In the interest of time:

I could not possibly cover the presence of all things medieval or early modern that crop up in Gravity’s Rainbow.

To be perfectly clear:

The Great Chain of Being and Fortune’s Wheel are not the only aspects of medieval or early modern tropes or philosophies.

They are just the ones I chose to cover in length for the scope of this project.

Below are a few more  medieval and early modern tropes found in the novel that should be added to this companion, and is a jumping off place for further research.

Shakespearean Meta Narrative:

As the novel frames itself around the motifs of film and visual performance, it aligns itself with Shakespeare’s self aware moments in his plays where the actors (or the Bard himself) acknowledged and direct the audience to notice the multiple performance platforms of their lives. Shakespeare uses the theater as a metaphor where Pynchon uses film as a metaphor.

   “All the world’s a stage,

And all the men and women merely players;

They have their exits and their entrances;

And one man in his time plays many parts,

His acts being seven ages” (from As You Like It, spoken by Jaques)

Proposed further readings:

MIXING MEDIA: FILM AS METAPHOR IN PYNCHON’S “GRAVITY’S RAINBOW” by Brian Edwards

“Beyond the Theater of War: ‘Gravity’s Rainbow’ as Film” by Scott Simmon

A Bakhtinian Reading of Gravity’s Rainbow:

Analyzing the novel for places where the carivalesque results in a flipped social order, especially during times of festival-like partying. The carnival and festival in medieval literature was a place where social norms or structures were momentarily suspended which allows for both disorder and the installment of a new order in its wake.

Mikhail Bakhtin used the medieval Festival of Fools as a basis for his theory of the carnivalesque. Within the novel there are many places where partying resembles the Festival of Fools. A close reading of those party scene could allow a reader to make the larger connections to the instability of novel within the context of WWII.

The Medieval Hellmouth:

The hell mouth or the Jaws of Hell is the imagined entrance to hell depicted in medieval imagery. The entrance is the gaping maw of an enormous demonic beast. The various descriptions of archways, overpasses and entrances in the novel could be a place one attaches this medieval imagery. It often represents a point of no return, and the beginning of suffering and chaos.