Learning to Read Writing

Writing in Slate about 2666, Adam Kirsch paraphrased an intriguing idea:

According to Proust, one proof that we are reading a major new writer is that his writing immediately strikes us as ugly. Only minor writers write beautifully, since they simply reflect back to us our preconceived notion of what beauty is; we have no problem understanding what they are up to, since we have seen it many times before. When a writer is truly original, his failure to be conventionally beautiful makes us see him, initially, as shapeless, awkward, or perverse. Only once we have learned how to read him do we realize that this ugliness is really a new, totally unexpected kind of beauty and that what seemed wrong in his writing is exactly what makes him great.

This describes exactly what happened when I first read Thomas Pynchon (Vineland, to be specific). At first, the manic energy, page long sentences, and worm hole digressions were wildly entertaining but very hard to make sense of. However, after a few readings, his prose style falls into place and I fell in love.