Crying of Lot 49 Ending, Spoilers Ahead
The ending of The Crying of Lot 49 is a great ending to a mystery story as it gives a partial answer to what Oedipa was searching for the entire novel, but also leaves so many unanswered questions for the reader. We find out what W.A.S.T.E. stands for (We Silently Await Tristero's Empire) and how the whole quest of closing out Pierce's estate may be an elaborate joke on Pierce's part. But the ending also presents the questions of does Tristero actually exist, what will Oedipa find out at the crying of Lot 49, and finally how did Pierce plan this out if he did at all. The uncertainty is conveyed well in this quote from the novel,
"'Maybe we haven't found them yet,' said Fallopian. 'Or maybe they haven't approached us. Or maybe we are using W.A.S.T.E., only it's a secret.' Then, as electronic music began to percolate into the room, 'But there's another angle too.' She sensed what he was going to say and began, reflexively, to grind together her back molars. A nervous habit she'd developed in the last few days. 'Has it ever occurred to you, Oedipa, that somebody's putting you on? That this is all a hoax, maybe something Inverarity set up before he died?'"
It does a good job of illustrating how there are questions till unanswered and possibly how the whole experience that Oedipa has been through is a hoax. The quote also plays into the idea of what this whole class is about.
This whole class has been about reading and finding the mystery within the story's plot. As we learned in Piers Plowman, the definition of a mystery is a religious truth that a person is trying to seek through revelation and cannot truly understand. While this is the literal definition of what a mystery, I believe this class deals more with the colloquial definition of a mystery which is in my definition is similar to the literal definition but rather is a problem that every person faces in their life that they can never find an answer to.
"'Maybe we haven't found them yet,' said Fallopian. 'Or maybe they haven't approached us. Or maybe we are using W.A.S.T.E., only it's a secret.' Then, as electronic music began to percolate into the room, 'But there's another angle too.' She sensed what he was going to say and began, reflexively, to grind together her back molars. A nervous habit she'd developed in the last few days. 'Has it ever occurred to you, Oedipa, that somebody's putting you on? That this is all a hoax, maybe something Inverarity set up before he died?'"
It does a good job of illustrating how there are questions till unanswered and possibly how the whole experience that Oedipa has been through is a hoax. The quote also plays into the idea of what this whole class is about.
This whole class has been about reading and finding the mystery within the story's plot. As we learned in Piers Plowman, the definition of a mystery is a religious truth that a person is trying to seek through revelation and cannot truly understand. While this is the literal definition of what a mystery, I believe this class deals more with the colloquial definition of a mystery which is in my definition is similar to the literal definition but rather is a problem that every person faces in their life that they can never find an answer to.
I definitely agree that this ending was very fitting given the type of mystery Pynchon proposes within this novel. I know a lot of people are pretty upset/confused about having such an open-ended ending because, for them, the mystery must have some form of satisfying conclusion or the iconic whodunit. Regarding your definition of mystery as a problem every person faces in their live that they can never find the answer to, I think that your definition is going a bit too far. In Piers Plowman, it is arguable that the dreamer does indeed figure out the answer to his intellectual journey, so I don't think you can say that a mystery cannot have an answer. It is the journey of understanding and revealing the truth, about an outside scenario or an internal truth, that may or may not lead to fruition.
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