George Washington, the Revolutionary War, and Mason & Dixon

[gary webb]

Greetings and Salutations,

I am new to the group but have been quietly observing for some time. I am a
great admirer of the work of Thomas Pynchon. 2014 has been quite a
remarkable year. It does seem rather fitting that it would be the year in
which he makes his debut on the silver screen. I have mixed emotions about
it all, as I'm sure most fans do... I've noticed that there have been
distinctive murmurings of a M&D reading, and I think aside from Gravity's
Rainbow, M&D is equally brilliant... Maybe, like in the novel, Charles
Mason and Jeremiah Dixon, are dual aspects of Mr. Pynchon... I don't
know... Like Gravity's Rainbow and Against the Day, Pynchon intermingles
fact with fiction, real historical figures with characters created with in
his imagination... Like "Red" Malcolm and Slothrop thinking of JFK, his
classmate at Harvard - Nalline writing Joe Kennedy- Slothrop and Mickey
Rooney, etc. M&D are real historical figures, interpreted by both Rev'd
Wicks Cherrycoke - Pynchon, that come into contact with other figures from
history... Nevil Maskelyne, Dr. Bradley, the Peaches, Dixon's tutor
Emerson... and most notably across the pond Benjamin Franklin, George
Washington, and even a young Thomas Jefferson... I'm currently reading The
Return of George Washington 1783 - 1789 by Edward J Larson... The American
Revolution is an interesting bit of history, as well as Washington's
role... it is interesting that another good history read that came out this
year was Napoleon : A Life by Andrew Roberts, and Napoleon and Washington
make interesting bedfellows... Both were swept by the that Revolutionary
sentiment that swept continents at the time, i.e mid- to late 18th Century,
with dramatic and different results... think Ethelmer and Wick's discussion
of Plato's Republic concerning the change of music indicates a social
revolution and the Anacreon Song,
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ydAIdVKv84g, and Mason's discussion with a
anachronistic Amy Fisher and Joey Buttafuoco, with their Sons of Liberty
crew about the Virtual Represntation of Parliament.... All very
interesting... Anyway, Happy Christmastide of '14...
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