Currently Reading

[hatta]

i suppose the word choice was somewhat in response to conversation jon and I had offline about it. if pynchon wanted to write about ARPAnet he could have done much better. as it stands it was a brief, under-developed, and a huge disappointment considering how pynchon seemed to have a better grasp on the role of the internet 40 years earlier. this time around it was just a funny anachronism.

I'm not really all that interested in discussing this book here (which I liked just fine, though obviously in the bottom half of my, and probably everyone's, Pynchon list) but I had no issues with the ARPANet stuff. I'd probably have to go a bit too much into the whole book then I want to to really explain why, but basically it has to do with the way that Pynchon handles conspiracies in his books. They often are long digressions (think of the great backwoods conspiracy in Mason&Dixon) but in this book they are sort of the reality of Doc in that dead on hippie pothead way. Anyone who's read any of Pynchon's major works knows what a research junky he is, the minor period details that he throws in are at a near otaku level. At the same time he mixes in anachronisms as a kind of commentary, in the main all his books are still about the present regardless of when they are set. So ARPANet in 1972 (that's roughly when the book is set right?) connects something like a dozen schools and a number of government and military installations. The ARPANet began as a four node network in Southern California and became closer what we think of the internet when this expanded cross country with a packet switched network connecting the CA nodes and BBN (on the east coast). By 1971 the ARPANet was at 15 nodes: UCLA, SRI, UCSB, Univ of Utah, BBN, MIT, RAND, SDC, Harvard, Lincoln Lab, Stanford, UIU(C), CWRU, CMU, NASA/Ames (source: Hobbes Internet Timeline). Pynchon clearly is aware of the Southern California nodes and directly cites the UofU node as those being the regions that data can be gotten. But the data that they are able to get, you barely can get now. That slots right into to stoner paranoia surrounding computers that existed then (and now for all I now). The conspiracy that Doc is developing throughout the entire book, is pretty much 180 degrees off from what turns out to be a pretty straightforward set of crimes that seemed more complex due to happenstance. This of course is par for the course with all of the Pynchon developed conspiracies in that they are built and detailed and then always undercut by events leaving you wondering whether any of it was more then just almost stoner like riffing. In this book its the whole book instead of a digression. Personally I thought that was great and enjoyed it all the way through.

[Dan Warburton]

Thanks Mark & Robert for the posts. I'm off out of town for the day - and guess what I'm taking with me to read on the train.

[Jesse]

I'm off out of town for the day - and guess what I'm taking with me to read on the train.

[yonhosago]

[cheerios]

Do you know when "A Power Stronger than Itself" is going to be released? I read the entire preview they had on books.google.com and am very much looking forward to reading the entire book.

[jon abbey]

it came out quite some time ago, maybe a year?

[cheerios]

nice, so I guess you can purchase it as an ebook on the amazon.com kindle store and read it on the ipod touch which is what I'm doing. Really interesting so far, a lot of name checking, but great detailed information about the Chicago and New York City jazz scene and am just getting to the founding of the AACM right now. Didn't know that Ornette Coleman had such a huge influence on so many jazz greats. He is mentioned a lot as being a big influence on folks.

[p.t]

MPD-Psycho volume 3

[surfer]

Having finished Ghosts, I felt the need to reread a classic:



NR:



although not this first edition, in very good condition, worth $4,200.

[Chromosome]

although not this first edition, in very good condition, worth $4,200.

Wait. Your copy is or the pictured copy is worth $4,200?

[surfer]

My copy is worth approximately $.98

[Jesse]

Determined to read all credible books on Ta-Shunka-Witco [ His-Horse-Is-Crazy ].
The Larry McMurtry one in that Penguin books bio series was quite good, conveying his greatness without aggrandizement or sentimentality (hard to do, fraught with tragedy and heroism as his life was).

[Root Doctor]

[jon abbey]

welcome, dude!

[Root Doctor]

Thanks, Jon! I'm liking the new digs.

[surfer]

Hey Joe!

(Where you goin with that book in your hand?)

[grisha]

Talking Music: Conversations With John Cage, Philip Glass, Laurie Anderson, And 5 Generations Of American Experimental Composers

[Root Doctor]

Hey Joe!

(Where you goin with that book in your hand?)

Hey, Darren! I tried to drag your erstwhile college roommate into Burlington for some music the other night, but I was unsuccessful. The upside for John was he got a lot more sleep than I did.

[surfer]

The upside for John was he got a lot more sleep than I did.

I wouldnt be so sure of that. Man, I havent heard from him in ages. He used to post here. I hope he's doing OK adjusting to fatherhood. His son was born just about the same time as mine was. They're both coming up on their 2nd birthdays, so they're a handful right now. If you see him, give him my best.

[Dohol]

The upside for John was he got a lot more sleep than I did.

I wouldnt be so sure of that. Man, I havent heard from him in ages. He used to post here. I hope he's doing OK adjusting to fatherhood. His son was born just about the same time as mine was. They're both coming up on their 2nd birthdays, so they're a handful right now. If you see him, give him my best.

Ahahaha...the terrible twos baby..



My sister told me ( right after she told me I was a brave man for having twins at 43 ) was that the terrible twos start at 18 months and end when they leave the house..{their twenties usually} )