Vineland

Vineland (1990) is a novel by Thomas Pynchon, set in California in 1984. The novel explores the paranoia of the collapsing counterculture movement of the 1960s through the experiences of Zoyd Wheeler, a former hippie, and the past of his ex-wife wife, Frenesi. Their daughter Prairie meets her mother’s former lover, DL, and discovers the truth about her mother’s life. The novel explores such themes as The Failures of Counterculture, The Search for Meaning, and The Importance of Family. Notably, Vineland was the first novel by Pynchon after the extended hiatus following the publication of Gravity’s Rainbow.

This guide uses the 2000 Vintage edition of Vineland.

Content Warning: The source text contains brief references to child abuse, human trafficking and enslavement, substance misuse disorder, and brief allusions to Nazism and the Holocaust. The source text also displays anti-transgender biases and misgenders transgender women.

Plot Summary

Vineland begins in the eponymous California town in 1984. Zoyd Wheeler, a former hippie, wakes up and drives to his annual stunt performance. After some initial confusion about the location, he jumps through a window as television news crews film him. Zoyd does this each year, a necessary step to collect his intellectual disability check.