m going to be thinking about this novel for the rest of my life.
Hey Yall, I have created a sister subreddit solely for discourse on Gravity’s Rainbow, as well as for the upcoming reading group for it, Gravity’s Fall. Weekly updates will be posted there as well as discord once it begins on September 1st!
Hey yall, just letting everyone know that in one month’s time on September 1st, we will be hosting a Gravity’s Rainbow Read along on Discord. I would be honoured for as many people here to attend so that we can dissect and enjoy one of Pynchon’s most iconic novels!
Hey guys, just posting to let everyone know that I am hosting the inaugural and hopefully annual read along of Gravity’s Rainbow starting this fall on September 1st! So please, if you are new to Pynchon or looking to reread GR, I would love for as many people as possible to join in!
‘Why wouldst thou be a breeder of sinners? I am myself indifferent honest; but yet I could accuse me of such things that it were better my mother had not borne me: I am very proud, revengeful, ambitious, with more offences at my beck than I have thoughts to put them in, imagination to give them shape, or time to act them in. What should such fellows as I do crawling between earth and heaven? We are arrant knaves, all; believe none of us. Go thy ways to a nunnery.’ -Hamlet to Ophelia
In my life, credited to Lennon McCartney but mostly in Lennon’s favour, is to me, a perfect song. Every aspect of this song is perfect. But the lyrics and harmonies are transcendental. Goosebumps. The lyrics are so insanely beautiful I can’t believe it was written by a man so young. Idc if it’s cliche or over-said or over played. And the bridge! Omg! This song for me cannot be over played or overstated. Truly truly the best beatles song and a true 10/10 song!
She gave a pubic lecture in Paris, 1892 which then got published as an essay The Pain of Living:
https://talk.r.zapp.ir/original/4X/0/5/9/05919c09e4a8a029ef53f22723f4b4c5a15767d3.pdf
Honestly I cannot believe this album is 1965. When I first heard this song come on, it immediately felt different to me than anything else, and thats just how about every other song on rubber soul felt for me
‘Gately's snapped to the fact that people of a certain age and level of life experience believe they're immortal: college students and alcoholics/addicts are the worst. They deep down believe they're exempt from the laws of physics and statistics that ironically govern everybody else. They'll piss and moan your ear off if somebody else fucks with the rules, but they don't deep down see themselves as subject to them, the same rules.
And they're constitutionally unable to learn from anybody else's experience: if some jaywalking B.U. student does get splattered on Comm. Ave. or some House resident does get his car towed at 0005, your other student's or addict's response to this will be to ponder just what imponderable difference makes it possible for that other guy to get splattered, or towed, and not him, the ponderer. They never doubt the difference—they just ponder it. It's like a kind of idolatry of uniqueness.
It's unvarying and kind of spirit-killing for a Staffer to watch, that the only way your addict ever learns anything is the hard way. It has to happen to them to upset the idolatry.’
(604)
One of the fundamental questions that Wallace asks the reader (literally through the character of Marathe) is this: What will you worship?
One answer is: ‘I will worship the self. I will worship the individual’
This is a very American Exceptionalist, solipsistic answer and we can see the cracks in the longevity of it. Of course, no one is exempt from the laws of physics. If you worship yourself, you become delusional and selfish. You cannot care to think or act beyond yourself, and ironically this is actually worse for you in the long run. When people worship the self, they become irresponsible and unbearable. They make the world colder and more dangerous than it has to be.
I increasingly view natalism as a consequence of insufficient metacognition.
By metacognition, I mean the ability to step outside one's immediate desires and examine them critically. It is the difference between feeling something and asking why one feels it. It is the difference between wanting something and asking whether that want is morally justified.
The desire to reproduce is among the most powerful drives human beings possess. Yet many people never seriously interrogate it. Instead, the desire itself is treated as evidence of its own legitimacy. Having children feels meaningful, fulfilling, natural, and right; therefore having children is meaningful, fulfilling, natural, and right.
This is a category error. A feeling is a psychological fact, not a moral argument.
Metacognition begins when a person recognizes that their intuitions are not self-validating. The fact that evolution has equipped us with a desire to reproduce does not tell us whether reproduction is ethically justified. It only explains why the desire exists in the first place.
From my perspective, natalism often rests on a failure to make this distinction. The impulse to reproduce is accepted at face value rather than subjected to moral scrutiny. The conclusion is reached before the reasoning begins, and the reasoning arrives afterward to defend it.
Once the desire is examined rather than assumed, difficult questions emerge. Why is it permissible to expose another person to aging, suffering, loss, disease, and death without their consent? Why should the satisfaction of an existing person's desires outweigh the risks imposed on a future person? Why is creating a life presumed good when the created individual must bear every consequence of that decision?
I have yet to encounter a natalist answer that survives this scrutiny. The more deeply I examine the assumptions underlying procreation, the more it appears that natalism depends not on moral reasoning but on the unexamined authority of an ancient biological impulse.
The fact that something feels right is not evidence that it is right. Metacognition begins when we stop treating those two things as synonymous.
‘Because no shit I really have to sleep here in a second. So listen — one way to lower the flag to half-mast is just to lower the flag. There's another way though. You can also just raise the pole. You can raise the pole to like twice its original height. You get me? You understand what I mean, Mario?’ (42)
Mario thinks of a steel pole raised to double its designed height and clips his shoulder on the green steel edge of a dumpster… (84)
The page this appears on (84) is double the number of 42. Also 42 is the meaning of life in HGTTG, so this quote is the answer to ‘what is the meaning of life?’ In a way.
I went to page 21 To see if there were any allusions to a flagpole but it was just Erdedy thinking about his new bong and having dry mouth from smoking. But still a really cool find nonetheless!
Hello Pynchions! I have decided to create a Gravity’s Rainbow Read Along starting this fall on Sep 1st, I am dubbing it ‘Gravity’s Fall 2026’. GR is a notoriously difficult book to get through, so whether you’re a first timer or looking to reread, I would love for everyone to join in this year. I will make more announcements as we get closer to the date!
Hello all, with Infinite Summer 2026 underway, I thought it would only be fitting to follow it up with a Reading group for David Foster Wallace’s posthumous novel, The Pale King. I have dubbed it, ‘The Pale Winter 2026-27’ and will begin on Dec 1st and finish in February with a Christmas break in between. I will make more announcements as we get closer to the date. https://discord.gg/Deewuh7a8
Hello all, with Infinite Summer 2026 underway, I thought it would only be fitting to follow it up with a Reading group for David Foster Wallace’s posthumous novel, The Pale King. I have dubbed it, ‘The Pale Winter 2026-27’ and will begin on Dec 1st and finish in February with a Christmas break in between. I will make more announcements as we get closer to the date. https://discord.gg/Deewuh7a8
Prevention is the best treatment! Prevention is the best cure to all troubles and ailments! We can abstract this out one level further though. If prevention truly is the best treatment for problem X, then we ought to prevent the possibility of X occurring at all. This is possible through AN! By denying the existence of new children, you prevent the possibility of any problem existing at all. There cant be any problems or pain or suffering because there’s simply no one there to experience it! Why doesn’t humanity follow that mantra? A nice sunset and smile doesn’t offset the brutality of life. Even if your life is cupcakes, your empathy for your brothers and sisters crying out in agony should outweigh your own personal satisfaction. To know your needs are met while the many’s needs are not, should incite rage in you. It’s injustice! Life is injustice! Prevent Injustice by not having kids to experience it!
The reason natalists can’t be converted (or it’s near impossible en masse) is because it is the equivalent of dragging the prisoners outside of plato’s cave to see reality for what it truly is. Our society is one big puppet show and is its own audience curtesy of social media. To wake up and decide to stop feeding the machine triggers alarm bells to the other actors on the stage. The emperor must have clothes on; the actors must continue to believe. Antinatalism goes against the script. It goes against the play. It refuses a perpetuation of the suffering. And it’s much easier for the actors to have the show go on. To continue following the script at all costs. The show must NOT go on.