Against the Day is a novel written by Thomas Pynchon. Released in 2006, it is Pynchon's longest novel and recounts events spanning from the end of the 19th century to the beginning of the 20th century and the immediate aftermath of World War I.
Characters[]
- Scarsdale Vibe - a "wicked arch-plutocrat"
- Webb Traverse - an anarchist killed by Scarsdale Vibe
- Nikola Tesla
- Bela Lugosi
- Groucho Marx
rest to be added
Publisher's summary[]
Spanning the period between the Chicago World's Fair of 1893 and the years just after World War I, this novel moves from the labor troubles in Colorado to turn-of-the-century New York, to London and Gottingen, Venice and Vienna, the Balkans, Central Asia, Siberia at the time of the mysterious Tunguska Event, Mexico during the Revolution, postwar Paris, silent-era Hollywood, and one or two places not strictly speaking on the map at all.
With a worldwide disaster looming just a few years ahead, it is a time of unrestrained corporate greed, false religiosity, moronic fecklessness, and evil intent in high places. No reference to the present day is intended or should be inferred.
The sizable cast of characters includes anarchists, balloonists, gamblers, corporate tycoons, drug enthusiasts, innocents and decadents, mathematicians, mad scientists, shamans, psychics, and stage magicians, spies, detectives, adventuresses, and hired guns. There are cameo appearances by Nikola Tesla, Bela Lugosi, and Groucho Marx.
As an era of certainty comes crashing down around their ears and an unpredictable future commences, these folks are mostly just trying to pursue their lives. Sometimes they manage to catch up; sometimes it's their lives that pursue them.
Meanwhile, the author is up to his usual business. Characters stop what they're doing to sing what are for the most part stupid songs. Strange sexual practices take place. Obscure languages are spoken, not always idiomatically. Contrary-to-the-fact occurrences occur. If it is not the world, it is what the world might be with a minor adjustment or two. According to some, this is one of the main purposes of fiction.
Let the reader decide, let the reader beware. Good luck.
See also[]
| Title | Author | Release date | Significance |
|---|---|---|---|
| Mason & Dixon | Thomas Pynchon | 1997 | The author's previous epic historical fiction novel |
| In the Beauty of the Lillies | John Updike | 1996 | A novel with a similar setting |
| Henry James' Midnight Song | Carol de Chellis Mill | 1993 | A novel with somewhat similar themes |
| Omensetter's Luck | William H. Gass | 1966 | A postmodernist novel set around the same time as Against the Day |
| Vanity Fair | William Makepeace Thackeray | 1847-1848 | A novel with somewhat similar themes |
| The Armor of Light | Ken Follett | 2023 | A novel with somewhat similar themes |
| Gravity's Rainbow | Thomas Pynchon | 1973 | A novel by the same author with similar themes |
Sources[]
- Wikipedia
- Goodreads
| Works of Thomas Pynchon | ||
|
Early works (Collected in Slow Learner) | ||