Quote:
Originally Posted by Snack Eater
I'm thinking about joining this circle very soon. But is this circle an upgrade from the pretentious wankers who have read Gravity's Rainbow circle, or roughly on the same level?
By the way, my pretentious wanker circle is a pretty awesome one to be in, though it is only for those with a high tolerance for excessive erudition and scat.
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From what I’ve been able to garner, it’s exactly the same club, except that the Pynchon card is not as internationally valid. Joyce is an institution in Europe as well as in the rest of the world, I think. Pynchon shares that status in America, but he’s widely unknown and not much discussed outside it, with the obvious exception of specific (usually American-based) academic circles. As an icon, I think he’s not so much on the plane of Joyce as of Robert Musil (and if you’ve never heard of him, that proves my point).
Also, same advice as to Shun. If you’re going to read Ulysses, make sure you’ve read the Odyssey first.