«How had it ever happened here?» Thomas Pynchon's protagonist Oedipa Maas asks towards the end
of his second novel The Crying of Lot 49. This question is taken up in this book to explore
Pynchon's novels in the light of constructivist theory. It begins with a detailed reading of
The Crying of Lot 49 which is carried into readings of Pynchon's other novels (V. Gravity's
Rainbow Vineland Mason & Dixon Against The Day and Inherent Vice). All are shown to
critically deal with the social construction of reality as a central theme and a development
of this theme is traced throughout Pynchon's novels.
