Less of a DNF than an RNF: Refused To Finish, although I read more than half of this overwritten, bloated tome.

Like DeLillo, I find Pynchon to be incredibly overrated--but I understand why he was so vital a force for the moment when his work came to light. Nonetheless, this doesn't mean that I should have to endure his flat, uninteresting characters and his worthless plotting (in spite of his sparkling prose) in the 21st century, where he has little to no relevance.

But I do think it's hilarious how many English postgrads still find it necessary to pontificate on their love for Pynchon in bookstores across the country. Happens every couple of years, while I'm browsing in some musty old shelves, and it's almost always a guy with bad skin or thick glasses who can't help himself, because Pynchon represents what every writer who deserves to be canonized should supposedly aspire to achieve....

Ugh. So much intellectual onanism, and for what? What is the great gift Pynchon has to give us NOW? I think he's a relic of a time and a place that haven't existed for decades. Study him? Sure, but don't elevate him, don't stick him in the pantheon of past masters and make him out to be a god.