MDDM: Chs 33 & 34 - Summaries

[Scott Badger]

Chapter 33 - Profit & Lines

Ch. 33 opens with a description of Mary Janvier's, haven from stormy nights
without and cauldron of stormy politics within, a gathering place of
Proprietarians and, in particular, the Line commissioners. A coffee house,
in fact, at which the commissioner Benjamin Chew hopes to meet up with the
Surveyors, who, it seems, have arrived.

The coffee house, as a place of congregation, and coffee, as a stimulant,
has played a prominent role in our story, if not also in History. Wicks
ponders the effect caffeine, along with alcohol, tobacco and sugar, might
have had on the politics at hand. How these stimulants of the mind (and
depressants of the soul, tied as they are to slavery) have effected the
emergence of political discussion, American style. At MJ's, a sometimes
violent mix of religious factions, renegades, Proprietarians and
Anti-Proprietarians, mechanics, wenches, macaronies, gentlemen, limitless
quantities of the aforementioned stimulants and not just a dash of Bad
History roils, 'at the verge of riot'. A newly forming political sense
coupled, the narrator suggests, with a change in the accounting of time -
the spending of which, now, is ever balanced against some profitable return.

The Colonies are in turmoil, yet Mason and Dixon pass through unimpeded,
'well away from Events'. A protective dispensation they seem to have enjoyed
from the beginning of their journeys, on the Seahorse. The Surveyors arrive
at John Harland's farm on the 8th of January, a choice of location that
Dixon, finally -- grudgingly --, admits is in part contingent, 'Mr. Tumbling
fir'd his gun at us'.  They mean to survey their way due south and,
approximately 31 miles west and 15 miles south of the southernmost tip of
Philadelphia, establish the zero point of the West Line.  John Harland, if
not his wife, is happy to oblige - willing to obtain future vegetable
necessities with income from the rental of his property. A sign of changes
afoot.. Without delay, the surveying party sets up in Harland's field and
John, entranced by the alien proceedings, finds excuses to hang about. Mason
and Dixon give him a crash course in 'bringing the instrument into the
Meridian' and he displays a preternatural (American?) dexterity with the
instruments. Though at ease with the mechanics of the telescope, Harland
finds the inverted image it shows profoundly unsettling. 'Are you looking
into Futurity?', he asks, to which our boys reply, "We wish!" But Harland,
and perhaps our narrator as well, remains suspicious.  The telescope might
not be a crystal ball, but its data, collected and reduced, may still bring
the World, and by extension, its future, into sharper focus.

After calculating their latitude and finding True North, Mason and Dixon are
ready to measure their way 15 miles south, John Harland in tow (reassuring
his wife, 'five shillings ev'ry day I work,- silver,- British, real as any
spade'). He will return, but with his head turned West and a new sense of
movement as Home (Manifest Destiny?). Once arrived at Mr. Alexander Bryant's
field, the surveying party turns around and re-measures their way north
again, hoping for that perfect return...

The starting point of the West Line marked, Mason and Dixon next turn their
attention to the ticklish problem of the Tangent Line. A classic case of
'Stupiditas Regia' that, so far, has proven 'intractable' (ta-dum!). By
being *London* **astronomers**, it is assumed that they will succeed where
the 'rude Colonial' surveyors have failed (among whom, one might find Mr. G.
Washington, suffering, as well, his chicken-nabob status). Our boys come
close - off by just 'two feet and two inches, more or less'.

The Tangent Line problem is tailor made to Pynchon's themeatic purposes -
magic to science - order out of chaos. Before being surveyed, the
proprietary status of land, like the Wedge, could be indeterminate; a
spinning binary of ownership by occupation and ownership by proclamation.
Once surveyed, lines of control can be drawn, borders defended, and the
subjunctive (or quantum) proprietary nature of the land is resolved -
ownership by determination is possible. A small price to pay, some would
say, for the PROFITS gained.

Wicks segues from his description of the Tangent Line problem to Mason &
Dixon's experience of New Castle and the 'Sphere of power' emanating from
the mysterious 'Scepter atop the Court House'. New Castle is a town
perpetually under siege, even in its dreams, but the, perhaps not altogether
unwilling, residents are never quite molested whilst living and sleeping
within the Sphere. Note that the 'Citizenry' fear *Catholick* war-ships,
which are unable to encroach within the *Court House's* influence. Does this
suggest an increasingly subjugal relationship between Church and State?

The Tangent Line completed, the surveyors head back to Harlands for some
winter hibernation. Dixon dreams of 'pure Adventure' to come while Mason's
melancholick hopes are for routine and return. One man's Space is another's
Void. Inevitably, they squabble. Finally, fearing the effects of
cabin-fever, and clearly overstaying their welcome anyhow, they road-trip to
Lancaster.



Chapter 34 - Bad Debt

Well...maybe "they"...maybe just one...maybe it doesn't matter at this
point. Like a binary collapsed, or a set of data reduced to a single value,
more and more our pair seem fused into One. A violently unstable fusion, to
be sure; assuming the face of one, or the other - as easily as switching
hats. In any case, one or both, or One representing both, or maybe just
Wicks...is headed to Lancaster, site of the recent Indian massacre.

No sooner do they hit town, when Jabez, tour-guide to the stars, is at their
side, ready to steer them through the perilous *attraction* -- first stop,
the Dutch Rifle. (...first stop indeed, signs, not just of the Cape, but in
particular, of the evil presence 'one or both had spied' there). As it turns
out, it's Cha. and Jere who run interference for Jabez, and almost
immediately they are in a bit of a spot. Mistaken for 'the Press', Dixon
follows the lead extended by a 'Countryman' and turns on his Quaker charm,
selling the crowd on the most 'up-to-the-minute' surveying, 'London-Style'
and 'surprisingly cheap'. The crowd is less than convinced, so our boys fall
back on the tried and true, 'We're men of Science', which doesn't exactly
put them in the clear, but does seem to buy them time.

Dixon engages the Colonials in a debate on justice and retribution and, to
Mason's fearful surprise - and respect -, he confronts the local crowd,
'"They were said to be harmless, helpless people"'. The Americans respond
with a very fiduciary attitude - debts and payments in balance and
it's-all-just-business. Talk of victims soon turns to complaints of
victimization and the now familiar criticisms of everything British and/or
Royal. By this time, Dixon has adopted a somewhat lower profile and, after a
'Mysickal' interlude on the nature of Time and living off the land, he
*innocently* changes the subject, '"Whah's thah' smoahkin' Object in thy
Mouth"'?

The waters oiled, not to mention 'Heads a-reel', the Boys 'are surpriz'd to
discover', after 'several Hours'[!!], that the conversation has become
little more than background noise and there seems to be no second-stop on
Jabez's tour. So, they head off to bed.

'Does Britannia, when she sleeps, dream? Is America her dream?[...]all that
*may yet be true*[...]seen and recorded, measur'd and tied in, back into the
Net-Work of Points[...]Possibilities to Simplicities[...]assuming them unto
the bare mortal World that is our home, and our Despair.'

'Mason, insomniack,' is instead, thinking about dreams. Dreams as
outlets...and inlets. Dreams that when chased, are caught - and turn into
clay. Even among this Philadelphia 'Enthusiasts Fair', Mason's search for
transcendence continues in vain, unwilling as he is to accept Death (of
self?) as a 'pre-condition'. More than anything, he hopes for a visit from
Rebekah, his only assurance, but instead is left 'cycl[ing]' through
'well-mark'd memories'.

Early, and presumably not in the best state of mind, Mason slips out to
visit the jail. Though an enthusiast of the Gothick, and not easily spooked,
the site of the massacre 'torpedo[s]' him. An Evil, manifested as 'almost a
smell', lingers in the courtyard. Later, Mason tries to explain to Dixon;
that, worse than the murders even, is the ability of 'these People' to
forget - that the smell was of 'Lethe-Water'.

Dixon fails to take Mason seriously (which Mason, of course, takes
personally) and proceeds to ready himself for a visit of his "own". He is
unsure, though, how to dress, worrying that he may cause 'war-like Frenzy'
or 'sullen[ness]' with his usual Quaker or military style clothes. In the
end, taking along his Quaker conscience, and riding with a military resolve,
Dixon decides to go as Mason. Of course.

What follows, Dixon's experience of the massacre site, is, for me, one of
P's most powerful passages. Dixon's reaction parallels Mason's, but also
differs significantly; while Mason feels '"like a Nun before a Shrine"',
Dixon laments his lack of regular prayer - and his fear, which prevents him
from praying at the site; Mason despairs that it is the Acts, the murders,
which will be forgotten, but for Dixon, it is the voices of the victims 'no
one understood' which are lost. Both believe that there must be
'consequences' but only Dixon, it seems, feels that he, himself, should be
an agent of that retribution. Though shaken, Mason tells Dixon that he was
'"Torpedo'd"' which, I think, could be read as "emPOWERED" - in the way of
those seeking to be struck by lightning; for Dixon, the experience is
overwhelming and shattering, both to his sense of social ethic, as well as
to his sense of personal ethic. He is as unable to shoulder the personal
responsibility of meteing out 'appropriate Fates' as he is to understand
what could have possessed those responsible for such acts. But, and probably
because, he comes much closer to an epiphany, 'the lightness he feels now,
lightness premonitory to Flying'.

As was discussed in the '97 MDMD, the sense of Evil Dixon encounters,
'something in this Wilderness, something ancient, that waited for them, and
infected their souls when they came', seems not yer' usual Pynchon. Of
course, it's Dixon's reaction, as described by Wicks (who isn't even sure
Dixon was there...), that we have, not at all necessarily Pynchon's. But
there's such power and clarity to Dixon's despair, that I can't help but
imagine P (like Dixon) standing before that 'chipp'd' wall (still visible at
the Fulton Opera House in Lancaster) *wanting* to believe, at least, that
humanity *does not* possess such capacity. That the perpetrators of the
massacre must have been poisoned - their 'mortal envelopes' infected.
(188)'the death-faced Hunters below were not moaning that way from any
cause,--rather,'twas the Sound itself that posses'd them, an independent
Force, using them as a way into the Secular Air...' Is this Gnostic? Is the
Land(Matter) corrupted, or does 'Wilderness' mean something else? Whatever
it is, in America it seems to lay a whole lot closer to the surface.

Dixon returns to the rooms to find Mason 'reclin'd', the picture of Sloth -
smoking, perhaps to forget that terrible Smell. Both are already packed and
ready to leave town - post-haste - but with as little commotion as possible.
'"I am cool" Mason replies' -- Question is, does he care?