Thomas Pynchon - Mason & Dixon: A Novel

Praise for Mason & Dixon

"Awash with light and charm, rich with suggestion and idea, stuffed with the minutiae of another time and world. Mason & Dixon is less a book to read through than to read in, to savor paragraph by paragraph."

Paul Skenazy, San Francisco Chronicle

"As a fellow-novelist I could only envy it and the culture that permits the cre
ation and success of such intricate masterpieces. This almost feels like the
last great fiction of our dying era. Though I'm sure it won't be, I must admire
its sense of the bright farewell, the clear passing overseas of the torch that
Peacock, Dickens, Lawrence, and Conrad bore. You'll not find a better, this
next time round." John Fowles, The Spectator

"A dazzling work of imaginative re-creation, a marvel-filled historical novel... Exceptionally funny."

Michael Dirda, The Washington Post Book World

"Mason & Dixon will make you want to curse American history, then turn around and bless it, because nowhere else but America could you find a zany literary genius like Thomas Pynchon." Malcolm Jones Jr., Newsweek

"Splendid... Mason & Dixonlike Huckleberry Finn, like Ulyssesis one of the great novels about male friendship in anybody's literature."

John Leonard, The Nation

"Pynchon always has been wildly inventive, and gorgeously funny when he surpasses himself: the marvels of this book are extravagant and unexpected."

Harold Bloom, Bostonia

"This is the old Pynchon, the true Pynchon, the best Pynchon of all. Mason
& Dixon is a groundbreaking book, a book of heart and fire and genius, and
there is nothing quite like it in our literature, except maybe V., and Gravity's
Rainbow." T. Coraghessan Boyle, The New York Times Book Review

Mason & Dixon

Thomas Pynchon

An Owl Book

Henry Holt and Company

New York For Melanie, and for Jackson Henry Holt and Company, Inc.

Publishers since lS66

175 West i8th Street

New York, New York won

Henry Holt is a registered trademark of Henry Holt and Company, Inc.

Copyright 1997 by Thomas Pynchon

All rights reserved.

Published in Canada by Fitzhenry & Whiteside Ltd., 195 Allstate Parkway, Markham, Ontario I/jR 4X8.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Pynchon, Thomas. Mason & Dixon / Thomas Pynchon.

p. cm.

ISBN 0-8050-5837-0 I. Mason, Charles, 1728-1786Fiction. 2. United StatesHistory

Colonial period, ca. 1600-1775Fiction. 3. SurveyingUnited StatesHistoryi8th centuryFiction. 4. BritishUnited States

Historyi8th centuryFiction. 5. Frontier and pioneer life

PennsylvaniaFiction. 6. Frontier and pioneer lifeMaryland

Fiction. 7. SurveyorsUnited StatesFiction. 8. Dixon,

JeremiahFiction. I. Title.

PS3s66.Y55M.37 1997 97-6467

t CIP

Henry Holt books are available for special promotions and premiums. For details contact: Director, Special Markets.

First published in hardcover in 1997 by Henry Holt and Company, Inc.

First Owl Books Edition 1998 Designed by Betty Lew

Printed in the United States of America All first editions are printed on acid-free paper.<

3579 IO 8642

The author wishes to thank the John D. and Catharine T. MacArthur Foundation.

Mason & Dixon

One

Latitudes and Departures

Snow-Balls have flown their Arcs, starr'd the Sides of Outbuildings, as of Cousins, carried Hats away into the brisk Wind off Delaware, the Sleds are brought in and their Runners carefully dried and greased, shoes deposited in the back Hall, a stocking'd-foot Descent made upon the great Kitchen, in a purposeful Dither since Morning, punctuated by the ringing Lids of various Boilers and Stewing-Pots, fragrant with Pie-Spices, peel'd Fruits, Suet, heated Sugar, the Children, having all upon the Fly, among rhythmic slaps of Batter and Spoon, coax'd and stolen what they might, proceed, as upon each afternoon all this snowy Advent, to a comfortable Room at the rear of the House, years since given over to their carefree Assaults. Here have come to rest a long scarr'd sawbuck table, with two mismatch'd side-benches, from the Lancaster County branch of the family, some Second-Street Chippendale, including an interpretation of the fam'd Chinese Sofa, with a high canopy of yards of purple Stuff that might be drawn all 'round to make a snug, dim tent, a few odd Chairs sent from England before the War, mostly Pine and Cherry about, nor much Mahogany, excepting a sinister and wonderful Card Table which exhibits the cheaper sinusoidal Grain known in the Trade as Wand'ring Heart, causing an illusion of Depth into which for years children have gaz'd as into the illustrated Pages of Books...along with so many hinges, sliding Mortises, hidden catches, and secret compartments that neither the Twins nor their Sister can say they have been to the end of it. Upon the Wall, banish'd to this Den of Parlor Apes for its Remembrance of a Time better forgotten, reflecting most of the Room, the Carpet and Drapes a little fray'd, Whiskers the Cat stalking beneath the furniture, looking out with eyes finely reflexive to anything suggesting Food, hangs a Mirror in an inscrib'd Frame, commemorating the "Mischianza," that memorable farewell Ball stag'd in '77 by the British who'd been Occupying the City, just before their Withdrawal from Philadelphia.

This Christmastide of 1786, with the War settl'd and the Nation bickering itself into Fragments, wounds bodily and ghostly, great and small, go aching on, not ev'ry one commemorated, nor, too often, even recounted. Snow lies upon all Philadelphia, from River to River, whose further shores have so vanish'd behind curtains of ice-fog that the City today might be an Isle upon an Ocean. Ponds and Creeks are frozen over, and the Trees a-glare to the last slightest Twig, Nerve-Lines of concentrated Light. Hammers and Saws have fallen still, bricks lie in snow-cover'd Heaps, City-Sparrows, in speckl'd Outbursts, hop in and out of what Shelter there may be, the nightward Sky, Clouds blown to Chalk-smears, stretches above the Northern Liberties, Spring Garden and Ger-mantown, its early moon pale as the Snow-Drifts, smoke ascends from Chimney-Pots, Sledging-Parties adjourn indoors, Taverns bustle, freshly infus'd Coffee flows ev'ryplace, borne about thro' Rooms front and back, whilst Madeira, which has ever fuel'd Association in these Parts, is deploy'd nowadays like an ancient Elixir upon the seething Pot of Politics, for the Times are as impossible to calculate, this Advent, as the Distance to a Star.

It has become an afternoon habit for the Twins and their Sister, and what Friends old and young may find their way here, to gather for another Tale from their far-travel'd Uncle, the Revd Wicks Cherrycoke, who arriv'd here back in October for the funeral of a Friend of years ago, too late for the Burial, as it prov'd, and has linger'd as a Guest in the Home of his sister Elizabeth, the Wife, for many years, of Mr. J. Wade LeSpark, a respected Merchant, active in Town Affairs whilst in his home yet Sultan enough to convey to the Revd, tho' without ever so stipulating, that, for as long as he can keep the children amus'd, he may remain, too much evidence of Juvenile Rampage at the wrong moment, however, and Boppo! 'twill be Out the Door with him, where waits the Winter's Block and Blade.

Thus, they have heard the Escape from Hottentot-Land, the Accursed Ruby of Mogok, the Ship-wrecks in Indies East and West, an Herodotic Web of Adventures and Curiosities selected, the Revd implies, for their moral usefulness, whilst avoiding others not as suitable in the Hearing of Youth. The Youth, as usual, not being consulted in this.