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4.18 AVERAGE
4.18 AVERAGE
adventurous
challenging
dark
emotional
funny
hopeful
informative
inspiring
lighthearted
mysterious
reflective
relaxing
sad
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Complicated
adventurous
challenging
reflective
slow-paced
adventurous
dark
emotional
lighthearted
mysterious
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Complicated
adventurous
challenging
funny
informative
lighthearted
mysterious
reflective
slow-paced
adventurous
challenging
emotional
funny
informative
mysterious
reflective
sad
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Complicated
adventurous
challenging
dark
emotional
funny
informative
inspiring
reflective
sad
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
An exceptional book, especially on a reread. What I enjoyed most of all is something others have picked up on - that this is a tale, told to wide-eyed children on a dark night; a tale of astronomy, enormous insidious powers, the chaotic beginnings of America - a tale at its center revolving around two very imperfect, delightful people. Charles Mason & Jeremiah Dixon, looking to the sky, to those around them, trying and trying to find Something, amidst oversized vegetables, talking dogs, a superpowered duck, and a Visto of unclear purpose.
Pynchon at his best.
Pynchon at his best.
adventurous
challenging
dark
emotional
funny
hopeful
informative
lighthearted
mysterious
reflective
relaxing
sad
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
adventurous
challenging
dark
emotional
funny
hopeful
informative
inspiring
lighthearted
mysterious
reflective
relaxing
sad
tense
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
Why aye, Right as a Right Angle, we're out here to ruffle up some business with any who may be in need of Surveying, London-Style, - Astronomickally precise, optickally up-to-the-Minute, surprisingly cheap. The Behavior of the Stars is the most perfect Motion there is, and we know how to read it all, just as you'd read a Clock-Face. We have Lenses that never lie, and Micrometers fine enough to subtend the Width of a Hair upon a Martian's Eye-ball. This looks like a bustling Town, plenty of activity in the Land-Trades, where think yese'd be a good place to start?
The story of Charles Mason and Jeremiah Dixon is so beautifully told by Thomas Pynchon that I didn't hesitate adding this book to my list of favourites. I think the choice of Revd. Wicks Cherrycoke as a narrator was an excellent one as it allowed Pynchon to include a mix of historical facts along with local legends, conspiracies and "undeliver'd sermons". In the end, does it matter what really happened? History is not Chronology, for that is left to lawyers – nor is it Remembrance, for Remembrance belongs to the People.
There are so many pleasures to be found in this book. A conversation between two pendulum clocks. Maskelyne and Mason drawing up each other's birth charts. Dixon giving a slave driver a taste of his own Whip. The Tale of the Tub. The Ear that caused the nine years "Jenkins' Ear War" between England and Spain. The Eleven Days that went missing. The coveted Longitude Prize that made one man go as far as to swallow Dixon's chronometer.
And then, the Line. Always from East to West. As to journey west, in the same sense as the Sun, is to live, raise Children, grow older, and die, carried along by the Stream of the Day, whilst to turn Eastward, is somehow to resist time and age, to work against the Wind, seek ever the dawn, even, as who can say, defy Death.
Then again, there may be something to say for the way things are done in the East. The contrast between Feng-Shui ideals of natural boundaries vs. Mason and Dixon's straight line as pointed out by the geomancer, Dr. Zhang, (to mark a right Line upon the Earth is to inflict upon the Dragon’s very Flesh, a sword-slash, a long, perfect scar) made me take a fresh look at all those straight boundaries between the states in the US and the political map of northern Africa.
While he appears to mock and question the capitalistic urge to demarcate private property, Pynchon shows a real affection for his characters, these two boundary makers, that is mostly absent from his other novels. It is the growing friendship between the melancholy Mason and the gregarious Dixon, the astronomer and the surveyor, that kept me turning the pages. A wonderful, brilliant book that I will read again from time to time, knowing that I'll enjoy it just as much as the first time around.
The story of Charles Mason and Jeremiah Dixon is so beautifully told by Thomas Pynchon that I didn't hesitate adding this book to my list of favourites. I think the choice of Revd. Wicks Cherrycoke as a narrator was an excellent one as it allowed Pynchon to include a mix of historical facts along with local legends, conspiracies and "undeliver'd sermons". In the end, does it matter what really happened? History is not Chronology, for that is left to lawyers – nor is it Remembrance, for Remembrance belongs to the People.
There are so many pleasures to be found in this book. A conversation between two pendulum clocks. Maskelyne and Mason drawing up each other's birth charts. Dixon giving a slave driver a taste of his own Whip. The Tale of the Tub. The Ear that caused the nine years "Jenkins' Ear War" between England and Spain. The Eleven Days that went missing. The coveted Longitude Prize that made one man go as far as to swallow Dixon's chronometer.
And then, the Line. Always from East to West. As to journey west, in the same sense as the Sun, is to live, raise Children, grow older, and die, carried along by the Stream of the Day, whilst to turn Eastward, is somehow to resist time and age, to work against the Wind, seek ever the dawn, even, as who can say, defy Death.
Then again, there may be something to say for the way things are done in the East. The contrast between Feng-Shui ideals of natural boundaries vs. Mason and Dixon's straight line as pointed out by the geomancer, Dr. Zhang, (to mark a right Line upon the Earth is to inflict upon the Dragon’s very Flesh, a sword-slash, a long, perfect scar) made me take a fresh look at all those straight boundaries between the states in the US and the political map of northern Africa.
While he appears to mock and question the capitalistic urge to demarcate private property, Pynchon shows a real affection for his characters, these two boundary makers, that is mostly absent from his other novels. It is the growing friendship between the melancholy Mason and the gregarious Dixon, the astronomer and the surveyor, that kept me turning the pages. A wonderful, brilliant book that I will read again from time to time, knowing that I'll enjoy it just as much as the first time around.