Pictures Showing What Happens on Each Page of Thomas Pynchon’s Novel Gravity’s Rainbow

Thomas Pynchons Gravitys Rainbow (1973), set in an alternative-universe version of World War II, has been called a modern Finnegans Wake for its challenging language, wild anachronisms, hallucinatory happenings, and fever-dream imagery. With Pictures Showing What Happens on Each Page of Thomas Pynchon's Novel Gravity's Rainbow, artist Zak Smith at once eases and expands readers experience of the book. A leading exponent of punk-based, DIY art, Smith here presents his most ambitious project to date an art book exactly as long as the work its interpreting: 760 drawings, paintings, photos, and less definable images in 760 pages. Extraordinary tableaux of the detritus of war a burned-out Knigstiger tank, a melted machine gun coexist alongside such phantasmagoric Pynchon inventions as the stumbling bird and Girgori the octopus. Smith has stated his aim to be as literal as possible in interpreting Gravitys Rainbow, but his images are as imaginative and powerfully unique as the prose they honor.

Gravity's Rainbow Illustrated: One Picture for Every Page features the work of an Ivy League-educated, punk-rock, porn-star visual artist who has created a drawing for every page of a novel that is widely considered to be the most difficult work of literature ever produced in English.

Thomas Pynchon’s Gravity’s Rainbow (1973) has been called a modernFinnegans Wake for its challenging language, wild anachronisms, hallucinatory happenings, and fever-dream imagery. With Pictures Showing What Happens on Each Page of Thomas Pynchon's Novel Gravity's Rainbow, artist Zak Smith at once eases and expands readers’ experience of the twentieth-century classic. Smith has created more than 750 pages of drawings, paintings, and photos—each derived from a page of Pynchon’s novel. Extraordinary tableaux of the detritus of war—a burned-out Konigstiger tank, a melted machine gun—coexist alongside such fantasmagoric Pynchon inventions as the “stumbling bird” and “Grigori the octopus.” Smith has said he aimed to be “as literal as possible” in interpreting Gravity’s Rainbow, but his images are as imaginative and powerful as the prose they honor.