Covering Part 3: Chapters 13-23. Slothrop goes on a boat, and maybe has sex with a child. Then he goes on another boat. And then back to the same boat. Gravity's Rainbow? They should call this book Boats! Also: Slothrop's beging "thinning out." What does that mean? Has Ozempic claimed Tyrone Slothrop?!

This episode: we talk with with journalist and podcast Noah Kulwin (Blowback) about post-war geopolitics, banana republics, and how the multinational corporation came to supplant the nation-state as the fundamental unit through which power operates.

Other topics include: Porky Pig tattoos, the art of Balthasar Klossowski de Rola aka Balthus, perversion, pedophilia, the fascist connection between youth and beauty, Allan Dulles, Vineland, Nazis as the "ur-evil," conspiratorial vs. skeptical thought, uncorrupted youth corrupted, Tom Pynchon's Ghost, Hannibal Lecter.

Read ⁠⁠Proverbs For Paranoids,⁠⁠ John's guide to Gravity's Rainbow.

Follow "Tom Pynchon's Ghost" on Twitter.

E-mail us your questions, queries, and crackpot theories: slowlearnerspod@gmail.com

The Death of Ivan Ilyich, Chapter 2: Part II