âWhen You Come to a Fork in the RoadââMarcuse, Intellectual Subversion and Negative Thought in Gravityâs Rainbow and Against the Day

Toon Staes

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âWhen You Come to a Fork in the RoadââMarcuse, Intellectual Subversion and Negative Thought in Gravityâs Rainbow and Against the Day

äºAgainst the Grain

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Toon Staes

Toon Staes
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Page Range:: 97â111

DOI:: https://doi.org/10.1163/9789042030732_007

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In an effort to establish a parallel between the intellectual subversion in Gravityâs Rainbow and that in Against the Day, this paper will draw on Herbert Marcuseâs critique of modern technocracy. Starting from the forks in the road, âtracks of departure to all manner of alternate Historiesâ (AtDFehler! Textmarke nicht definiert. 682), I will exemplify how Pynchon goes beyond official, teleological history in an attempt to restore the flattened one-dimensional man to his full multidimensional autonomy. Against the Day shares with Gravityâs Rainbow a skepticism towards the culture of social conformism and passivity installed by the rationalized use of language and technology. The mediated truth that is imposed in the public domain through discourse closes all meaning down to the presupposed meaning. Since the corporate structures appear to be insurmountable, effective dissent is neutralized, and there seems to be no other option than to join the one-dimensional synthesis of opinions. Dissent is co-opted, repressive tolerance bars any real change. The result is an impression of technological determinism: the systemâs configuration is exactly how it is meant to be. Both Gravityâs Rainbow and Against the Day point to the necessary incompleteness of any final explanation, but it can be argued that Marcuseâs claim that advanced industrial society bars authentic liberty resonates in Pynchonâs novels. What is more, it is exactly the insight into this necessary incompleteness that still allows for certain possibilities. Marcuse refers to the possibility of intellectual subversion, the effort to go against the established train of thought and find the forks in the road that step outside teleological history.

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Against the Grain

Reading Pynchonâs Counternarratives

ä¸ç¼ï¼ Dialogue, å·ï¼ 8and Dialogue Online, å·ï¼ 8

ISBN:: 9789042030732

åºçç¤¾:: Brill

å°å·åºçæ¥æ:: 01 Jan 2010

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- American Studies
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âWhen You Come to a Fork in the RoadââMarcuse, Intellectual Subversion and Negative Thought in Gravityâs Rainbow and Against the Day

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Against the Grain

Reading Pynchonâs Counternarratives

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âWhen You Come to a Fork in the RoadââMarcuse, Intellectual Subversion and Negative Thought in Gravityâs Rainbow and Against the Day

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Reading Pynchonâs Counternarratives

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