Spoiler Alert. Discussing the novel and movie will inevitably reveal things.
Watching Obi-Wan Kenobi, there's an implication that Ben created Darth Vader, as though in good, there is also inherent vice, the yin and yang of life. Good can't be created without bad, and bad creates good. That makes me think of Megamind (2010) and Watchmen (2009). Despite what the Tick says, the fight isn't between good and a little less good. Why isn't the novel called Inherent Virtue?
I'm listening to Country Joe & The Fish because the Pynchon wiki's first reference in the text is the band (Chapter 1). Shasta used to wear one when she loved Doc. Mostly she was only capable of spending time, so she moved on, and she was involved with a real estate man, who was trying to get her caught up in some scheme, or rather someone else was trying to get her to betray him, though she doesn't really say who that is or why they have leverage over her.
Debt is everywhere. I have laundry debt that is piling up, cleaning debt that keeps dusting up and the kipple. The biggest debt is hedonistic debt. You want more fun, and fun just doesn't come so you sell your soul for a scrap of fun. I think that's the California bargain. At least in film noir.
I'm following the Reddit Group. I think I might beat them through the book, but c'est la vie. The book is due too soon, even though there are no late fees at my library. I don't want to take advantage.
Inherent Vice by Thomas Pynchon was published in 2009. 13 years ago.
I watched the movie. It's confusing as expected. Had a Big Lebowski (1998) vibe, and I found a Reddit post that says the same thing, and in the comments that's a quote from the director:
"I also remember thinking, when I read the book, This is like The Big Lebowski. And that was a reason not to make the movie. That was a reason to say, like, "Why would I have to do something like The Big Lebowski? Why would I even come close?" But the more I looked at it, the more I loved the book, and I had to kind of ignore that and pretend like it didn't exist, because, you know, The Big Lebowski is the best movie in history. So I just ignored it and thought about it a different way." (Source)
I wanted to watch the movie so I would get a clue as to what was going on, I feel more comfortable going from a parts to the whole learner. But honestly I don't think I got the movie, so I wish I'd read the book first. But that ship has sailed, like the fun debt I've accumulated. Anyway, the book is amazing.
6 W questions
Who: Doc, a gumsandal. Larry "Doc" Sportello.
What: It's Pynchon, so there's a Kafka element of not knowing what is going on.
Where: Gordita Beach is fictional, but it's perhaps based on Pynchon's experience around Manhattan Beach 1967-1971.
Why: Uncover what is going on?
When: Starts March 24, 1970 to May 8th.
How: Through investigative questioning and following leads and putting it all together. It's sort of like I Heart Huckabees (2004), there is almost a existential detective element to it, but not quite or explicitly.
Links and reading list:
Thomas Pynchon introduction with California setting video on Penguin Books YouTube.
Playlist from movie on YouTube. Here's a list of songs mentioned in novel.
Podcasts about novel at Pynchon In Public
Character index pdf and other diagrams and the 5 plots.
Reddit Introduction. I picked up some books to read about the times historically:
Days of Rage:America's Radical Underground, the FBI, and the Forgotten Age of Revolutionary Violence by Bryan Burrough. This one is going to get to me first.
Chaos: Charles Manson, the CIA, and the Secret History of the Sixties by Dan Piepenbring and Tom O'Neill. This one is checked out, I need to wait for its return.
And two books about the book:
The Counterforce by JM Tyree. Library doesn't have this one.
Pynchon’s California, eds. McClintock and Miller. Library has this one!
Further thoughts...while reading...
The irony of everyone smoking is that it makes me want to smoke, but honestly I quit smoking because I can't read while smoking. That's the biggest indictment on weed is that I can't really read.
Gumsandal genera: high detectives: Big Lebowski, Inherent Vice.
There's a free wheeling Jack Kerouac vibe. I don't really like Kerouac, and I also think he gets more abuse than he deserves, if I can hold those two opinions.
When you google hair knot plantation style, you get hair salons in Plantation Florida. Apparently some woman got the internet mad because she was white and did a Bantu knot. The biggest problem is that when people double down on their ignorance, and see it as a virtue. Just acknowledge the history from Africa, people been doing it for a long time. Why have to be ahistorical? Being stoned all the time is like seeing ignorance as a virtue. I'm afraid with weed being legal all over the place we're going to see more and more of that type of behavior. A Californication of of America, we're fucking ourselves.
With Pynchon there's a lot of klang wordplay, assonance type idea rhyming. Just off.
Characters Chapter 1
Larry "Doc" Sportello: Our hero, gumsandal.
Shasta Fay Hepworth: Former beautiful love interest
Mickey Wolfmann: Real estate tycoon, Shasta's sugar daddy, paying for apartment in Hancock Park.
Mrs. Sloane Wolfmann: wife. Has her own side piece Mr. Riggs Warbling
Deputy DA Penny Kimball: lawyer from district attorney office, who fooled around with Doc for a time.
Aunt Reet: Aunt in real estate.
Bigfoot Bjornsen
Denis: friend who he goes and gets a pizza with first day.
Petunia: office receptionist.
Tariq Khalil: Referred to Doc from Sledge Poteet. In the Black Guerilla Family founded by George Jackson. Used to be an Artesia Crip. Land bought up by Wolfmann, being developed.
Glen Charlock: Bodyguard for Wolfmann, not long for this world.
Chapter 2 Thoughts
"bigger inside than out" was something in the last novel I read, She Who Became the Sun by Shelly Paker-Chan.
I can't help but think of Arrested Development (2003-2019) with the frozen bananas dipped in chocolate. That scene in the movie actually made me laugh, Joaquin Phoenix's face watching Josh Brolin blowing a chocolate banana while driving.
Arrested Development also makes the joke about maritime law that Pynchon makes.
Hope Harlingen and Coy's meeting is squalid not cute. Pynchon makes me want to be a writer, and also fills me with the dread that I could never be as good as him.
I had a patient who was a heroin addict once, and she said when people died, that dealer got hot because everyone sort of hoped to get the really good shit, that they somehow wouldn't die from. It's a weird aspect of heroin culture that I'd forgotten until reading about it in Pynchon.
It's after what's in the first 2 chapters that I sort of lost the movie.
Chapter 2 Characters
Jade: Sex worker at Chick Planet Massage Parlor.
Bambi: Sex worker
Sauncho Smilax: Doc's lawyer
Hope Harlingen: She calls Doc, asks him to find Coy, her husband. Daughter Amethyst.
Leonard "El Drano": The dealer
Pat Doubonet: Officer who said no ID was required by next of kin for Coy's body. See chap. 3.
Scott Oof: Cousin, son of Aunt Reet, practicing with his band in the garage.
Lefty: Bass player hanging out with Scott.
Chapter 3 musings
"During Reagan's 1966 campaign for governor, Republicans established the "eleventh commandment": Thou shalt not speak ill of another Republican." (source) Woof. Just reading about how Reagan ruined America. If it's quadrilateral against the hippies, I side with the hippies. Drugged out people won't win the revolution. I'd rather be blissed out on meditation in the dhyanas.
Chapter 4 goes into Larry’s backstory. He became a PI to avoid getting his car repossessed. He’s called doc because he carried around a case with FBI grade truth serum. We meet Fritz Drybeam, who trains Larry.
Chapter 4-5 Characters:
Fritz Drybeam: Chapter 4
Luz: Maide to Mrs. Sloane Wolfmann
Chapter 6 Characters
Special Agent Flatweed
Special Agent Borderline
Motella Haywood: Kahuna stewardess who's bikini came off in the hottub.
Lourdes Rodriguez: Stewardess who's bikini came off in the hottub.
Cookie and Joaquin: Motella and Lourdes current boyfriend
Chapter 6 questions
What is a Ronald Reagan style glance?
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