Why Pynchon took the National Book Award (Plus Extra Bile!)

[David Casseres]

Eric Weinstein sez

>           Mason & Dixon has a damn good claim to being the 
>either the best or nearly the best American novel for---maybe five,
>ten years? I will quite gladly eat my own shorts in a public place if
>posterity proves me wrong. It is  probably also the best British
>novel if one takes the wide view of this, removing the anti-US
>blinders of the Booker's Prize's ridiculous bottom-feeding,
>glad-handling, ill-literate, self-serving swine's breakfasts.

...and a lot of other good stuff.

But I'll go farther.  I've long claimed that in a few decades Pynchon 
will be widely regarded as *The Big Deal* in American fiction for the 
entire second half of the 20th century.  And if I should live long enough 
for posterity to prove me wrong, I too will happily gum my shorts (if I 
own any by then) on Public Television.


Cheers,
David