An Archetypal Interpretation Of The Existentialist Significance In Pynchon's Works

Thomas Pynchon (1937- ) is a unique postmodern novelist and short-story writer in contemporary America. He in his works combines black humor and fantasy to depict human alienation in the chaos of modern society.Pynchon's first two novels share the same plot pattern: V. focuses on Stencil's quest for a capital letter V.; and in The Crying of Lot 49, the plot develops itself around Oedipa's quest for the Tristero System,so both of their plots follow the quest archetype. But Pynchon's allusion to the traditional quest is never mechanical. He adds some profound alterations.Northrop Frye, one of the developers of archetypal criticism, divides the plot of the traditional quest into three parts: perilous journey, conflicts and the exaltation of the hero. Pynchon, in his first two works, changes this pattern into journey, clues and an uncertain ending. Besides this, in clues or plots related to quest, he dexterously weaves in direct depictions of the Whole Sick Crew in V. and the Paranoids in The Crying of Lot 49. They are both a special group of people whose daily existence mainly concentrates on wine, sex and art. These transformations make the quest variant full of metaphorical and realistic indications. Pynchon's novels are therefore filled with existentialist thoughts on human's existence. The existentialist significance embodies itself in following two directions:Firstly, in a metaphorical sense, to change a successful journey into an uncertain one is a metaphor. Uncertainty indicates that there is no permanent meaning or absolute values: everything is possible, yet everything seems impossible as well. Human's efforts and struggle to seek truth in this meaningless world is therefore futile and absurd.Secondly, from the realistic perspective, Pynchon's direct depiction of the existence of the Paranoids and the Whole Sick Crew mirrors the absurdity of existence. Their actions, to some degree, exemplify Sartre's"choosing freely"and Camus'"to explore more of the life". Meanwhile, their life styles also present a realistic evidence of the existential notion: existence of human is meaningless and absurd.Pynchon's allusion to quest archetype is also an allusion to history, which illustrates the richness of his historical and literary knowledge and renders his novels with a huge time span. Like many other writers, he adds something of strangeness in literary conventions while following them. Pynchon in this way passes on and enlarges literary conventions. He creates a fresh quest variant which provides the traditional quest a counterpart to compare. In this comparison, he establishes a dialogue between present and history, and therefore reflects clearly the ideological picture and existential turn in the postwar America. Moreover, his depiction of the absurdity as well as his technique to express absurdity represents the literary spirit of his time.