Mason & Dixon
Book of the Week: Mason & Dixon by Thomas Pynchon
Damned if this isn't the cutest Astronomer/Geordie Surveyor buddy novel ever. Okay, so there might not be a lot to compare it with but still. Curiosity after hearing "Sailing to Philidelphia" by James Taylor and Mark Knopfler made me pick it up. Against all sense or reason, I blew my book money for the week on what was, by all accounts, a somewhat incomprehensible book about the guys who drew the Mason-Dixon line instead of Making Money by Terry Prachett. That is how much of a sucker I am for James Taylor and historical song-stylings. For real.
Any road, it's fantastic. Weird and admittedly, Pynchon apparently smoked a little crack occasionally while writing it( Cape Town orgies! Talking maritime clocks! Malevolent Cheese! Golems! The first British Pizza! Blatent Star Trek Reference!), but as long as you weren't planning on writing your research paper on the historical implications of geographical survyors on America as a fledging nation using it, you'll probably be taking the fact that someone is using the Vulcan salute in stride and thinking it awesome. And what historical novel isn't better with a talking dog?
Mason and Dixon are, thankfully since it's named after them, great characters that really are impossibly cute together. Mason's the straight man, a melancholic widower astronomer that was born the son of a baker and rose to become part of the Royal Society. Dixon's the boisterous libertine Quaker Geordie surveyor. I know, I know, *every* comedy duo has a quaker and a melonchoic astronomer. Or maybe not. They are however, one of the most worthwhile pairs I've ever come across with a fantastically written friendship. And a book's just not worth reading unless I develop a crush on *someone* (Dixon).
Listen to the song. Buy the book. Crush on Mason or Dixon. Cast them in your head as Paul McGann and Christopher Eccleston. Or, you know, whoever.
Oh. And people sing. Quite often.
"You can begin to have
a whole new life
Soldj'ring for Christ
Reas'nobly priced-
and nobody's missing
the kids and the wife! So,
Here's the drill
Take a quill,
Sign upon the line or any
where you will
There's heretics a-pleanty and a liscence to kill!
If you're a brother in the S. of J.!"
At the close of which the Priest unhelpfully blurts, "(Celibacy of course being ever strictly enjoin'd-/if you're a brother in the-"
"What, no fucking?" Dixon acting far too astonish'd, as some otherworldly accompaniment jingles to a halt.