Journey of Self-Discovery in Thomas Pynchons' The Crying of Lot 49

In order to completely understand Oedipus and his actions, we must first understand the basics of Freud’s theories. One of the most well known aspects of Freudian theory is the Oedipus Complex. We can already see a relationship between the Oedipus

Oedipus the King by Sophocles’ is intertwined with many powerful themes and messages, establishing what real vision and real sight are. Sophocles’ play also demonstrates that sometimes in life we have to experience great loss in order to rediscover our true selves. In Oedipus’s quest for truth, lack of self-control, ignorance and tragic self-discovery prevail. Physical vision does not necessarily guarantee insight, nor impart truth. Intertwined with dramatic and cosmic irony, all of these elements contribute to the major theme of blindness and sight, depicting wisdom

It is said that the truth will set you free, but in the case of Sophocles’ Oedipus, the truth drives a man to imprison himself in a world of darkness by gouging out his eyes. As he scours the city for truth, Oedipus’ ruin is ironically mentioned and foreshadowed in the narrative. With these and other devices Sophocles illuminates the king’s tragic realization and creates a firm emotional bond with the audience.

Both the reader and the characters develop similar problems in dealing with the chaos around them. Like Pynchons' reader's, Oedipa is forced to either work toward interpreting the trail of seemingly indecipherable clues being tossed in her wake or forgo it all and walk away in bewilderment. Like the reader by deciding to go on, however aimlessly, she is forcibly drawn out of the complacency of her own existence; into a chaotic system of intrigue that reaches far beyond her normal scope of understanding. In the same turn, like Oedipa the reader's role is also based on interpreting numerous symbols and metaphorical clues as a means of stumbling upon a legible conclusion that will stop the madness. Each of them arriving at a different conclusion or none at all solely depended upon how far the use of our perceptions will allow us to go. Unfortunately both Oedipa and the reader (myself included) are overwhelmed by the myriad of inconsistencies and masked innuendo saturating this book from cover to cover. Unable to sufficiently distinguish between what is real and relevant and what is unreal and irrelevant, both are left feeling disconcerted and

Eleanor, the protagonist, undergoes a difficult childhood where she had to take care of her ill mother for 11 years, until she died. Taking care of her mother for most of her childhood prohibited her from developing as a person; that affected her tremendously. For example, During Theodora’s supernatural experience, Shirley Jackson displays how Eleanor’s inner child managed to let her grow anger and jealously towards Theodora. Eleanor felt like Hill House was giving Theodora more affection and attention than it was giving her; similar, to the one that a child would have

Oedipus is blind, not only in "mind," but also in "ears." He has proven himself to be a man who can listen carefully, but when he becomes angry he cannot hear anyone’s views but his own. His ability to reason, his second great virtue, falls victim to his

From the very beginning, what makes Oedipus ' actions in his quarrel with Teiresias and also throughout the play so dramatically compelling, is the fact that the audience knows the outcome of the story. We know Oedipus ' fate even before he does, and there is no suspense about the outcome itself, instead, the audience anxiously awaits Oedipus to reveal his fate unto himself in his desperate quest to rid his city of the terrible plague, or maybe even more so, to simply discover his own unfortunate tale. Oedipus is relentless in his pursuit of the truth, and his determination is commendable. There is nothing that compels him to act in this way, instead he freely chooses, with much zeal, to initiate the chain of events that will ultimately lead to his downfall. It is this interplay between Oedipus’ own free will and his fated eventuality that is the crux of the play, and constitutes the main dramatic power.

Oedipa is not happy with the events but there is no going back to change it. Along her journey she gets theses letters that don't really have information on what she needs to do but on other things. Her time there is a one mystery after another. But when reading it it's a journey that you feel apart of. Yes there were downs throughout it but the whole collecting his stamps that that may have been used by a secret underground postal delivery service, the Trystero, he wanted her to manage and help to solve the problem that he left for her was amazing and it was very exciting to read because the need for finding out what happens next was very

First published in 1965, The Crying of Lot 49 is the second novel by American author Thomas Pynchon. The novel follows Oedipa Mass, a young Californian housewife, after she unexpectedly finds herself named the executrix of the estate of Californian real estate mogul, and ex-boyfriend, Pierce Inverarity. In reflecting on their history together, Oedipa recalls how her travels with Pierce helped her acknowledge, but not overcome, the poignant feeling that she was being held paralyzed and isolated from the world (and others) within a staid, middle-class existence by some invisible and nefarious external force. Moreover Oedipa struggles to understand why Pierce would name her the executor of his will considering her deep ignorance of finance,

This metaphoric parallel becomes weak, however, when we realize that as Oedipa probes deeper into the issues, "other revelations...seemed to come crowding in exponentially, as if the more she collected the more would come to her,"(64). Oedipa becomes unable to accurately mimic Maxwell's Demon; she simply cannot sort through all of the clues, nor can she place the "truthful" ones on one side and the "false" ones on the other. This inability stems not only from the copious amount of information she receives but the ultimately unknowable (and, as we shall see, distorted) nature of such "clues;" Oedipa can never truly know if a clue is "true" or "false." Nonetheless, the other side of Maxwell's Demon, the side Pynchon chooses not to explicitly elaborate,

Similarly, the name of Oedipa’s psychiatrist Dr. Hilarius is, for instance, a similar play of the language, since there is nothing hilarious about his character, who is engaging in formidable experiments at a World War II concentration camp. When it comes to experiencing paranoia and conspiracy, the plot follows the main character Oedipa Maas, who discovers Trystero, a secret postal service organization, which threatens the economy of the official postal service. The information she finds about the existence of Trystero, however valid it may be, radically changes her perception of the world. Throughout the novel, Oedipa becomes more and more paranoid and disorganized, reading hidden meaning into everything. Solving the mystery of Trystero becomes her ultimate priority in life and makes her unable to distinguish the world of her obsession from the real world. Even though she is somewhat aware of creating her own reality, she does not know what extent of the world she perceives is real and how much is a part of her

Throughout the play Oedipus is given clues to his past and the fate that is to come, the moment that he gouges his eyes out shows these clues that he has missed. Jocasta says wildly, “In the name of heaven, don’t proceed! For your own life’s sake, stop! And I’ve been tortured long enough.” (59) This shows a moment of caution for Oedipus to not continue to seek the truth. The dramatic irony of this situation illuminates the horrors that are to come because of fate as well as Oedipus’ free will. Oedipus: “Laius was killed—I thought I caught the words—where three highways meet?” Jocasta: “So they said. That is how the story goes.” (41) Oedipus is first hearing the true story of the late king’s murder and seems to be beginning to realize that it was he who did the killing. Even though this could be his illuminating moment, Oedipus is unwilling to accept this fact and must hear

In both Jack Kerouac’s, On the Road, and Thomas Pynchon’s Crying of Lot 49 the characters act in a deviant manner outside of social norms. This in turn leads to a deviant sub-cultural group which competes with the institutionalized authorities for power. Deviance in both novels is usually defined as a certain type of behaviour, such as an inebriated professor babbling on in a lecture hall filled with students or a group of teenagers frolicking naked in a city park on a hot and sunny afternoon. However, deviance can also encompass both ideas and attributes (Sagarin, 1975). The primary understanding of deviance rests in the reactions of observers, something becomes deviant because an individual, group or society takes offense and reacts

The drug culture in the novel plays a huge part in the story Pynchon portrays. By the end of the novel, Oedipa is completely detached from society and often finds herself hallucinating, giving the reader the sense that she is always high off of some drug. Not only does Oedipa herself become detached from society because of her obsession and seemingly drugs, but her marriage also comes to an end because of drugs. After her obsession with figuring out the mystery of the Tristero she finds her husband has become addicted to LSD in the

From reading this book, I have figured out that the theme was coming of age and facing maturity. What you are about to read are examples of this.