The Crying of lot 49 Chapter 1

It took me a while to get used to the style of Thomas Pynchon specially because there are lots of descriptions to which I don't get why they are in the text. I thought that the first chapter was especially troubling since it jumped in time and didn't have a specific order.

On the other hand, I find it very confusing that she is has a psychotherapist because it let me to doubt that she wasn't healthy mentally specially after the hallucinations she had on Uncle Sam pointing a finger at her. Other thing that let me to doubt from Oedipa is that she, at the end of this first chapter, has a "revelation" as she calls it about herself and she thinks she is like Rapunzel and that just when Pierce who is her prince charming is climbing up, her hair falls off and then decides to go through the door after he forges the entrance. Until then, I just thought it might be a ridiculous and senseless dream as many of the descriptions included in the first chapter. However, when she started comparing her ego to the tower's height and architecture, and she realized she didn't have control over it at all I was troubled and confused.
Despite these confusing allusions I thought the story was intriguing because there wasn't much an exposition of Oedipa or her relation with Pierce and to why would he leave her all his goods. Why would he call her in the middle of the night? Probably he still loved her but, why did they stop seeing each other? What is the Shadow (pg3)?

I found this chapter chaotic and vague since it didn't describe anything in specific; it described everything without really saying something in specific. When the author makes a reference to the youth, the cars and the lust in young people of the time, it reminded me of the movements that developed since the twenties in the US. There was economic prosperity so new inventions were created (among them Ford's Car) which was at a reasonable price and since everyone had relatively good incomes then everybody could afford a car, which gave more mobility to cultures. At a point there were more people living on the cities that in the suburbs which led to a change in society and which worried Mucho. Although this must have happened about thirty or more years before, it seems that either Mucho or Pynchon were still traumatized by those changes.

I think it’s absurd that the doctor is making experiments with the women of the community by administrating them LSD-25 and other drugs which sound to be hallucinogens. Why would a psychotherapist want to drug their patients? Did he have the authorization from the government to perform such tests? I believe Dr. Hilarious is crazy, he thinks of therapy by making faces to his patients, he really believes this has such a great impact that it can actually change the condition of his patients. I sincerely don’t understand why is he in the novel and what does he represent. Did she and Roseman have an affair before? Is he just interested in her recently acquired holdings? Is he a friend of Mucho (since Mucho told his wife to ask Roseman for advice)?

Vocabulary:

Mogul: entrepreneur, industrialist, magnate.

Codicil: supplement.

Vortex: current, whirlpool.