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jwmcoaching 's review for:
Mason & Dixon
by Thomas Pynchon
Reading a Pynchon novel is more akin to embarking on a research project than enjoying a book. The only way you can really understand what's going on (and even then, one will probably only understand about 85-90%) is to use the wikis on the internet that provide copious footnotes for the myriad references, in jokes and history lessons that populate his works. This one is really good: http://masondixon.pynchonwiki.com/wiki/index.php?title=Main_Page
That being said, Mason and Dixon is near-perfect. It tells the story of the famous surveyors who drew the line that split the eastern half of the US in half and this action would have repercussions for the next 200 years. It's also a story of a friendship and even a rivalry between two men who were thrown together and spent much of their lives working on various projects for the British government.
This isn't just their story though, but also the birth of America through the eyes of many characters, real and fictional. There is history, mythology, and apocrypha here aplenty. Informative, entertaining, but above all, reeking of vintage Pynchonian bat shit craziness, the effort that it takes to read this is definitely worth the time. I would have to say this is my second favorite Pynchon, after Gravity's Rainbow.
That being said, Mason and Dixon is near-perfect. It tells the story of the famous surveyors who drew the line that split the eastern half of the US in half and this action would have repercussions for the next 200 years. It's also a story of a friendship and even a rivalry between two men who were thrown together and spent much of their lives working on various projects for the British government.
This isn't just their story though, but also the birth of America through the eyes of many characters, real and fictional. There is history, mythology, and apocrypha here aplenty. Informative, entertaining, but above all, reeking of vintage Pynchonian bat shit craziness, the effort that it takes to read this is definitely worth the time. I would have to say this is my second favorite Pynchon, after Gravity's Rainbow.