Crunch time: Bleeding Edge, Marxism, and Financial Capital

<p>This article argues Pynchon’s Bleeding Edge (2013) offers a more imaginativecompass in which to navigate the complex cultural frames of finance, crisis,neoliberalism, and the market. It is divided into two main sections. The firstuses Paul Crosthwaite’s recent arguments about the unsuitability of much of‘crunch-lit’ – fictions of the financial crisis – to adequately capture theunreality of financial exchange, thereby prompting a search for othernarrative modes to successfully address the abstractions of contemporaryglobal finance. Through examining selected sections, the article argues for theformal superiority of Pynchon’s style in relation to economy-led critique. Thesecond section excavates a narrative of radical left-wing affiliation, particularlyin relation to the characters Maxine Tarnow and March Kelleher,demonstrating how Pynchon’s narrative remains remarkably close to theMarxist political tradition, and dialectical criticism in particular.</p>