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“Falling into the sky”: gravity and levity in Pynchon’s Mason & Dixon

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journal contribution
posted on 2023-06-21, 06:01 authored by Doug HaynesDoug Haynes
My argument follows geographer Gunnar Olsson when he asks “What is geography if it is not the drawing and interpreting of a line? And what is the drawing of a line if it is not also the creation of new objects?” Using Thomas Pynchon’s 1997 novel Mason & Dixon about the drawing of the Mason-Dixon line, I explore how the mapmaker’s productive power is never merely reflective but generative too, constructing a world as much as representing one. I question the consequent relation between “above and below,” drawing on Farinelli’s insight that critique of such constructions must recognise an antagonistic humour in the production of maps and territories. Pynchon’s novel, I argue, is exemplary in the wit with which it pits the anomalous, strange and contingent phenomena of the below against the homogenising, categorising power of above. His approach helps us understand the dark heart of Enlightenment cartography and society.

History

Publication status

  • Published

File Version

  • Accepted version

Journal

Space and Culture

ISSN

1206-3312

Publisher

SAGE Publications

Issue

4

Volume

23

Page range

357-369

Department affiliated with

  • English Publications

Research groups affiliated with

  • Sussex Centre for American Studies Publications

Notes

This is part of a special issue called "Above: Degrees of Elevation" due to be published in hard copy in Jan 2020.

Full text available

  • Yes

Peer reviewed?

  • Yes

Legacy Posted Date

2019-08-01

First Open Access (FOA) Date

2019-08-01

First Compliant Deposit (FCD) Date

2019-07-31

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