The subject of author Thomas Pynchon's latest novel has been announced by his longtime publisher, Penguin. The forthcoming "The Bleeding Edge" will take place in New York's Silicon Alley, and will be set "in the lull between the collapse of the dot-com boom and the terrible events of September 11."
According to The New York Times, the release date of "The Bleeding Edge" will be Sept. 17, 2013. The surprise announcement of Pynchon's latest novel was first made by The Times on Jan. 4, 2013, although a publication date was not yet set and no subject matter was mentioned.
"While the new book is set in the recent past, it will no doubt resonate with the current fascination with tech start-ups in popular culture," says The New York Times' update on that original release.
Manhattan's Silicon Alley is a term that is an obvious spinoff of California's Silicon Valley and refers to an area of New York City dense with Internet and digital media companies. Although the sobriquet originally applied to the boundaries of the Flatiron District down to SoHo and TriBeCa along the Broadway corridor, but it has since been expanded to encompass the totality of New York City's dot-com industry.
Pynchon, meanwhile, is a writer who could be classified as being as complex, intelligent and even as surreal as the novels he's published for decades. One of the reasons it's hot news every time he does publish something new is the incredible myth that surrounds his existence.
Known for being elusive to the extent that makes J.D. Salinger look like an American Idol contestant, Pynchon has even been parodied in an episode of The Simpsons (allegedly contributing his voice to the episode: a very big deal in the Pynchon cult).
No picture of Pynchon exists after his earliest black-and-white-photo days. (A recent development involving the disclosure of a Kodachrome color photo of Pynchon giving a friend a peace sign from the side of a door — concealing the rest of him, even back in the '60s — caused a huge uproar as fans clamored to see the chimerical Pynchon's hands.)
Beyond any privacy gimmicks, Pynchon's books — particularly the epic tome Gravity's Rainbow — are considered by many to be among the finest ever written in the English language. Their Rabelasian sensibility hearkens back to the likes of Jonathan Swift and Don Quixote while remaining completely steeped in their time (often with an eerie prescience, particularly when it comes to technology, military power and government control).
Filmmaker Paul Thomas Anderson has been in talks with Pynchon about adapting Pynchon's last novel, The Big Lebowski-esque Inherent Vice, with rumors of Joaquin Phoenix and Charlize Theron as leads.
With Pynchon publishing more regularly these days (that's another thing he's known for: often taking a decade between books), some worry the 75-year-old may be seeing the end of the line soon and wishes to get as much published as possible. Others in his dedicated claque are just happy to see more vintage Pynchon in the new era.
"The Bleeding Edge" will be the first Pynchon book to take place in the 21st century.
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