Rape in the Hebrew Bible decried in the Bible's stories. It is not tolerated in the Bible's laws." Sunil Francis concurs in her book "Violence Against Women: A Christian Ethical Analysis on Rape", writing "The Bible always sees rape as violence and sin." Genesis 19 features an attempted homosexual gang rape. Two angels arrive in Sodom, and Lot shows them hospitality. However, the men of the city gathered around Lot's house and demanded that he give them the two guests so that they could rape them. In response to this, Lot offers the mob his two virgin daughters instead. The mob refuses Lot's offer, but
The Crying of Lot 49 real character's name," protests one reviewer. Pynchon disparaged this book, writing in the prologue to his 1984 collection "Slow Learner", "As is clear from the up-and-down shape of my learning curve, however, it was too much to expect that I'd keep on for long in this positive or professional direction. The next story I wrote was "The Crying of Lot 49", which was marketed as a 'novel', and in which I seem to have forgotten most of what I thought I'd learned up until then." As ever with Pynchon's writing, the labyrinthine plots offer myriad linked cultural references. Knowing these