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I would say that Brief Interviews is his finest work. For a series of scraps they just cohere so beutifully. I mean, The Depressed Woman and Octet tips the reader that a lot of his later work are very intricate questions and of course he breaks away from his affected hyper-complex style which can get choking after what, a novel and 2 non-fiction collections written in it (the affected style, that is). And I guess the topic of sex is a lot more accessable a topic than the folly of a quest for immediate self-gratification. Also meanolmrcloud, do you think that The Octet is a narrative? I was convinced that he really had failed to write an Octet and just decided to take it from there.
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Aug 17, 2010 19:09
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Mr. Squishy posted:
I'm leaning towards its being purposefully constructed-the complexly layered meta at play has me imagining him licking his lips with a dopey rear end grin on his face for actually flying this ridiculous idea and watching it sail so wonderfully. I actually wrote my previous post before finishing the rapist story and honestly that piece shines so brightly it brings every theme in the book up several notches. I've been wrapping my head around its depth all morning and honestly I'll probably go through that again before i start anything else.
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Aug 17, 2010 22:56
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Holy poo poo I need to get Brief Interviews. Any buzz about Girl With Curious Hair? I loved Oblivion if that's any indication I'll like GWCH.
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Aug 18, 2010 01:59
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Can anyone recomend anyone, well, even remotely like him?
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Aug 18, 2010 02:00
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Mr. Squishy posted:Can anyone recomend anyone, well, even remotely like him? I found some of Don DeLillo's stuff (especially Ratner's Star or White Noise) rather similar. Jonathan Franzen was good friends with DFW and I don't think they're entirely dissimilar. I read The Corrections right after Infinite Jest and they kind of reminded me of the other, especially when Franzen wrote about being depressed.
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Aug 18, 2010 03:53
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Mr. Squishy posted:Can anyone recomend anyone, well, even remotely like him? Tried Delillo, it wasn't nearly as lively or rich as I expected and I was actually pretty disappointed at White Noise despite it being an OK book. I opted for 2666 after IJ just for a sense of relentless scope and then read The Brothers Karamazov again because at that point I needed a masterful lunatic with a deep world and stupid long sentences to extend my 4 month 3 book submersion.
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Aug 18, 2010 05:46
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Mr. Squishy posted:Can anyone recomend anyone, well, even remotely like him? I'm reading Delillo's White Noise and while it is similar it's, like another poster said, not as lively. It has sort of a dissociated feel to it. I read somewhere that John Barth was influential to DFW. Specifically Lost in the Funhouse. From wiki: "Barth presents a literary "funhouse," a dense maze that weaves in and out of plot, narration, and a self-conscious attention to the process of writing itself." Sounds familiar.
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Aug 18, 2010 13:43
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Barthelme too, his short story The Balloon was supposed to have served as the inspiration for DFW to become a writer.
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Aug 18, 2010 14:08
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flavaaDAAAAAVE posted:I'm reading Delillo's White Noise and while it is similar it's, like another poster said, not as lively. It has sort of a dissociated feel to it. He says in the Lipsky book that Westward the Course of Empire Takes its Way was entirly ripping off of Barth.
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Aug 18, 2010 14:54
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Mr. Squishy posted:Can anyone recomend anyone, well, even remotely like him? I feel like Rick Moody was doing a passable DFW impression with his narrator character in The Four Fingers of Death, but I'm only a little ways in so I don't know if that will hold up throughout the rest of the book. Pick it up in the bookstore and read through the first dozen pages of the "Introduction", see what you think. Edit: I should disclaim that I haven't been a huge Moody fan. He's clearly talented but doesn't usually take things in the direction I'd like, I guess. This latest novel is much more like it, though. mdemone fucked around with this message at 15:33 on Aug 18, 2010 |
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Aug 18, 2010 15:31
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aricoarena posted:He says in the Lipsky book that Westward the Course of Empire Takes its Way was entirly ripping off of Barth. Ripping off is the wrong term. For whom, is the funhouse fun? e: Pothead McDonald is saying Varoom Varoom, as he drives through the endless cornfields but his dad is constantly irritated that his let-down of a son is saying "For Whom" the whole way. It is one of many many references to Barth, not a "rip off" syscall girl fucked around with this message at 16:56 on Aug 18, 2010 |
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Aug 18, 2010 16:52
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There's some parts of IJ I'd like to re-read, if anyone remembers the page numbers I'd appreciate it: - the whole spiel about the increasingly evolving camera-phones and people's attempts to hide their faces. - a part about how AA requires you to repeat mantras and believe in some higher power and how it works even if you don't believe in it. - a part about how a depressed guy felt like every day and how his wife handled it.
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Aug 19, 2010 01:12
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Pedro De Heredia posted:There's some parts of IJ I'd like to re-read, if anyone remembers the page numbers I'd appreciate it: i) there is kind of a funny article about his thoughts on video communication here: http://www.ivarhagendoorn.com/blog/literature/david-foster-wallace-on-video-phones (with page numbers, if you follow the link) ii) AA mantras be they good or bad (I love how DFW doesn't clown on them but lets his desperate and near hopeless characters do that) are throughout IFJ iii) I dunno, but Kate Gompert had the unipolar depression that was just a mind gently caress to read. That and the short story "The Depressed Person" (if you really want to be depressed.)
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Aug 19, 2010 01:55
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flavaaDAAAAAVE posted:From wiki: "Barth presents a literary "funhouse," a dense maze that weaves in and out of plot, narration, and a self-conscious attention to the process of writing itself." That's a postmodern thing in general. Nothing special about DFW or Barth in that sense.
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Aug 19, 2010 02:21
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Pedro De Heredia posted:There's some parts of IJ I'd like to re-read, if anyone remembers the page numbers I'd appreciate it: Second: 442? 270? It's covered a few places. This might be useful -- http://faculty.sunydutchess.edu/oneill/Infinite.htm
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Aug 19, 2010 03:00
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Man, I'm so glad to see a DFW thread! I have loved everything I've read by the guy and if there was any single person I wish was still around today, it would be him. What a tremendous loss. I've seen a fair amount of Infinite Jest discussion and it's all making me feel like re-reading it. I read A Supposedly Fun Thing... first, then when the bookstore only had one copy of Infinite Jest and nothing else, I decided to take the plunge. It was incredibly bittersweet finishing the book, as I'd been reading it over a few months and it never seemed to get any closer to finishing (which was fine with me). Then boom!, the last page turned and for a few seconds I contemplated turning to page one and doing it again. If a group of fellow DFW-enthusiasts are willing, I'd love to have a Infinite Jest read-along, a la the Infinite Summer project. It'd be great to read a set amount every week or so and discuss it more in depth while it's still fresh in my mind. If there's any book I've read that calls for analysis and discussion, it'd surely be Infinite Jest. Anyway, if no one wants to do this, I've still got The Girl With Curious Hair to read next! Favorite IJ part: Hm, either the Eschaton stuff or Hal's phone call with Orin while he flicks fingernails (toenails?) into the trash. If I'm in a more downbeat mood, it's the section where he describes how it feels to have depression (using the girl in the hospital). Holy poo poo was that a chilling and eye-opening passage.
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Aug 20, 2010 01:00
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Pedro De Heredia posted:- the whole spiel about the increasingly evolving camera-phones and people's attempts to hide their faces. This whole rant should be required reading for anyone involved in the ACN scam.
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Aug 20, 2010 02:43
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PopZeus posted:If a group of fellow DFW-enthusiasts are willing, I'd love to have a Infinite Jest read-along, a la the Infinite Summer project. It'd be great to read a set amount every week or so and discuss it more in depth while it's still fresh in my mind. If there's any book I've read that calls for analysis and discussion, it'd surely be Infinite Jest. Anyway, if no one wants to do this, I've still got The Girl With Curious Hair to read next! I'm down with this.
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Aug 20, 2010 13:49
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flavaaDAAAAAVE posted:I'm down with this. Me too, but we'd need some way to keep everyone reminded and moving along in it (even if it's a slow pace), because every group-reading I try to do with IJ winds up with me losing track of it 25% of the way through and forgetting to keep up with the thread, or whatever. Or maybe I just need to get my poo poo together.
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Aug 20, 2010 14:28
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mdemone posted:Me too, but we'd need some way to keep everyone reminded and moving along in it (even if it's a slow pace), because every group-reading I try to do with IJ winds up with me losing track of it 25% of the way through and forgetting to keep up with the thread, or whatever. Agreed. If it's done, it needs to be done right.
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Aug 20, 2010 17:53
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I actually just got IJ from the library (finally) so I'm on board. Plan on starting it today actually.
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Aug 20, 2010 18:13
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Le Sean posted:I actually just got IJ from the library (finally) so I'm on board. Plan on starting it today actually. This reminds me, we'd need to be careful about spoilers for exactly this reason. (Not that there are a lot of things to be spoiled in the plot, per se, but some things are better left to the first-time reader's discovery.)
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Aug 20, 2010 19:56
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I finished reading Elegant Complexity this week. (I've read IJ twice.) It helped me with the consistent imagery in the book, specifically, the color blue, spiders and water. I would've liked if it helped fill in more of the blank slices of the plot's sierpinski triangle.
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Aug 20, 2010 21:07
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mdemone posted:This reminds me, we'd need to be careful about spoilers for exactly this reason. (Not that there are a lot of things to be spoiled in the plot, per se, but some things are better left to the first-time reader's discovery.) Mine is in the mail. Does someone want to start a new thread for this? I'm too lazy.
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Aug 22, 2010 01:25
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So, when does IJ get good?
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Aug 24, 2010 02:13
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Le Sean posted:So, when does IJ get good? When you put it down and give it someone with good taste. e: vvvvv Sorry, that was uncalled for. Maybe on your second reading. vvvv syscall girl fucked around with this message at 03:33 on Aug 24, 2010 |
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Aug 24, 2010 02:22
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No, yeah, but seriously.
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Aug 24, 2010 03:02
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I highly recommend Lost in the Funhouse if you liked IJ, but have a wikipedia handy when you do it. It seems like every other sentence had a word I didn't know or a reference to a Greek god I didn't get or something like that.
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Aug 24, 2010 03:03
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Le Sean posted:No, yeah, but seriously. Have you got the wheelchair assassins yet? Id say that i had problems getting going, but I do that with most books. Around page 200 I started reading seriously every day. I hit a speed bump around the time with the wraith though.
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Aug 24, 2010 03:39
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aricoarena posted:Have you got the wheelchair assassins yet? Id say that i had problems getting going, but I do that with most books. Around page 200 I started reading seriously every day. I hit a speed bump around the time with the wraith though. Honestly, the opening segment with Hal at the college interview hooked me for good. I feel like if you are going to be the type of person to love Infinite Jest, it's going to get you in the first 100 pages, easily. You either get it or you don't!
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Aug 24, 2010 04:27
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Mr. Squishy posted:Can anyone recomend anyone, well, even remotely like him? List of books mentioned/blurbed/etc by DFW: http://htmlgiant.com/author-spotlight/dfw-praise-compendium/ I highly recommend David Markson, DFW was heavily influenced by him. The syllabus for his class is really interesting to me as I've only read 2 of these so far: quote:DFW’s Syllabus Texts
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Aug 24, 2010 07:04
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McSweeney's iPhone app some time ago had an excerpt of Adam Levin's forthcoming novel The Instructions which very much reminded me of DFW. He certainly seems to have the same... playfulness with words and format. The excerpt had me hooked, and I really can't wait until it comes out in November. Oh, and it's also set in a school and over a thousand pages long... Recently, they featured another piece of him, a reading of a short story originally published in the quarterly some time ago, "Considering the Bittersweet End of Susan Falls", which was also fantastic.
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Aug 24, 2010 09:55
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Le Sean posted:So, when does IJ get good? mighta hit a lil close to home  Also, don't skip footnotes. Not that that would ruin the narrative for you, but it's designed to be a fractured experience. edit: also in re: synchronized reading, I've had a couple tries peter out, too; I also realized that I've started it and not finished it on my own several times. At this point, I can just pick up a copy and open to a random page and start reading and be instantly engaged and within the narrative flow. It's a lot more like a movie than a book in that regard. Any movie I think approaches art, I can just watch a few minutes of the middle, or watch the ending again and so forth. It's such a weird book. I loved the hell out of The Secret History and read it over and over, but always start to finish and I never went back to see what a character said 75% of the way through the book, or to reread the description of something. bort fucked around with this message at 13:14 on Aug 24, 2010 |
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Aug 24, 2010 13:04
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bort posted:I was hooked the moment I started reading Erdedy's story of climbing the walls waiting for the woman who'd said she would come. Exactly this for me too, with a feeling of "so I finally read a passage of a book which I can relate to so very strong and it's this?!". IJ is also the only book I've (so far) finished just to start reading all over again.
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Aug 24, 2010 15:32
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Konec Hry posted:Exactly this for me too, with a feeling of "so I finally read a passage of a book which I can relate to so very strong and it's this?!". IJ is also the only book I've (so far) finished just to start reading all over again. I didn't start all over again, but the first thing I did when I got to the ending of IJ was go back and read the first chapter again. I was really, really glad I did; one sentence in particular that I'd kind of passed over with the miscellany surrounding it and then forgotten about due to the book's length stuck out like a sore thumb and completely charged my view of What Happened Afterwards. (Should be pretty obvious which sentence I mean.) I'd almost say rereading the first chapter after finishing the book is essential.
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Aug 24, 2010 16:12
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Dust Man posted:I didn't start all over again, but the first thing I did when I got to the ending of IJ was go back and read the first chapter again. I was really, really glad I did; one sentence in particular that I'd kind of passed over with the miscellany surrounding it and then forgotten about due to the book's length stuck out like a sore thumb and completely charged my view of What Happened Afterwards. (Should be pretty obvious which sentence I mean.) I'd almost say rereading the first chapter after finishing the book is essential. This is what I did as well and I highly recommend it. The next thing I did was get online and start searching for other people's thoughts on the subject.
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Aug 24, 2010 16:17
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Hey, this thread got interesting in the past few pages!aricoarena posted:I honestly would like to know what you mean by this because I've heard other people and critics talk about it and don't know what they mean. Yeah. I'm just fine with discussion coming from people who didn't like the book, but it's interesting that for some readers IJ actually seemed not-genuine. To me, DFW almost always seemed utterly desperate to be genuine, to be honest. He seemed to lay himself bare in an attempt to connect with and understand others and the world around him, and to wrack himself to the utmost trying to show us his characters in such a way, too. Only the dialogue from smart-asses was smart-rear end. Everything else was, to me, about as genuine as one person could be with another. For people wondering when it gets good - well, it doesn't have to be right for everybody. I was interested from page 1, really interested by page 20, and realized I was completely hooked sometime after page 100 or so. But I didn't see that as the book "getting good," just me getting my head around it.
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Aug 24, 2010 20:34
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flavaaDAAAAAVE posted:I'm down with this. I'd also like to do this, though I kind of fully expect it to peter out after a fortnight. Mostly because I'd like to read it after I read a few of his essays which read to me like primers for his more oblique attacks on the same subject. And IJ had me sold by the triangled fingers.
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Aug 24, 2010 23:09
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Considering the subject of a lot of stories around the AA, I find it quite funny that some people like IJ only after they identify! To me the book became interesting once I'd orientated myself to the style. After about 50 pages in, the stories were so powerful or funny or ludicrous or sad that it was impossible not to like it. I think it would be a mistake to consider DFW being "honest". The book even goes to great lengths to describe itself as meta (eschaton - mapping - hyperreal - honest about being dishonest - characters flagging themselves as metaphors - cross-dressing and so on). The power of the book is that it presents a multi-faceted look at what people do to survive, amongst other themes. Every single story (apart from perhaps the mountain top conflab, which serve a different role entirely, in my view) are ruminations on what people cling on to in life to get them through (and of course the lies they tell themselves), but it's hard to see the characters as honest in any shape or form.
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Aug 24, 2010 23:21
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Did anybody else read the Time cover story on Jonathan Franzen? I knew him and DFW were friends but not the extent of it (they were best friends and Franzen helped pull him out of a deep depression shortly before Wallace's death) and how affected Franzen was by Wallace's suicide. The whole thing doesn't appear to be online, but it's worth checking out.
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Aug 25, 2010 04:24
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