...
Show More
Not quite as refined as his later works, but it’s a real spectacle of a novel, this onslaught of a style that’s so uniquely Pynchon.
Ease Reading-Find Your Next Favorite Book
V.
...
Show More
The wild, macabre tale of the twentieth century and of two men—one looking for something he has lost, the other with nothing much to lose—and "V.," the unknown woman of the title.
547 pages, Paperback
First published August 1,1963
This edition
- Format
-
547 pages, Paperback
- Published
-
January 1, 2005 by Harper Perennial Modern Classics
- ISBN
-
9780060930219
- ASIN
-
B00BG7GBF4
- Language
-
English
Characters More characters
-
Pig Bodine
...
About the author
...
Show More
Thomas Ruggles Pynchon Jr. is an American novelist noted for his dense and complex novels. His fiction and non-fiction writings encompass a vast array of subject matter, genres and themes, including history, music, science, and mathematics. For Gravity's Rainbow, Pynchon won the 1973 U.S. National Book Award for Fiction.
Hailing from Long Island, Pynchon served two years in the United States Navy and earned an English degree from Cornell University. After publishing several short stories in the late 1950s and early 1960s, he began composing the novels for which he is best known: V. (1963), The Crying of Lot 49 (1966), and Gravity's Rainbow (1973). Rumors of a historical novel about Charles Mason and Jeremiah Dixon had circulated as early as the 1980s; the novel, Mason & Dixon, was published in 1997 to critical acclaim. His 2009 novel Inherent Vice was adapted into a feature film by Paul Thomas Anderson in 2014. Pynchon is notoriously reclusive from the media; few photographs of him have been published, and rumors about his location and identity have circulated since the 1960s. Pynchon's most recent novel, Bleeding Edge, was published on September 17, 2013.
Hailing from Long Island, Pynchon served two years in the United States Navy and earned an English degree from Cornell University. After publishing several short stories in the late 1950s and early 1960s, he began composing the novels for which he is best known: V. (1963), The Crying of Lot 49 (1966), and Gravity's Rainbow (1973). Rumors of a historical novel about Charles Mason and Jeremiah Dixon had circulated as early as the 1980s; the novel, Mason & Dixon, was published in 1997 to critical acclaim. His 2009 novel Inherent Vice was adapted into a feature film by Paul Thomas Anderson in 2014. Pynchon is notoriously reclusive from the media; few photographs of him have been published, and rumors about his location and identity have circulated since the 1960s. Pynchon's most recent novel, Bleeding Edge, was published on September 17, 2013.
Readers also enjoyed
Community Reviews
Rating(4.1 / 5.0, 100 votes)
5 stars
33(33%)
4 stars
40(40%)
3 stars
27(27%)
2 stars
0(0%)
1 stars
0(0%)
100 reviews All reviews
...
Show More
A wild novel unified only by the impossibility of unifying it. As with most of Thomas Pynchon’s work, this first one is not for everybody but those who like it are going to like it a lot. Quests, paranoia, pop-culture (especially from the United States), wild parties, race & racism, belief systems, music, frantic sexual exploration, and a total lack of definitive answers to most of the novel’s questions are present in Pynchon’s work from the beginning.
...
Show More
I first read V. and Pynchon ,for that matter in 1999 and I was blown away. I probably understood 5% of it but I was amazed at the writing and some plot points.
20 years later and this reread was much needed.
The basic plot is about a spy who discovers a line about a mysterious character called V in his father’s journals. He then dedicates his life to finding out who V is.
But this is Pynchon so nothing is so straightforward. There are many plot diversions, false leads and seemingly unconnected scenes. I say seemingly because Pynchon drops clues and then returns to them. Even most absurd plotline has a deeper role. V is like a huge jigsaw , where the final piece makes the reader understand the plot.Like all Pynchon novels, there are songs, rhymes and bizarro set pieces, which lead to some funny moments.
It goes deeper though.
V is about the futility of war, the stupidity of mankind,our obsession with technology and our need to destroy. This is seen in the major set pieces in Cairo, Florence, South Africa and Malta.
If you deeper you’ll find out that t
The whole novel is a homage to Wittgenstein’s theories but I only caught hints of that.
There is no doubting that V is a masterpiece and one of the foundations of experimental literature.Unlike what critics say, The text is not unreadable and Pynchon does help the reader with the journey. Not the easiest of reads but a fun and rewarding one if the reader perseveres.
20 years later and this reread was much needed.
The basic plot is about a spy who discovers a line about a mysterious character called V in his father’s journals. He then dedicates his life to finding out who V is.
But this is Pynchon so nothing is so straightforward. There are many plot diversions, false leads and seemingly unconnected scenes. I say seemingly because Pynchon drops clues and then returns to them. Even most absurd plotline has a deeper role. V is like a huge jigsaw , where the final piece makes the reader understand the plot.Like all Pynchon novels, there are songs, rhymes and bizarro set pieces, which lead to some funny moments.
It goes deeper though.
V is about the futility of war, the stupidity of mankind,our obsession with technology and our need to destroy. This is seen in the major set pieces in Cairo, Florence, South Africa and Malta.
If you deeper you’ll find out that t
The whole novel is a homage to Wittgenstein’s theories but I only caught hints of that.
There is no doubting that V is a masterpiece and one of the foundations of experimental literature.Unlike what critics say, The text is not unreadable and Pynchon does help the reader with the journey. Not the easiest of reads but a fun and rewarding one if the reader perseveres.
...
Show More
Reading Pynchon is sometimes like being thrown into the deep end of the pool and not knowing how to swim. You either drown in the prose or fight for survival. Pynchon's first novel is dense like much of his work but that should not be off putting. Among the themes are the duality of man and the circle of life. Also the animate and inanimate world. " profane decided no to argue. So all he said was "it's probably a nice place, that Rusty Spoon. But out of my class." "Rot she said, class, Aristocracy is in the soul. You may be the descendant of kings. Who knows." All the while only in the process of learning life's single lesson: that there is more accident to it than a man can ever admit to in a life time and stay sane."
...
Show More
Reading this novel was like a week-long binge on high-grade pot, while you’re at home feverish with COVID-19 and swilling massive quantities of Robitussin-with-codeine and endless pots of English Breakfast Tea, all the while channel-surfing on a television set that only plays twelve different obscure early-60s TV shows whose plots you can never quite follow. I give the book five stars.
...
Show More
Huhu tại sao mới 26 mà người ta đã có thể viết được một cuốn như vầy! Tầm tuổi này tôi vẫn còn đang vắt óc suy nghĩ caption 10 chữ cho mấy tấm ảnh chụp chó mèo up instagramm!
...
Show More
I spent last night thinking about this book when I should have been sleeping. That's a far cry from where I was a few weeks ago, lost in Cairo and ready to toss the e-book...and where I was again in Florence. Namibia was terribly disturbing, but I had to respect the effort. Malta was a bit slow too. But Pynchon never lost me for a second in Paris and when he got back to Malta again, I was fully engaged
What the hell am I talking about, you might ask, if you haven't read this. (And probably you haven't??) The real appeal for most of this book for me was Benny Profane, who lived a life on equal with his wonderful name. Just out of the Navy, he spent 1956 in the Virginia naval world and in the New York City underworld, until he graduated to the Whole Sick Crew, a crowd of very hippie-like eccentric, entertaining and generally useless souls (and also Rachel). The other leg of the V-ish plot includes the travelogue above and tried every which way to shake me off the book. Herbert Stencil searches for V., a woman of his father's generation, but also many other undefined and generally unobtainable mysteries. He takes us through the travelogue above, generally, by recreating other peoples stories of V. Pynchon just tries too hard in the early parts of these sections. It feels like he's showing off and it's very hard to take him seriously or care. But it pays out in the end. Eventually I not only adored the tragic lady V. but then sat wondering about all the different variations that V might be. I'm still wondering, even as I know there is no answer...I hope there is no answer.
So a gem of sorts comes out of this sometimes charming, sometimes just all too smart tangled mess.
V, by the way, could be Valletta, Malta, or Vesuvius, or many other things, but notably also a V2 rocket, which connects this book firmly with Gravity's Rainbow (which I haven't read. This is my first book by Pynchon). The rocket gets one very subtle mention. But I took it and ran. My head thinks Pynchon is, in 1963 and before, fretting about the modern world and all its destructive technology, with V2 rocket standing in for a nuclear missile. Profane yo-yo's, but he frets everything inanimate and V gets progressively more and more inanimate herself as she loses an eye and a few limbs. Humans are building and building and killing everything and Pynchon is trying to make sense of it. But it's not that simple. So he was V and we wonder. Mind you, my head could be a bit high on some Benny (a slang term for Benzedrine, an amphetamine).
This is a quick a review. Maybe I should have taken more time and been more careful. I can see I missed more than I covered. But, these moods are temporary things. So, posting as is.
What the hell am I talking about, you might ask, if you haven't read this. (And probably you haven't??) The real appeal for most of this book for me was Benny Profane, who lived a life on equal with his wonderful name. Just out of the Navy, he spent 1956 in the Virginia naval world and in the New York City underworld, until he graduated to the Whole Sick Crew, a crowd of very hippie-like eccentric, entertaining and generally useless souls (and also Rachel). The other leg of the V-ish plot includes the travelogue above and tried every which way to shake me off the book. Herbert Stencil searches for V., a woman of his father's generation, but also many other undefined and generally unobtainable mysteries. He takes us through the travelogue above, generally, by recreating other peoples stories of V. Pynchon just tries too hard in the early parts of these sections. It feels like he's showing off and it's very hard to take him seriously or care. But it pays out in the end. Eventually I not only adored the tragic lady V. but then sat wondering about all the different variations that V might be. I'm still wondering, even as I know there is no answer...I hope there is no answer.
So a gem of sorts comes out of this sometimes charming, sometimes just all too smart tangled mess.
V, by the way, could be Valletta, Malta, or Vesuvius, or many other things, but notably also a V2 rocket, which connects this book firmly with Gravity's Rainbow (which I haven't read. This is my first book by Pynchon). The rocket gets one very subtle mention. But I took it and ran. My head thinks Pynchon is, in 1963 and before, fretting about the modern world and all its destructive technology, with V2 rocket standing in for a nuclear missile. Profane yo-yo's, but he frets everything inanimate and V gets progressively more and more inanimate herself as she loses an eye and a few limbs. Humans are building and building and killing everything and Pynchon is trying to make sense of it. But it's not that simple. So he was V and we wonder. Mind you, my head could be a bit high on some Benny (a slang term for Benzedrine, an amphetamine).
This is a quick a review. Maybe I should have taken more time and been more careful. I can see I missed more than I covered. But, these moods are temporary things. So, posting as is.
...
Show More
Here are some thoughts I have on the Thomas Pynchon book "V." here:
https://open.substack.com/pub/tosh/p/...
https://open.substack.com/pub/tosh/p/...
Leave a Review