Mason & Dixon

[WillL at fieldschool.com]

Date	10/21/96
Subject	Mason & Dixon
>From	WillL
To	Pynchon List

Mason & Dixon

Today's Washington Post reports (p.1, Style Section) that Henry Holt has
announced the April 1997 publication of Pynchon's next novel, to be titled,
"Mason & Dixon" (the ampersand is theirs, not mine).  The article said that they
were ordering a first printing of 200,000, which, according to the Post, meant
they expected it to be "a No. 1 bestseller."  The article noted that Pynchon was
the only of the "60s avant-garde" to still matter, comparing him to Burroughs,
Vonnegut ("more or less in retirem,ent"), Barth and Heller ("no longer burn[ing]
up the sales charts")..  The article explained his continued significance by
referring to the Pynchon "acolytes" and comparing them (us?) to "Kennedy
assasination buffs."

The article describes the book as "a reimagining of the lives of British
surveyors Charles Mason and Jeremiah Dixon.  According to one description, it
features Native Americans, frontier folk, ripped bodices [??-WKL], naval
warfare, erotic and political conspiracies and major caffiene abuse.  At over a
thousand pages in mauscript, it's probably about many other things too."

Can't wait for those ripped bodices.

-- Will Layman