4. Oedipa recites the couplet from the play which mentions Trystero and Bortz and says the quote came from a pornographic version of the play which was held where?

5. What scientific rule does the Nefastis Machine violate?

Short Essay Questions

1. In addition to visiting John Nefastis, why does Oedipa need to go to Berkeley?

2. Oedipa compares her search for The Tristero to what process?

3. Give examples of individuals with the post horn symbol who are somehow alienated from society.

4. When Oedipa and Metzger go back to The Scope in Chapter 4, Mike Fallopian explains that there exists what kind of underground group?

5. What is the story behind the religious splinter group known as the Scurvhamites that Professor Bortz tells Oedipa about?

6. What causes Oedipa to realize that every source of information on the Tristero can somehow be traced to Inverarity?

7. What is Pynchon ridiculing through all of Oedipa's in-depth research into the Trystero?

8. The overall crisis Oedipa faces by the end of the novel could be summed up how?

9. The men Oedipa meets on her journey end up abandoning her. What were some of their fates and what did they represent?

10. Bortz hands Oedipa an ancient book about the Italian travels of Dr. Diocletian Blobb. What does this story have to do with the Trystero?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

The presence of numerous male characters in the narrative who are unable to truly love Oedipa alludes to Freud's theory of the Oedipal complex.

1) Explain Freud's theory and how it relates to The Crying of Lot 49.

3) Show specifically what each of these male characters represents to Oedipa and how they abandon her: Metzger, Driblette and Mucho.

Essay Topic 2

Explain how the Nefastis Machine is used as a metaphor for language within the novel. What does the use of a complicated scientific machine convey about Pynchon's views about language and communication?

Essay Topic 3

The larger setting of The Crying of Lot 49 is the United States in the era of the counter-culture, the 1960s, when experimentation with psychedelic drugs was rife and identity crises pervasive. The problem the novel presents is the crisis of meaning present in modern life. Choose one of the four ways this theme manifests itself throughout the novel. Discuss it thoroughly with events and characters.

1) Identity crises

2) Relationship and sexuality problems

3) Injustice in the economic system

4) Loss of cultural consensus as to what constitutes truth

(see the answer keys)

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