Gravity's Rainbow

Gravity's Rainbow is a postmodern novel written by Thomas Pynchon and first published on February 28, 1973.

The narrative is set primarily in Europe at the end of World War II and centers on the design, production and dispatch of V-2 rockets by the German military, and, in particular, the quest undertaken by several characters to uncover the secret of a mysterious device named the "Schwarzgerät" ("black device") that is to be installed in a rocket with the serial number "00000."

Gravity's Rainbow is transgressive, as it questions and inverts social standards of deviance and disgust and transgresses boundaries of Western culture and reason. Frequently digressive, the novel subverts many of the traditional elements of plot and character development, and traverses detailed, specialist knowledge drawn from a wide range of disciplines.

The novel has been praised for its innovation and complexity, but criticized by others. In 1974, the three-member Pulitzer Prize jury on fiction supported Gravity's Rainbow for the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction. The other eleven members of the board overturned this decision and no award was given for fiction that year. The novel was nominated for the 1973 Nebula Award for Best Novel and shared the 1974 U.S. National Book Award for Fiction with A Crown of Feathers and Other Stories by Isaac Bashevis Singer. Since its publication, Gravity's Rainbow has spawned an enormous amount of literary criticism and commentary, including two readers' guides and several online concordances, and it is frequently cited as Pynchon's magnum opus.

Gravity's Rainbow

Are you lonely tonight?
are you thinking about me?
did you ever wonder how should i feel?
close your eyes now and picture me there
you can push us aside, you can tear us apart
but it doesn't change the way that i feel
close your eyes now and you'll see me there
by your side, so wrong, so right
we make our choices, as time goes by
but nothin' matters more than you and i
one in a million, two of a kind
you & i
It was all we could stand
it was heaven and hell
it was everything and nothing together
maybe some things are just meant to be
what they are, so close, so far
We make our choices, as time goes by
but nothin' matters more than you and i
one in a million, two of a kind
you & i
You know i love you
i want you, but what can i do?
can't fight this feelin'
i just can't go on without you
baby i want you
Are you lonely tonight?
are you thinking about me?
did you ever wonder how should i feel?
maybe somethings are just meant to be - yeh
We make our choices, as time goes by
but nothin' matters more than you and i
one in a million, two of a kind
We make our choices, as time goes by
but nothin' matters more than you and i
one in a million, two of a kind
you & i
we make our choices
but nothin' matters
only you & i
From the album "gravity's rainbow"
written by: n. giraldo, p. giraldo & m. grombacher

photo: WN / Aruna Mirasdar

full moon in the month of February - nature

There's Going To Be A Rare "Strawberry Moon" Tonight

Edit IFL Science 20 Jun 2016

This year the summer solstice is even more special for everyone who loves the night sky. A bright full Moon will appear tonight, the first time since 1967 that a full Moon coincides with the summer solstice in the Northern Hemisphere, the longest day of the year ... “The Sun gets super high so this Moon must be super-low ... ....

photo: AP / John Raoux

Supporters of the victims of the recent mass shooting at the Pulse nightclub attend a vigil at Lake Eola Park, Sunday, June 19, 2016, Orlando, Fla. Tens of thousands of people attended the vigil.

Around 50,000 people attend Orlando shooting vigil Sunday night

Edit WPTV 20 Jun 2016

ORLANDO, Fla. - On the week anniversary of the Pulse nightclub shooting that left 49 people dead, a vigil was held that brought the city of Orlando together. Organizers say around 50,000 people attended the Sunday event. RELATED. Special Section . Photos of victims ... "It's been really healing." ... "A beautiful thing came out of it," Suarez said ... ....

photo: AP / Rich Pedroncelli

n this photo taken Wednesday, Aug. 15, 2012, three variations of the AR-15 assault rifle are displayed at the California Department of Justice in Sacramento, Calif. While the guns look similar, the bottom version is illegal in California because of it's quick reload capabilities. State Sen. Leland Yee, D-San Francisco, is proposing to change California law to make it more difficult and time-consuming to reload. The proposed measure is one of a number of gun control laws being introduced in some the nations most populous states after the recent shootings in Colorado.

Supreme Court Lets Stand Assault Weapons Bans in Connecticut, New York

Edit WorldNews.com 20 Jun 2016

The U.S ... In December, less than a month after a mass shooting in San Bernardino, Calif., Justices Clarence Thomas and Antonin Scalia dissented when the court refused to hear an appeal to overturn a Chicago suburb's ban on assault weapons. Scalia died in February. Seven states as well as the District of Columbia have enacted laws banning assault weapons, the report said ... He then killed himself....

photo: WN / Aruna Mirasdar

Apartment building - real estate - property

As U.S. Property Values Rebound, Growing Class Of Renters Is Caught In Bind

Edit WorldNews.com 20 Jun 2016

In the 10 years since the U.S. housing bubble peaked and then burst in a ruinous crash, homeowners have been thriving as real estate values have climbed back, while renters are struggling, The Associated Press reports.For many longtime owners, times are good. They're enjoying the benefits of growing equity and reduced mortgage payments from ultra-low rates ... Whatever wealth most Americans possess mainly comes from home equity....

photo: AP / Majdi Mohammed, File

In this Friday, June 19, 2015 file photo young Palestinians use a ladder to climb over the separation barrier with Israel in Al-Ram, north of Jerusalem. Israel has built several walls and fences, including its West Bank separation barrier, which is to reach 450 miles (700 kilometers) when complete.

Israel Building Underground Wall On Gaza Border To Prevent Smuggling, Infiltration

Edit WorldNews.com 20 Jun 2016

In an effort to prevent Hamas’ smuggling and attack tunnels from wreaking havoc on Israeli citizens, Israel is building an underground wall meters below ground level, local media reports and Newsweek reported Monday.Israeli newspaper Yedioth Ahronoth said late last week military leaders have approved the defense project aimed at protecting the entire 60km (37.2 mile) length of the Israel-Gaza border from infiltration....

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Klaxons' James Righton plays clown in new Simon Amstell-directed Shock Machine video - watch

Edit NME 14 Jun 2016

Former Klaxons member James Righton plays the part of a sad clown in a new short film directed by comedian Simon Cowell ... Watch the video below. Klaxons played their debut show at Soho's St Moritz Club in January 2006, and released their debut single, 'Gravity's Rainbow', in March 2006, on Angular Records ... He added ... ....

Mirror’s Edge and the politics of parkour

Edit Kill Screen 03 Jun 2016

As world design in games nowadays trends towards visions of vast, sprawling overworlds, intricately layered and impeccably nuanced, questions of mobility have risen to the forefront ... But, as in any art, games too must also be concerned with not just raw efficiency, but beauty as well ... From this desire has emerged the rise of parkour in games ... movement ... world ... It is modernism at its finest ... The seconds hang in the air, gravity’s rainbow ... ....

Wrestling With The Witness' Most Difficult, Divisive Puzzle

Edit Kotaku 15 Feb 2016

“This piece of the game is supposed to be difficult,” the game designer Jonathan Blow recently said to me as we discussed the hardest puzzle in The Witness, the so-called bonus “Challenge” that only 3.3% of PS4 players and 4% of PC players have managed to complete. He was helping me make peace that I might not be able to clear it either ... Stuff like that ... So yeah, it’s hard.” ... “I don’t expect myself to master 100% of Gravity’s Rainbow ... ....

The Dolphins Speak, and the Power of Power Electronics

Edit Houston Press 12 Feb 2016

"Nothing says holidays like a cheese log" — Ellen Degeneres. Music For Dolphins, feat. Dave Dove and Jason Jackson ... The English were bombed by the Nazis, not that this is Nazi music whatsover, but the memory of clinical trauma is said to pass on as genetic information with resultant cellular damage, and senseless destruction screams overhead like the V2s in Pynchon's Gravity's Rainbow; a shadow cast is a shadow cast ... Disclosure ... ....

War and Peace … and then what?

Edit The Guardian 08 Feb 2016

Andrew Davies’s triumphant TV series has caused sales of Tolstoy’s epic to soar. Here are five more big reads to fill the gap – from Finnegans Wake to Gravity’s Rainbow. And every one is ripe for the small screen. Let the bells ring. War and Peace concludes in triumph. 5.7m viewers can’t be wrong. The critics agree. the man did it ... Genius in a box set ... No warbling ... Gravity’s Rainbow by Thomas Pynchon ... Gravity’s Rainbow is hyper-paranoiac ... ....

Jonathan Blow: 'I want to make games for people who read Gravity's Rainbow'

Edit The Guardian 27 Jan 2016

But compare the quality of that story to a novel, and the novel just beats the shit out of the game in every dimension.” The reason? “If your idea of a good story is a Star Wars novelization, that’s very different than if your idea of a good story is Gravity’s Rainbow.”. It may be helpful, in fact, to think of Jonathan Blow as a kind of Thomas Pynchon of gaming, and of The Witness as his Gravity’s Rainbow....

Is James Joyce's Ulysses the hardest novel to finish?

Edit The Guardian 13 Jan 2016

James Joyce died 75 years ago this week, leaving a lifetime of books beloved by many... and Ulysses, heralded as both the best novel in the English language and the hardest to read. So what do you do if you get stuck?. @siancain ... I can believe it; I needed a nap after reading 40 pages ... Related ... At first, it was fun ... A lot of the Goodreads top 10 – Moby-Dick, Gravity’s Rainbow – are weighty tomes, but I like big books (and I cannot lie) ... ....

Turning Pages: See red over the colouring-in craze? Try these titles for a laugh

Edit Sydney Morning Herald 21 Dec 2015

Following the latest mindfulness craze, we have updated literary classics with illustrated editions. 1. The Colour Purple Colouring Book. Here's one to get you started. Alice Walker's searing epic of poverty and abuse in the Deep South demands some nice shades of mauve. 2. Moby-Dick Colouring Book Advertisement ... 3. How Green Was My Valley Colouring Book ... 4. Pale Fire Colouring Book ... Not too dark though. 5 ... 6 ... 7 ... 8 ... Gravity's Rainbow Colouring Book ... ....

Why We Should be Thankful for Trump’s Muslim Ban Comments

Edit CounterPunch 11 Dec 2015

Finally Donald Trump said publicly what many—not all—American institutions, individuals, decision-makers, bankers, capital owners, media pundits, corporations, and knowledge producers have been promoting and working tirelessly to achieve for many decades behind the scenes ... The reactions of Republicans and Democrats to Trump remind me in a sense of a line from Thomas Pynchon’s novel, Gravity’s Rainbow ... This is what the hell is going on....

Gravity’s rainbow

Edit The Economist 03 Dec 2015

Looking for wrinkles in space ... LISA Pathfinder (the acronym stands for Laser Interferometer Space Antenna) is intended to demonstrate the technology needed to detect waves of gravity, rather than light, X-rays or gamma rays ... ....

CERN Scientist Reassures That Black Hole Will Not Destroy the Human Race

Edit Huffington Post 28 Oct 2015

The black hole is an object whose gravity is so strong that nothing can escape its gravity ... We have used such a modification of Einstein's theory of relativity, and this theory is called gravity's rainbow ... So if the mini black holes are detected, we will know that gravity's rainbow is the correct modification of Einstein's theory of relativity ... Please define gravity's rainbow. This is a new theory of gravity....

What the Cow Country controversy can teach us about Thomas Pynchon

Edit Entertainment Weekly 15 Sep 2015

Last week, literary critic Art Winslow wondered in Harper’s if famously reclusive author Thomas Pynchon had pulled a fast one over everybody, by secreting writing a recent novel under a pseudonym ... While Pynchon has not been known to write under pseudonyms before, he has cultivated an air of mystery by staying out of the public eye, even as he wrote landmark novels like Gravity’s Rainbow and Mason & Dixon ... Voice/style ... Paranoia vs....

Mystery of book's authorship solved

Edit Houston Chronicle 13 Sep 2015

... funny" and found enough similarities to Pynchon to make it plausible that the media-adverse author of "Gravity's Rainbow" had also written "Cow Country."...

Gravity's Rainbow

ALBUMS

Confrontation in Dub

Gravity's Rainbow

There's Going To Be A Rare "Strawberry Moon" Tonight

Around 50,000 people attend Orlando shooting vigil Sunday night

Supreme Court Lets Stand Assault Weapons Bans in Connecticut, New York

As U.S. Property Values Rebound, Growing Class Of Renters Is Caught In Bind

Israel Building Underground Wall On Gaza Border To Prevent Smuggling, Infiltration

You can search using any combination of the items listed below.

Klaxons' James Righton plays clown in new Simon Amstell-directed Shock Machine video - watch

Mirror’s Edge and the politics of parkour

Wrestling With The Witness' Most Difficult, Divisive Puzzle

The Dolphins Speak, and the Power of Power Electronics

War and Peace … and then what?

Jonathan Blow: 'I want to make games for people who read Gravity's Rainbow'

Is James Joyce's Ulysses the hardest novel to finish?

Turning Pages: See red over the colouring-in craze? Try these titles for a laugh

Why We Should be Thankful for Trump’s Muslim Ban Comments

Gravity’s rainbow

CERN Scientist Reassures That Black Hole Will Not Destroy the Human Race

What the Cow Country controversy can teach us about Thomas Pynchon

Mystery of book's authorship solved