The Crying of Lot 49

"San Narciso lay further south, near L.A. Like many named places in California it was less an identifiable city than a grouping of concepts- census tracts, special purpose bond-issue districts shopping nuclei, all overlaid with access roads to its own freeway. But it had been Pierce's domicile, and headquarters: the place he'd begun his land speculating in ten years ago, and so put down the plinth course of capital on which everthing afterward had been built, however rickety or grotesque, toward the sky; and that, she supposed would set the spot apart, give it an aura. But if there was any vital difference between it and the rest of Southern California, it was invisible on first glance... Nothing was happening... She thought of Mucho, her husband, trying to believe in his job. Was it something like this he felt, looking through the soundproof glass at one of his colleagues with a headset clamped on and cueing the next record with movements stylized as the handling of chrism, senser, chalice might be for a holy man, yet really tuned in to the voice, voices, the music, its message, surrounded by it, digging it, as were all the faithful it went out to; did Mucho stand outside Studio A looking in, knowing that even if he could hear it he couldn't believe in it?" -Pg. 14

This passage describes Oedipa's first impression of San Narciso, a town where Pierce's hope and Mucho's despair are present everywhere. Oedipa thinks of both when she sees this town because she sees how Pierce transformed such a rustic, unnoticeable place into something that was a place he called home, had his share of secrets, and was almost happy. But then she thinks of Mucho, who looks at the world from the outside, and he can see the homes, secrets, and happiness, but he never believes in these things. He just can't.

I think that this embodies the way the American Dream can work. There are the people who sit on the outside and watch the dreams being built. Mucho, like many people, doesn't allow himself to truly want success, either out of ignorance or the knowledge that he might fail. I feel like that is even more present in today's society. People watch the rich and famous get what they work for, think about how much they want their success, but don't put forth the effort to get it. The only difference between the two is that the people who go for their dreams believe they will make it in the end. Mucho is an all too reliable character; he falls into depression from being unfulfilled, loses his wife to everything else that guarantees to be more interesting than him, and/or puts up with jobs that slowly crush his spirit. This also embodies the time, since many middle-class families had husbands who worked monotonous corporate jobs and wound up with nothing to show for their lives.

The one thing that I found funny was that Mucho got the girl instead of Pierce. During a conversation between Metzger and Oedipa, she asks, "'What the hell didn't he own?'" to which Metzger says, "'You tell me.'" This could reflect how people tend to pick the safe things in life. They want the people who they know they can fall back on, not the people they have to take a chance with. While Pierce was dangerous and caring, Mucho was reliable and distant. Or it could reflect the way people spare their feelings, once again, out of fear. Oedipa is equally like Mucho, only she is unsatisfied in the world of love. She saw what it was like to be with Pierce, enjoyed it, but did not believe that they could be together, as they broke up. But I have a feeling that Pierce still had a thing for her, as he left her the executor of his will.

The whole American Spirit is the prospect of change. We all want change in some way, look at Obama's entire presidential campaign. Pierce helps embody that aspect of America because he transformed that town. While it was not by the most moral means, he still obtained his success and made San Narciso something. He saw the possibilities in small things, which is not easy.

Oedipa decides to go visit the Yoyodyne factory, a company Pierce holds stock in. While on her tour, she gets lost and winds up meeting a man named Koteks who is doodling the same symbol she saw on the bathroom walls. Kotek is possibly crazy or extremely brilliant, as he is well educated in science, but rambles on in an insane way. After Oedipa pretends to know the secret Trystero symbols and people, Kotek begins to give her information, only to realize that she was lying. He quickly takes back his words, and Oedipa leaves to find Fallopian. After not getting any useful information, Oedipa leaves to find Driblette, the actor who knew about Trystero. Instead she meets Mr. Thoth who has a rind with the symbol she saw in the bathroom on a ring, and once again goes to meet Fallopian who says it is a historical marker. Oedipa then gets a call from one of Pierce's old friends, Genghis Cohen, who notices the same symbols on all of Pierce's stamps. The markings were made purposely, but neither of them knows why they are there.

In this chapter, I started to like Oedipa a little bit more. Pynchon's writing started to become more clear, so her thoughts were not as clouded as they were before, making it easier to relate to her. I thought that this chapter was the easiest to get through, or at least the most involved with the plot. The only thing I wish is that Metzger was in it more. He seems to have disappeared ever since the book revealed how he is going to litigate Pierce's home to make a name for himself. I just wish the characters would stay more consistent through the whole book. Mucho is barely in here, and he is Oedipa's husband. It just makes things that much harder to know what is important and what is not.

Pynchon's use of music and pop culture is also used again. The Paranoids are one example of music's importance, as their actions and lyrics tend to coincide with the events of the book. Pynchon did not include them in this chapter at all, so that could symbolize how Oedipa's paranoia is slowly starting to subside as she gets closer to the truth. But while Oedipa is in Yoyodyne, she hears a hymn being sung through the halls. It is about loyalty and warmth, which is ironic, because I would hardly describe the Yoyodyne building or corporation as being warm. The other cultural reference is to the amount of plays and books Oedipa reads and sees. They just happen to coincide with her life too perfectly, as if symbolizing and foreshadowing her future.

The one passage that I made me think and connect with my own reality was, "Oedipa wondered whether, at the end of this (if it were supposed to end), she too might not be left with only compiled memories of clues, announcements, intimations, but never the central truth itself, which must somehow each time be too bright for her memory to hold; which must always blaze out, destroying its own message irreversibly, leaving an overexposed blank when the ordinary world came back." I really had to think about that sentence when I read it because I can relate that so easily to life. There are the mysteries you want to be solved, but sometimes don't know if you can hande the truth. Then there is the fear of being left with things unanswered and going on being unfulfilled. It's sad to think of the regret that Oedipa could have over Pierce and not solving the mystery that was him and them together. I wonder if it would have been better if she had not been left his executor at all. She would not have known he cared about her, but she would not have to find out some ugly truth that could ruin her memory of him.

This painting reminds me of the way Oedipa is confused. Everything in this painting is fragmented and their own solid object, but only some of it connects. Then you can make out the few images that are whole, like the person on the left, but they still don't seem entirely believable.
This relates to the way Oedipa's mind is fragmented. She finds things that she believes to be fact, but might not be. She is constantly trying to find the truth behind the mystery of Pierce and the Trystero, but she is not entirely sure she wants to know.

In the novel, Southern California living is depicted in a satirical way even though it captures southern California living pretty accurately. San Narciso, where most of the novel takes place, is said ot be a quiet town between LA and San Francisco that does not attract attention but has its own respect. I do not think this picture entirely captures what San Narciso means in the novel. However, you can see that the area the picture was taken in is away from the city, but more importantly I like how the roads are connecting the city to this more suburban area. San Narciso still has some sort of connection to the larger cities, and to something larger than itself. The presence of secrets and cults are present all over San Narciso, and ultimately holds Pierce. Pierce's hopes and life were kept there as well as the secret life he lived, which is cause of the whole book.






In this picture, there is only a single person standing in the middle of an alley trapped by the walls around him. The way that this picture is very bleak and colorless shows how Oedipa, along with most of the characters, lack emotions in a polarized state.
This picture is similar to Oedipa because she is so alone, and she is boxed in because of herself and the situation she has put herself into. I don't think of her being miserable was planned, I think that her wanting to isolate her emotions was a reaction to feeling too much. Either with Pierce or at some other point in her life, but for some reason she is one of the people who find it easier to not feel anything than sacrifice something you've grown to love. The only difference between this picture and Oedipa is that she surrounds herself with people to create her walls.

In chapters two and three, Oedipa's adventure down the rabbit hole only goes deeper. She travels to San Narciso, where Pierce's corporation is, along with many other companies he invested in. The town in located in the middle of nowhere, described as, "less an identifiable city than a grouping of concepts," almost embodying Pierce himself, as he was a mystery, invested in everything but somehow rustic. Oedipa leaves Mucho for the time being to meet up with Metzger, the coexecutor/lawyer responsible for Pierce's will. After spending several hours in a hotel room mourning over Pierce and reviewing their own lives, they sleep together.

As chapter three starts, Oedipa and Metzger are trying to find the new grounds of their relationship, while Oedipa calls Mucho to see if he knows yet. Metzger takes Oedipa to a bar where they meet Fallopian, a man who tells them of the Peter Penguin Society. The club is dedicated to a Russia vs the capitalists standoff in which nothing happened, kicking off the theme of conspiracy combined with paranoia. Oedipa then goes to the bathroom to find some strange symbols written on the walls, which she copies and is later warned against. When Oedipa and Metzger leave, they meet up with The Paranoids, an up-and-coming band, and Manny Di Presso, Metzger's actor/lawyer friend who has decided to resort to litigating and is on the run from a client of his. Several things are revealed while Metzger and Di Presso talk: 1) Metzger wants to file a lawsuit repossessing Pierce's belongings and 2) Di Presso questions Pierce's character, as he had sold old human bones as fertilizer, and ripped off the client that now chases him. Oedipa and Metzger go to see a play called The Courier's Tragedy, where paranoia overcomes Oedipa as she realizes too many things about the play fit her own life. Afterwards, Oedipa goes backstage to question the actors about the bones Pierce was selling, but winds up talking about something called Trystero.

In this chapter, things really just get more complicated. The whole conspiracy mixed with paranoia as a way of mocking society is really starting to develop. It is almost like a bad horror film, but luckily it knows it is, and simply flaunts the fact. Considering, I don't know what the Tryster are, it was hard to follow the whole last converation, but I hope Pynchon explains things further unlike the most of the book.

The Peter Penguin Society was probably the most satirical thing in that whole chapter. The story behind it was drawn-out to be something much more ominous than it really was, but basically it was that there were two ships, one Russian, one American, and they fired at each other, despite the fact that they were too far away to cause any real damage, and both ships left completely unscathed. It was just funny because that was really what the Cold War was like, looking back on it now. Russia and America were both slandering each other from a distance, but both got out of it without any real tragedies. The typical paranoia mixed with conspiracy theories lingered though, resulting in the Peter Penguin Society. This shows Pynchon's ability to relate the crazy paranoia to real lives, blurring the lines between reality and fiction even more.

In chapter three, Oedipa also goes to a lake Pierce owned, called Lake Inverarity, which she "fell in love with," after the first few minutes of being there. I think the lake reflects Pierce because she likes it so much and it is described to be grand and tastefully combined with buildings. It is funny that Pynchon actually says Oedipa fell in love with the lake because he has not really gone into depth with any of the characters feelings, so to say she loves the lake so bluntly is kind of suprising.

I don't really like Di Presso, although I have to say that he is very entertaining. He is another bizarre character that helps Oedipa get down to the truth about Pierce and his company. He tells her about the bone charcoal, and how "American tourists... would pay good dollars for almost anything." And they did; they bought ground up human bones for multi-purpose use. Despite his weirdness, I didn't like Di Presso because I didn't feel like he was reliable. For one, he left Oedipa and Metzger, his "close friend," on an island by themselves with no means of getting off. Friends do not do that, regardless of who they are running from, but more importantly, the do not let friends get into those situations in the first place. But I have a feeling that Di Presso will become more important later, as he knows something.

In the second chapter of The Crying of Lot 49, we meet Metzger, the coexecutor of Pierce's will. He also catches the whole whacked-out LA moviestar aura, where you can't always follow their train of thought, and you know they have a dark side entangled with sex and drugs. Metzger is first described as "so good-looking that Oedipa thought at first They, somebody up there, were putting her on. It had to be an actor." It turns out that he was a childstar, born and raised in the world of film as "Baby Igor." As Baby Igor, he learned how to become a lawyer, and told through a satirical way he says, "A lawyer in a courtroom, in front of any jury, becomes an actor, right? ...Me, I'm a former actor who became a lawyer. They've done a pilot film of a TV series, in fact, based loosely on my career, starring my friend Manny Di Presso, a one-time lawyer who quit his firm to become an actor." I just think that passage is funny because that is exactly the kind of thing you would see in Hollywood, which is one of the great ways that Pynchon characterizes America's weird obsession with fame.

He is probably my favorite character so far because he is a complete cliché, but at the same time, he isn't. He is all about having a good time, but you can tell that he seeks things that are bigger than himself, as if he needs to know that he will live past being Baby Igor and the girls who are too easy. Not only that but he brings out something in Oedipa that makes her less mental and more human. The kind of usual confused where emotions get in the way of things, versus her normal nuttiness where she confuses her physical environment. He seems like the kind of person who has become crazy because they have been through things that could be deemed crazy, and I feel like that his confusion is not really his fault.

The other thing that becomes even more important in this chapter is the sounds that Pynchon likes to use. In the first chapter I realized that he makes his characters have accents where they use things like "finks" and "shirks," and gives every character a strangely spelled name (Oedipa, Mucho, Metzger, Funch, San Narciso, Inverarity, etc.). I think that this is to show the confusion of everyone, and how things are not always precise and to the point, but cloudy and tangled.

In the second chapter there is also symbolism used in Oedipa and the game she plays with Metzger, called Strip Boticelli. In order for Oedipa to get answers to all her questions, Metzger makes a game where she must take off an item of clothing for every answer she wants. Before playing, Oedipa rushes into the bathroom to put on as many items of clothing as she can in order to ask as many questions without revealing herself. I think this symbolizes how once again, Oedipa is unwilling to get too close to a situation, and wants answers to her questions, but when she gets to the truth, she’s scared. I think this could be applied to how she wants to know more about Pierce because some part of her still wants him, and to be able to let someone in, but she makes sure there are too many layers to get through so she can stop them when she wants.

The book starts out with the main character, Oedipa Maas returning home from a tupperware party to find that an ex-boyfriend of hers, Pierce Inverarity, has left her as the executor of his will. Having never carried out a dead man's wish before, she sets to listening to her distant husband's complaints, arguing with her psychotherapist, and playing footsies with her family lawyer/ group therapy ally. When she finally allows herself to analyze her relationship with Pierce, she realizes that she might have been truly happy with him.

The first few pages were particularly difficult to get through, mainly because Pynchon's writing style is hard to adjust to. He has sentences with too many thoughts that carry on for much too long. When he is making a joke, it is awfully subtle but very satirical. For example, when he describes Wendell "Mucho" Maas (Oedipa's husband) he says, "The sight of sawdust, even pencil shavings, made him wince, his own kind being known to use it for hushing sick transmissions, and though he dieted he could still not as Oedipa did use honey to sweeten his coffee for like all things viscous it distressed him, recalling too poignantly what is often mixed with motor oil to ooze dishonest into gaps between piston and cylinder wall." The oil references how he hates cars and the way people make cars like themselves, and how he generally hates everything. It was only when Pynchon described Mucho that I finally started to get into the book. But not long afterwards, he lost me again as he went into a series of bizarre conversations between Oedipa and her psychotherapist, Dr. Hilarius, who is not funny at all, and Roseman, her lawyer. It wasn't so much that I was adjusting to his style, it was more like the story was starting mid-conversation, and ended before I knew what anyone was talking about.

That actually seems to be how the whole first chapter goes. The reader knows that there is some kind of mystery behind Pierce and Oedipa, that there is a secret letter from Pierce that has already been read and contents not revealed, and that Oedipa is on some sort of medication that could kill her; however, none of these things are explained, despite the feel that they are important.

For the final page or so of the chapter, there is a large tone shift. Pynchon goes into Oedipa's minds and feelings for the first time as he describes the way Pierce made her feel. It becomes something serious and almost tragic. Pynchon compares their relationship to Rapunzel. How Oedipa waited for someone to call for her to "let down your hair," and Pierce climbed up, but got too close and, "Her lovely hair turned, through some sinister sorcery, into a great unanchored wig, and down he fell, on his ass." This really characterizes the two because Pierce was willing to get close to her, while she could not. Then Pycnhon goes on to say how Oedipa further questions her own actions, blaming her chosen isolation on magic.

I think that the craziest thing of this whole book is that all of this took place in just the first twelve pages.

"The comedy crackles, the puns pop, the satire explodes!" - The New York Times

"Mr. Pynchon's satirical eye doesn't miss a thing, including rock 'n'roll singers, right-wing extremists, and the general subculture of Southern California." - Library Journal

The Crying of Lot 49 is a satirical story of a woman confused between reality and fiction. After the death of her ex-boyfriend, Pierce Inverarity, Oedipa Maas finds herself the executioner of his will, and runs into a worldwide conspiracy, attaining a not-inconsiderable amount of self-knowledge.