Against the Day

by Thomas Pynchon

From this height it was as if the Chums, who, out on adventures past, had often witnessed the vast herds of cattle adrift in ever-changing cloudlike patterns across the Western plains, here saw that unshaped freedom being rationalized into movement only in straight lines and at right angles and a progressive reduction of choices, until the final turn through the final gate that led to the killing-floor.

After reading this paragraph, I had to stare into nothingness for a second. What writing prowess Thomas Pynchon has.