The Word Game in The Crying o
The Word Game in The Crying of Lot 49 In Thomas Pynchon's novel The Crying of Lot 49 (TCL49), the author uses the multiplicity of language, in the form of words with conflicting definitions, conflicting connotations and puns, to construct multiple, often times conflicting meanings. The effect of these puns and words with conflicting meanings serve to connect the audience with Oedipa in the way that both are bombarded with information. On page 100 of the novel Oedipa, wandering for clues about the Trystero by taking on a voyeuristic role, encounters a plethora of "waste" associated characters. The connection between the reader and Oedipa surfaces again in the voyeuristic connotations associated not only with Oedipa, but also the act of reading. As readers, we are playing the voyeur to Oedipa and, in turn, all of the characters she encounters. This, in effect, serves to connect the audience with not only Oedipa, but also with these WASTE associated characters. The significance being that if we are associated with WASTE, then aren't we also outcasts. Pynchon's portrayal of the characters in this passage, on a broad level, focuses on imagery of searching in darkness through the con
This blank, devoid of covering or content, and lulling, to cause to relax vigilance, community seems to be a threat to this child's search. It seems less that coincidental that at the end of the novel Pynchon leaves us roaming for an answer towards the question of the Trystero. This intimate association between Oedipa and the people she watches serves to connect her to the movement of WASTE, which exists so that those in the underground can communicate. The word voyeur itself has connotations along the lines of intimacy. Each of the characters revealed is in some way connected not only with WASTE, but also with searching and Oedipa. In this novel, these examples of words with multiple meanings and differing connotations mixed in with puns serve the purpose of allowing for meaning to be constructed by the reader and not spoon fed into their mouth. If the child is instead randomly wandering, the conclusion can be drawn that there is nothing out there to be found. The act itself seems to be more significant than what is lost. The Negro woman is followed by "an aging night watchman, nibbling at a bar of Ivory Soap. The fact that the soap mentioned is Ivory seems to be a stark contrast to the imagery of blackness presented before with the other figures. Presented before was a child who missed the opportunity for a miscarriage, now we have someone who is giving babies the apparent privilege of the death before birth. This seems to imply that the night watchman is trying to ingest a world free of moral impurity, a symbol that white usually represents. This, however, could either be a search with a purpose or a random wandering.
Common topics in this essay:
WASTE Trystero,
Ivory Soap,
Trystero Significance,
Oedipa WASTE,
Civil Rights,
Thomas Pynchon's,
negro woman,
night watchman,
Carlisle ENGL,
roaming night,
San Francisco,
death birth,
page 100,
child roaming,
lulling blankness,
playing voyeur,
blankness community,
lulling blankness community,
normality society,
Game Crying,
connect audience oedipa,
waste associated characters,
night watchman trying,
aging night watchman,
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Acceptance Essays
