The Crying of Lot 49 (Masterplots II: American Fiction Series, Revised Edition)
At a glance:
- Author: Thomas Pynchon
- First Published: 1966
- Type of Plot: Philosophical satire
- Time of Work: The early 1960’s
- Setting: Primarily San Francisco
- Principal Characters: Pierce Inverarity, Mrs. Oedipa Maas, Metzger, Mucho Maas
- Genres: Long fiction, Satire, Philosophical realism
- Subjects: 1960’s, Truth, Wills, Wit or humor, San Francisco, Popular culture
- Locales: San Francisco, CA
The Novel
At first reading, The Crying of Lot 49 is a surrealistic portrayal of life in America in the 1960’s—a time of self-doubt, frustration, and alienation. Scenes of California life-styles and of characters such as Dr. Hilarius, Oedipa’s psychotherapist who is himself mad, combine with such surrealistic details as human bones being used to decorate the bottom of swimming pools and the inane plots of old films which Oedipa and her lawyer and would-be seducer, Metzger, watch on television.
Such satiric elements fuse elegantly with the novel’s plot—a...
[The entire page is 2267 words long]
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