Sunday, April 15, 2007

"The Crying of Lot 49" by Thomas Pynchon

This is an interesting book, and one that I really don't know how to begin to describe. Perhaps with a loose synopsis of the plot, and we'll see what that brings forth.

Set in late 60's, main character, Oedipa, is a lady in her late 20's, is married to a disk jockey who questions the value of his profession (at least when he sold used cars, he did something solid). One day, Oedipa receives a notice that an ex-lover has died, and has made her co-executor of his estate. She heads off in her car to stay in the ex-lover's town and sort through the estate. She meets the lawyer who is her co-executor, has an extramarital fling, and they go out to a bar one night. In a toilet cubicle, she finds some graffiti with a strange symbol (like a musical horn) underneath with a message and a phone number. The rest of the book traces her attempt to find out the meaning of the symbol.

The symbol seems to be linked to a rogue mail service (that's right, we're talking postal services here). She goes to a play with her lover, and finds more references that seem to be linked to whatever she is hunting down. As she trawls through the ex-lovers' estate, she finds connections and references to the symbol. Her journey takes her to talk to English professors at nearby Universities, to shops selling rare editions of books, and up to San Francisco. At San Francisco, she wanders around through the night, finding symbols plastered around, helping an old down and out man to deliver mail to a loved one through the rogue mail service. She comes across a man in a gay bar who has sworn chastity, to avoid becoming reliant on another person.

I started to wonder at this point whether, given Oedipa's visit to San Fran is supposed in the late 60's, she might be on some giant acid trip. Next, she goes to visit her shrink, because she is aware she is paranoid about the whole symbol/mail service thing, and she isn't sure whether the whole thing is coincidental, whether the dead guy set it all up for her to find while executing his will or whatever. This is made worse when some people she is hunting down suddenly die or go missing. Her shrink has lost it when she arrives, and holds her hostage in his rooms. It he has some issues to resolve from working for the Nazi's during WW2. When she gets out and ambulances and police arrive, Oedipa is reunited with her husband, covering the siege for his radio station.

At this point, you realise she is not on acid, because her husband has taken up the habit since she left on her journey. He is openly taking drops of the stuff, and is losing touch with reality. And instead of being overly concerned, Oedipa heads off to continue attending to her ex-lover's estate for a bit. Then the novel ends quite suddenly when the meaning of the title is revealed.

What's it all about? Lots of things and nothing. It's mostly about counterculture, but in a strangely conservative and educated way. The main character gets engrossed and researches a topic much like a writer must when researching their novels. An interesting read.