Out of the Debris Cloud

What makes Pynchon's work so difficult?

I find myself finally able to answer this question with some clarity now that I've reached Part 2 of Gravity's Rainbow. The first 177 pages of the novel is all set up.

Part 2 begins the action. The characters have all waited (not-so-patiently) in ranks behind the curtain as the audience has labored through the playbill, learning about their backgrounds, their situations/motivations, and now the curtain rises and out they come, streaming past the proscenium and into the crowd because the drama they begin to act out is too complex to be constrained to any stage.

Now finally Pynchon is liberated to do what he does best, which is to let his imagination go nuts. He's off immediately into the realm of the fantastic, and, with any luck, he'll stay there until the novel's conclusion. I don't know how he's managed to avoid the label of science fiction. Perhaps just by writing as well as he possibly can.

2 Feb. - Page 201 - Tyrone Slothrop is on the run.

Most wonderful element introduced thus far: a Pavlovian-conditioned octopus.