Vineland is set in California in 1984, and the time is a clue to how the book should be taken. Although 1984 is in the past, for the post-World War II generation the year represented the future because of the political associations with George Orwell's novel. Most of the characters are survivors of the social changes and political upheavals of the Sixties, and the term "survivors" has a positive connotation in this work.

The characters not only have passed through the Sixties but have been strengthened by the experience. Vineland is by far Pynchon's most hopeful work.