Date of Award

5-17-2021

Document Type

Masters Project

Abstract

This paper introduces and uses Paul Feyerabend’s Epistemological Anarchism (EA) as an interpretive lens through which to read key passages in Thomas Pynchon’s 1997 novel Mason & Dixon. In particular, this paper uses EA to provide a novel and distinct way of understanding what Brian McHale terms the novel’s subjunctivity, or spaces of possibility. I use EA as a new framework for understanding the epistemological, ontological, and humanitarian/ethical dimensions of the novel’s subjunctive spaces, and hint at ways in which EA might be used in Pynchon’s other novels.

Handle

http://hdl.handle.net/11122/14551

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