Among the most interesting points to emerge from early reviews of Cormac McCarthy’s new novel The Passenger are unfavorable comparisons to Thomas Pynchon. For example, Laura Miller in Slate refers to “interludes [that] recall the most tiresome parts of Thomas Pynchon novels, all bad jokes and stupid music hall songs.” But it’s a mistake to read Pynchon seriously. To enjoy Pynchon, one must studiously ignore every tendentious theory about the parallels between Gravity’s Rainbow and the Tarot’s Major Arcana, the conflict between free will and determinism, psychosexuality, and sacrifice. Instead, simply laugh and/or despair at the words on the page. They’re good.
