What first struck me about the first four chapters of “The Crying of Lot 49” is the disconnected aspect of the protagonist’s narration in relation to the reality of her actions. Oedipa’s method of framing her thoughts, actions, and identity is both relational and highly stylized. An example is her description of her relationship with Pierce Inverarity, as she takes on a, “Rapunzel-like role of a pensive girl… looking for somebody to say hey, let down your hair. He’d slipped the lock on her tower door and come up the conchlike stairs…” (10) This curious portrayal not only creates a metaphor for the two characters’ relationship, but directly provides the realities of everyday life with a magical and dream-like quality. It is interesting to draw links between this style of identification and narration with the character’s internal consciousness, as we slowly begin to get a sense of how she receives events with a certain numbness and vague romanticization. While this is a common and fundamental technique that we first see in a story, it can have the most impact as the readers take on the character’s eyes and the rest of the narrative is shaped by a single perspective.

 

 

RESPONSE: “Self-awareness in The Crying of Lot 49”

This post closely links with my point, and provides yet another example of how Oedipa’s self-narrative deviates from, for example, a traditionally sequential and descriptive narrative style. It seems very accurate to say that there are two worlds, leaning towards either reality or fiction, that seem to increasingly blur together. While it is difficult to quantify this effect, the distance we feel from the character’s internal thoughts is undeniable. One question to keep in mind, then, is to what extent the events of the story produce this phenomenon, or whether the protagonist’s personality makes her surrounding environment seem disconnected and bizarre.