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Thomas Pynchon's The Crying of Lot 49: A Hyperreal Apocalypse


Affiliations
1 English Department, Islamic Azad University—Karaj Branch, Alborz, Iran, Islamic Republic of
2 English Department, Islamic Azad University—Malard Branch, Alborz, Iran, Islamic Republic of
     

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In "The Crying of Lot 49" (1966), Thomas Pynchon depicts a world in which numerous messages are recurrently generated via simulations and the proliferation of signs increases so incessantly that the original aim of their production is eventually overlooked. The protagonist of the novel is constantly bombarded by an ever-increasing excess of information that makes her life chaotic, seeing that the more she attempts to find out answers to the puzzling questions raised in her mind, the more she gets lost in a net of seemingly associated but actually unrelated data. Suffering from the consequent uncertainty and perplexity, she gradually reaches a state of indifference which is considered in this article an entropic and hence apocalyptic state. Moreover it is discussed here that by exposing the fictional, hyper-real replications of catastrophic historical events of the twentieth century in his novel, Pynchon deviates from the traditional view of history as a linear movement, and envisages an approaching apocalypse for the world. These points are discussed in this article with regard to Baudrillard's theories of "Simulacra and Simulation" and "The End of History" to attest "The Crying of Lot 49" as an apocalyptic text.

Keywords

Simulation, Simulacra, Hyper-Real, Entropy, Apocalypse.
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  • Thomas Pynchon's The Crying of Lot 49: A Hyperreal Apocalypse

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Authors

Sima Farshid
English Department, Islamic Azad University—Karaj Branch, Alborz, Iran, Islamic Republic of
Hanieh Mehr Motlagh
English Department, Islamic Azad University—Malard Branch, Alborz, Iran, Islamic Republic of

Abstract


In "The Crying of Lot 49" (1966), Thomas Pynchon depicts a world in which numerous messages are recurrently generated via simulations and the proliferation of signs increases so incessantly that the original aim of their production is eventually overlooked. The protagonist of the novel is constantly bombarded by an ever-increasing excess of information that makes her life chaotic, seeing that the more she attempts to find out answers to the puzzling questions raised in her mind, the more she gets lost in a net of seemingly associated but actually unrelated data. Suffering from the consequent uncertainty and perplexity, she gradually reaches a state of indifference which is considered in this article an entropic and hence apocalyptic state. Moreover it is discussed here that by exposing the fictional, hyper-real replications of catastrophic historical events of the twentieth century in his novel, Pynchon deviates from the traditional view of history as a linear movement, and envisages an approaching apocalypse for the world. These points are discussed in this article with regard to Baudrillard's theories of "Simulacra and Simulation" and "The End of History" to attest "The Crying of Lot 49" as an apocalyptic text.

Keywords


Simulation, Simulacra, Hyper-Real, Entropy, Apocalypse.

References