Pynchon and Ginsberg (1) The American literature is known to have been affected by the stylistic experimentation, since the last half of 19th century. There are many socio-political and purely artistic reasons that explain it. The most important of them, in my opinion, is the fact that Marxist theory used to be very popular among left-wing intellectuals, prior to the outbreak of Second World War. After being ideologically suppressed during fifties, Marxism was able to reemerge at the beginning of sixties, while being disguised as spiritual liberation. But since the Marxist doctrine is nihilistic in its essence, the philosophy of flower children was also affected by it. Thomas Pynchon and Allen Ginsburg are traditionally considered as great innovators, in the field of literature and poetry.
This is because their works do not correspond to the classical principles of writing. Both authors do not convey their message to the reader, after having formulated it logically. They try to accomplish the same effect by applying a chaotic principle, where the elements of plot, main idea and characters motivation, get fused together in something inseparable. But, since the average readers are considered as being too narrow minded, to be able to interpret the true meaning of such literature on their own, various literature critics do this job for them. They simply refer to both Ginsburg and Pynchon as great writers and leave us no chance to evaluate their works, according to own artistic taste. It is just like with Malevich painting Black Square, which is praised as the great work of art, when in fact, any 3 years old child could produce the same.
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Let us to analyze Pynchons short story Entropy and Ginsburg poem Howl, so that we could refine the common elements of artistic innovation, which can be thought of as symptomatic to all American degenerative literature of 20th century. (2) Pynchons Entropy is the story of an endless party, during the course of which, the main characters Meatball, Callisto, Miriam and Obad engage into the pointless conversation that is being constantly interrupted by the noise from outside. The sound of music, which comes from the main floor, is dissonant with Pynchons characters trying to make point, before they finally recognize the futility of their attempts. Pynchon describes his story as Arabesques of order competing fugally with the improvised discords of the party downstairs (Pynchon).
In Entropy author tries to understand the true nature of social instability, which he is rightly describes in terms of entropy. For the first time, author uses a dissonance as writing method in literature. Before him, it was being done by Debussy in the field of music. As the result, he was able to come up with highly whimsical pieces, which nevertheless, can hardly be referred to as pleasant to ones ears.
The same can be said about Entropy. Storys events do not relate to each other directly. There is seemingly nothing in common between Callistos monologue about the thermodynamic properties of entropy and the discussion about music of Stravinsky, which takes place directly beneath. Still, the odd elements, found in Entropy, can be relate to each other conceptually. This corresponds to another form of artistic expression the symbolic conceptualism. It is obvious that Pynchons story is affected by it. It was William Faulkner, who began experimenting with this style, at the beginning of 20th century. Given the fact that he was one of Pynchons most favorite writers, it becomes clear where Pynchon was getting his artistic inspiration from.
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Some of Faulkners stories, like Sound and the Fury, are also considered to be hardly readable. There is no doubt that Pynchons writing style is being directly influenced by Faulkner. The absence of clearly defined plot, the relative nature of time, the overly emphasized importance of insignificant details these are the common elements of both authors writing style. Still, if Faulkner used dichotomy to defy it, Pynchon applies it to show that entropy is natural and, therefore, beneficial. He attributed his understanding of entropy with the political properties. Let us not forget that Entropy was being written in 1960, when anarchist ideas were very popular among young people.
That is why, the official terminology is considered by Pynchon to be the element of order. At the same time, he associates it with bureaucracy, which shows Pynchon as simply lacking logical skills. (3) Allen Ginsbergs Howl is considered to be a poem, although the absence of rhyme significantly reduces its poetical value. Basically, Howl is an endless rant of Communist agitator, under the influence of drugs and alcohol. The form of this poem can be considered as being very innovative, for as long as the usage of profane language is thought to be socially acceptable. Howl addressees to the generation of beatniks, whose intellectual arrogance made them to deny every kind of social authority and to indulge into perverse sex practices. Author refers to them as who: who bit detectives in the neck and shrieked with delight in policecars for committing no crime but their own wild cooking pederasty and intoxication, who howled on their knees in the subway and were dragged off the roof waving genitals and manuscripts, who let themselves be fucked in the ass by saintly motorcyclists, and screamed with joy (Ginsberg) At the same time, in my opinion, author had very wisely chosen the style of white verse to convey his message. Also, because he was aware that, if he did not use word fuck extensively, than his masterpiece would simply be considered as the good example of degenerative poetry, but it would never be able to stir social controversy.
Ginsberg needed to make his poem truly shocking, in order to attract public attention. His promotion of Communism and Homosexuality is socially destructive; therefore, these ideas are best expressed in socially destructive form. This is why; we cannot suggest that Ginsberg is deprived of any sense of logic, unlike Liberal critics, who praise him to the sky. The real reason why Ginsbergs poetry became popular is not because of his poetical finesse, but because peoples artistic sense had deteriorated to such a degree that it could only be appeased by something shocking. It is like in ancient Rome, before its downfall – people needed to see more and more gladiators fights, because only the sight of blood could get them excited. Ginsberg Howl is more of a political manifesto than poem, in traditional sense of this word.
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Dislikes of the American Society And the Injustices in America In Allen Ginsberg's Poetry By Matt FeekoMrs. JuengerEnglish 118 April 1999 Dislikes of the American Society And the Injustices in America In Allen Ginsberg's Poetry Allen Ginsberg started his infamous life as a revolutionary and poet of the beat generation when he began attending Colombia University. While at Colombia Ginsberg met ...
What makes it comparable to Pynchons Entropy is the fact that it actively promotes the idea of social chaos. It describes lawlessness and degradation of morals as something that people need to be striving for. This also can be thought of as innovation, since poetry and art, as whole, was always about benefiting human mind spiritually and not about encouraging people to indulge in pursuing their animalistic instincts. In my opinion, Ginsbergs poem is degeneracys metaphysical attempt to gain an intellectual legitimacy. And the only way to attract mentally healthy individuals to the spiritual depravity is to make it appear as something different from what it really is. This is why Ginsberg needed to use innovative poetic style to convey his ideas.
It appears that the radical Liberalism, which derives from Marxism, simply cannot express itself other then through artistic outrage. Therefore, we cannot really think of Pynchon and Ginsberg as innovators. Because it would imply that they had a choice between the varieties of literary styles. But this is not true. Both authors were bound to write unlike anybody else, as they simply wanted to conceal the destructiveness of their ideas. It is very fortunate that era of beatniks belongs to the past, as well as the works of literature that promote social and political degeneracy.
Bibliography:
Ginsberg, Allen Howl. 2000.
Poem Hunter. Com. December 12, 2006. http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/howl/ Wood, Michael The Apprenticeship of Thomas Pynchon. 1998. New York Times Online. December 12, 2006. http://www.nytimes.com/books/97/05/18/reviews/pync hon-slowlearner.html.
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