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I just plowed through Cloud Atlas, not an easy read itself, and I'm on to The Pale King tomorrow. Totally stoked.
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Apr 5, 2011 05:18
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http://www.theawl.com/2011/04/inside-david-foster-wallaces-private-self-help-library Pretty cool article
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Apr 6, 2011 07:40
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http://johnziegler.com/editorials_details.asp?editorial=165 this article is pro-click for anyone who really, really loves wallace (all of you)
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Apr 6, 2011 08:33
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so what alexander posted:http://johnziegler.com/editorials_details.asp?editorial=165 I don't see even one reason why readers who appreciate Wallace should waste time on that article. It seems to me he's someone who simply says Wallace was overrated because of his personal grudges, then gives zero motivations and a lot of unproved assumptions to justify his claims. That guy is so self-absorbed that it is impossible for him to see further than his nose. Let him be so convinced of his own opinions, but why should we waste time on them too?
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Apr 6, 2011 14:43
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so what alexander posted:http://johnziegler.com/editorials_details.asp?editorial=165 I was hoping that would have been more funny than sad, but it's just pathetic.
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Apr 6, 2011 15:25
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Abalieno posted:I don't see even one reason why readers who appreciate Wallace should waste time on that article. I don't know - as someone p. much steeped in the "literary liberal elite agenda" that Ziegler refers to, it's pretty interesting to hear the (very, very defensive) perception of someone who isn't, and in fact feels excluded/targeted by it. What's really incredible about it is the fact that he acknowledges that he doesn't read DFW's work, but instead engages in the same kind of personal attack that he's accusing DFW of enacting on him. Both explicitly and implicitly, he struggles to place himself as a figure that is parallel or analagous to DFW, most obviously when he quotes him at the end of the article and his insistence that DFW is NOT A "GENIUS". Of course, to fans it's totally outrageous and frustrating (and the wimpiest move ever to publish this after he killed himself), but I think it's important to understand that this is the kind of reaction DFW inspires in some people. It's powerful in a way that fans may not be able to understand without hearing it from the horse's mouth.
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Apr 6, 2011 16:05
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so what alexander posted:http://johnziegler.com/editorials_details.asp?editorial=165 That's interesting. I thought DFW was pretty fair to Ziegler in that story, especially considering the man's a loving moron. For those who aren't familiar, he's basically a second-rate Limbaugh. It is funny watching a conservative demagogue (THE LITERARY ELITE AMIRITE?) squirm under the microscope. This article, in contrast: Marvel posted:http://www.theawl.com/2011/04/inside-david-foster-wallaces-private-self-help-library Definitely is worth reading. A pretty insightful look at DFW's apparent interest in cheesy self-help books and some of his own thoughts on the genesis of his depression. I was interested to learn his relationship with his mother bore a lot of resemblance to that of Hal Incandenza. Definitely some heavy self-insertion there.
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Apr 6, 2011 16:21
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Abalieno posted:I don't see even one reason why readers who appreciate Wallace should waste time on that article. I'd read that article before. I don't remember "Host" particularly well, but I'm sure the conservative radio talk show host didn't come off well. So: Wallace did the shadowing, wrote the piece, and knew the guy probably wouldn't be happy with it. The guy wasn't, and is understandably upset with Wallace. He asks Wallace to come on the air to talk about it, Wallace refuses, obviously because it would be an incredibly uncomfortable experience. Maybe, ethically or etiquette-wise, Wallace "should have" done so, maybe he did "owe it" to the guy. But it would have been a sucky experience, and you'd understand why he'd want to avoid it. I mean, maybe writing a piece about another human being (the talk show host) where the other human being is portrayed, ultimately, negatively - or at least in a way that doesn't align with his self-image - is also a sucky thing to do, if that other person is not negatively affecting the lives of far more people in a worse way (debatable, for a conservative talk show host). But... oh well? Wallace isn't a perfect human being? Well, yeah. But that's all there seems to be to that article - one guy, upset with Wallace for an obvious reason, with no actual literary criticism, just a probably justified personal grudge. There's nothing of value to discuss about Wallace's work from that, and only the teensiest tiniest bit about him personally. Liked the awl article, though.
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Apr 6, 2011 16:45
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aricoarena posted:I was hoping that would have been more funny than sad, but it's just pathetic. Yeah, I wish I could be surprised by a conservative talk show host being a pedantic whiny turd, but they all seem to be like that off the air. I totally understand why DFW didn't appear on his show, because he'd just sit there being ranted at and interrupted under the pretense of discussing his article. Worse than Ziegler's personal grudge against Wallace, justified or not, is the bullshit about Wallace's death. Hate someone all you want, but using their suicide as an occasion to poo poo all over them is pretty low.
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Apr 6, 2011 17:34
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The Giant rear end in a top hat Who Wrote That lovely Article posted:I strongly believe that a large ingredient of the toxic mix that ended up forming Wallace’s self-inflicted poison was the pressure he felt of living up to the hype surrounding his writing and the guilt he must have felt for not really having the true talent to back up his formidable reputation. Good lord this is the worst thing. Why even write this piece? Literally just to make ridiculous snipes at DFW? I felt a bit sick reading some of these lines and knowing that some of his followers may have believed them  .In lighter news The Pale King is quite excellent so far. I'm taking my time though, as this is the last DFW "new" work that we'll probably ever see.
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Apr 6, 2011 17:48
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I posted that because I found it hilariously terrible. Have you guys actually read the story, "Host", that this guy got destroyed on? If you read it, it's no wonder why Ziegler was so livid at Wallace. Even though he attempts to claim that Wallace isn't a "genius" (I think we all can agree he definitely is), he also admits he hasn't read anything other than "Host". I think this quote sums it up quite nicely:quote:After publishing a bloated 1,000 page novel called Infinite Jest in 1996 (which Time Magazine named as one of the best novels from 1923-2005), Wallace received the "genius grant" from the MacArthur Foundation in 1997. Being dubbed a “genius” at a young age (at least by the standards of the literary world) must have been a rather daunting burden for Wallace, especially when he probably knew deep down that he didn’t have the goods to back up those kind of elevated expectations. I take solace in that after Wallace's death his legend has only grown more and more, and when this rear end in a top hat dies no one will give a poo poo. I didn't even know he existed until I came across this.
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Apr 6, 2011 18:06
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DFW killed himself not because of severe depression, but because he wanted to be a cool literary icon?  I have always believed that right-wing pundits are petty, self-absorbed dickheads with literally no understanding of politics, economics, science, human behaviour or any other of the subjects they desperately feel the world needs to hear their opinions on. That piece has nothing in it to challenge that view.
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Apr 7, 2011 02:03
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Just finished the book 5 minutes ago, here is what I think. Spoilering the whole thing because I'm not sure what people would or wouldn't want to know going in, but if you're deciding either way, I'm not giving anything away in terms of plot. Because there isn't any plot. Like no progression at all. I don't know if that's a good or bad thing, but reading the whole work (I wouldn't call it a novel) really made me aware of how unfinished it was. Again, I don't know if that's a good thing (in that we get to read something by DFW in any state of development at all) or a bad thing (in that we read something by DFW in a state that is sort of hard to accept for what it is and not think about what it could have been) When I first started the book I was really exhilarated by being able to read whole huge sections that felt confident and polished, like DFW at the absolute top of his game. It was sort of impossible not to think to myself "this is the exact writer that he would end up becoming." And that's how the whole work functions. I honestly think it's his best writing. It's self-conscious in the way someone really confident is aware of himself and his capabilities. I know that's not how we think of DFW as an actual person, but that's the sense I got from this book. On a sentence to sentence, paragraph to paragraph level, this feels like a finished work, and it is really compelling and genuine and wise. The hard thing about this book is that it seriously feels unfinished. I know that's obviously stated everywhere, but the more you make your way in the book the greater that feeling pervades the reading experience. Imagine if Infinite Jest was 1/3 of the length, featured only 1 chapter from each character, none of their relationships were established, and they almost never interacted. Those individual chapters would have all been great, but nothing moves forward or deepens or blooms. There's a section in the back of the book with notes for possible directions for the book, and it really hits you after reading that how incomplete the work is, and what it could have been. That said, I don't want to sound like I'm complaining about something we could have just as likely never seen at all. There are three large sections of the book that really tower over what most other writers are accomplishing these days, and show DFW's true talent. I know I'll come back to those parts many times in my life. But I'll always, in the back of my mind, have to wonder what those parts could have meant to Pale King, the novel.
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Apr 7, 2011 02:42
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so what alexander posted:I posted that because I found it hilariously terrible. Have you guys actually read the story, "Host", that this guy got destroyed on? If you read it, it's no wonder why Ziegler was so livid at Wallace. Even though he attempts to claim that Wallace isn't a "genius" (I think we all can agree he definitely is), he also admits he hasn't read anything other than "Host". I think this quote sums it up quite nicely: Yeah it's incredibly petty. He claims that he doesn't think Wallace was a genius because...he seemed kind of weird and the piece had factual inaccuracies (which Ziegler fails to describe--presumably because they're incredibly petty or perhaps nonexistent). It's the stupidity of it that's really appalling--sure, call the guy overrated but at least pretend to have read the guy's work, the stuff that made people rate him in the first place! What makes me happy is that this article really proves DFW's assessment of Ziegler in "Host" was accurate, but Ziegler's way too stupid to realize it. In an inadvertent but deeply satisfying way, it's a tribute to Wallace's insight.
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Apr 7, 2011 05:09
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I'm about 100 pages into The Pale King and I'm loving it. Wallace's ability to keep the same literary voice, while still tapping deeply into his panoply of endearingly neurotic characters, is absolutely dazzling and keeps me glued to the pages. I also think it's great that Wallace has made himself a character and gives the entire back story of his time leading up the IRS, including a funny stab at frat bros.
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Apr 7, 2011 05:55
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drat girl! posted:Just finished the book 5 minutes ago, here is what I think. Spoilering the whole thing because I'm not sure what people would or wouldn't want to know going in, but if you're deciding either way, I'm not giving anything away in terms of plot. I just bought Pale King yesterday and can't wait to start (have to finish another big book first). I assume I will feel the same way you do, but I think it is important to keep the unfinished aspect of the book in mind. There is a blog post on Slate that takes reviewers to task for talking about Pale King as if it were a finished novel: http://www.slate.com/blogs/blogs/scocca/archive/2011/04/04/david-foster-wallace-wrote-two-novels-and-the-pale-king-is-not-one-of-them.aspx I think the point is valid, but I wonder how those of you who have finished or begun the book feel?
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Apr 7, 2011 14:32
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Old Janx Spirit posted:I just bought Pale King yesterday and can't wait to start (have to finish another big book first). I assume I will feel the same way you do, but I think it is important to keep the unfinished aspect of the book in mind. There is a blog post on Slate that takes reviewers to task for talking about Pale King as if it were a finished novel: http://www.slate.com/blogs/blogs/scocca/archive/2011/04/04/david-foster-wallace-wrote-two-novels-and-the-pale-king-is-not-one-of-them.aspx I'm only eight chapters in, but I already sense that I'll share Pietsch's view expressed in his foreword: that there were multiple notes in DFW's handwritten manuscript copies that said (regarding plot resolutions) "lots of things build up but nothing ever happens" or similar sentiments. This is a signature of his other work, in my opinion, and if I didn't know TPK was an unfinished work I'm not sure I would be able to discern that. Pietsch himself says "Just how unfinished is this work?" -- and I would argue that the material we see is almost entirely complete (in the draft sense), but that a lot of bits had yet to be written (or were in shabby condition in the rest of DFW's notes). At the very least, it's lightyears better than the last Nabokov, which is a cool gift and/or display item but a bunch of goddamn index cards in punchout pages do not a novel make. Of course after I'm finished I may have an entirely different view, but the post by drat girl! could almost as easily have been applied to Infinite Jest had we only been exposed to about half of its exposition. More disconnection between characters does not automatically equal a lack of completion in the plot, in fact given the subject matter he's playing with here, I might suggest that alienation is an important theme. I'm not arguing that the book was more than half finished (or thereabouts), and I'm sure a finished product might have been much more well-connected, but I'm not sure we would have learned anything more from it in the way that DFW wants readers to feel about his work (e.g. the idea of battling your own head's tendency toward solipsism and remaining connected to the world, the roles of work and monotony in society and neurosis, &c).
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Apr 7, 2011 15:18
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It really does feel like a finished novel for a long stretch, because the sections seem so polished. I didn't start to feel the way I did until maybe the last third. I get the feeling that the whole "lots of things build up but nothing ever happens" probably refers to the larger intra-office Lerhle vs Glendenning IRS stuff (about which there are a few really interesting notes to hint that there should have been larger undercurrents had the book been finished) but what I'm talking about felt most unfinished was the thematic stuff. With IJ, which I really believe was intricately plotted and the way it was on purpose, there's an argument (I don't know if that's the right word) developing throughout the work about the nature of addiction, and that is tied to the plot and the order things are presented. The ending really does make sense and belongs where it does, same as the opening and everything in between. I think thematically PK suffers because that argument, this time about boredom and how we spend the minutes of our life, seems overall to be sketched and sort of roundabout, and I get the feeling that if he had finished the book, DFW would have somehow gotten somewhere more conclusive. I dunno if that like means a conclusive answer, but I get the feeling there was a lot more depth to mine on that subject. The three long passages I mentioned earlier: A three-way conversation on gov't, corporations and morality / a really lengthy testimonial from "Irrelevant Chris Fogle / and the Drinion + Rand conversation stand out to me as where DFW really started to hit his stride on the larger issues, and I don't know if those themes get worked on as much through the rest of the piece. On the Gompert / Marathe interaction in IJ - I thought the line about Gompert reminding him of his wife was funny but also really telling about depression - linking someone like Gompert to the most over-the-top physically debilitated person, and Marathe it almost seems was offering the Entertainment to her as a mercy killing - something he isn't able to do for his own wife.
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Apr 7, 2011 19:00
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Quick, possibly dumb, question: are there footnotes? A sizeable amount? and placed at the end of the book or on each page? Feel free to answer in spoiler tags. Cheers
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Apr 8, 2011 14:07
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inafoxhole posted:Quick, possibly dumb, question: are there footnotes? A sizeable amount? and placed at the end of the book or on each page? Feel free to answer in spoiler tags. Cheers Don't think this needs spoilering: there are no footnotes (that I've found), and only a few pages of endnotes describing things DFW had written down concerning particular chapters -- directions for future plot evolution, very brief background material, things like that. Nothing nearly as involuted as Infinite Jest.
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Apr 8, 2011 14:14
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So actual endnotes as opposed to his stylistic tic endnotes.
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Apr 8, 2011 15:26
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Footnotes make a couple appearances throughout the book, maybe in like three or four chapters. The chapters narrated by David Foster Wallace obviously.
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Apr 8, 2011 15:31
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Amazon Canada started to ship out the Pale King early as well and I got my copy today. It's too bad I started The Idiot thinking I had until the 15th - now I still have half of it to go before I can start DFW.
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Apr 8, 2011 20:05
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Interesting article in the NYT about how Pietsch put the novel together: http://tinyurl.com/3jt3oz2 A question for those who have read Pale King: Given that it is about IRS workers and taxes, does it speak to the current financial crisis at all, even implicitly? Does it seem to be effected by the currant ecnomic climate?
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Apr 9, 2011 16:45
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Here's another part of the Pietsch putsch, from the Guardian. It's different enough to at least skim.
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Apr 9, 2011 18:00
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Old Janx Spirit posted:Interesting article in the NYT about how Pietsch put the novel together: http://tinyurl.com/3jt3oz2
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Apr 9, 2011 18:44
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Thought I might post this here; http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2011/apr/10/karen-green-david-foster-wallace-interview Its an interview with Wallace's widow about the man himself and "The Pale King". It may not have many new insights but its touching and interesting nonetheless. The Guardian actually have quite a few articles up about DFW this week, so it might be worth checking those out as well.
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Apr 10, 2011 11:42
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Heres a new review of Pale King on Slate; http://www.slate.com/id/2290950. Quite positive, and the author claims that the unfinished nature of the book may be a plus. JUST finished the book I was reading. On to The Pale King!
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Apr 12, 2011 13:24
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I just started reading IJ. I don't know if it's been brought up before, but the part on mastery, plateaus, and the three 'types' on pg.115 seems to be the same thing George Leonard talks about in his book "Mastery". The types are exactly the same, but with different names. Despairing <=> The Dabbler Obsessive <=> The Obsessive Complacent <=> The Hacker
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Apr 13, 2011 02:57
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Hello friends! Didn't see this posted here, so I thought I'd let you know that the Harry Ransom Center (the archives with DFW's papers) will be holding an homage to DFW tonight at 7 PM. If you aren't lucky enough to live in Austin, it's also going to be available as a webcast here.
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Apr 15, 2011 16:16
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I'm pretty bummed that I missed out on the launch party down at UT on friday just because I forgot. Can't bring myself to start the pale king because I'm not sure I have time to completely disappear for a week yet. Edit: Also, why the gently caress isn't girl with curious hair available on the kindle? All of his other works are. It's the only collection of his I haven't read.
mith fucked around with this message at 02:41 on Apr 18, 2011 |
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Apr 18, 2011 02:30
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So I'm at Chapter 14 and loving it so far. It really does feel "tornadic", as DFW intended - there's a menagerie of characters and plotliness thrown at us from the very start, only a few thus far directly involved with the IRS (although the same themes are emerging all over the place). Something that struck me as a little sad - and I'm sorry I'm bringing this up again because I really do hate the trend of DFW's death overshadowing talk about his work - is the first chapter in which he inserts himself into the story. It's a great chapter and really fun and well written, but the way he goes into lots of tangential talk about editing and multiple drafts and negotiations with his publisher and all that sortof pulled me out of the book. I realize it'd be obviously fictitious even if he had really gone through that process, but the contradiction of knowing things never got to that point and how convincingly DFW writes about it feels a bit strange. Definitely not a complaint or criticism, though.
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Apr 18, 2011 02:46
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mith posted:I'm pretty bummed that I missed out on the launch party down at UT on friday just because I forgot. You can still see some of his papers on display at the Harry Ransom Center! They have a number of letters between him and his publisher and other writers being exhibited right now, which is really interesting and a lil depressing to walk through.
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Apr 19, 2011 15:12
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Ya, I'm actually thinking of going up there tomorrow.
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Apr 19, 2011 17:55
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LA Goons can go to this: A Pale King reading (with Henry Rollins and Megan Mullally?!?) on 4/28 http://www.penusa.org/node/217 While those in NYC can see this on 4/26 with Michael Pietsch: http://www.pen.org/viewmedia.php/prmMID/5757/prmID/2126
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Apr 19, 2011 19:18
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plasmolysis posted:You can still see some of his papers on display at the Harry Ransom Center! They have a number of letters between him and his publisher and other writers being exhibited right now, which is really interesting and a lil depressing to walk through. It's not as cool as the real thing, but you can see a lot of the archives on the website. http://www.hrc.utexas.edu/press/releases/2010/dfw/
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Apr 19, 2011 19:27
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synertia posted:I was just telling my buddy that Infinite Jest on the Kindle or Nook would be EXACTLY how he meant it to be read. Click on the hyperlink for the endnotes. I wish I had one now... I bought a Kindle when I was about 600 pages into a hardcover edition of IJ, and it was the first book that I purchased. It was pretty amazing how much easier it became to read. Not only the ability to jump instantly to footnotes, but the inline dictionary came in quite handy. I'm working on a backlog of books right now, but I'm really looking forward to my second read through on the Kindle.
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Apr 19, 2011 23:01
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Goldmund posted:I bought a Kindle when I was about 600 pages into a hardcover edition of IJ, and it was the first book that I purchased. It was pretty amazing how much easier it became to read. Not only the ability to jump instantly to footnotes, but the inline dictionary came in quite handy. I'm working on a backlog of books right now, but I'm really looking forward to my second read through on the Kindle. I'm about a quarter of the way through the paperback of IJ now, with a kindle sitting unused on my desk. For reason I had imagined that reading it on a kindle would be a disaster but now that you mention it maybe it's worth a shot. Though I do feel like the physical aspect of the book is important to me, personally. If I'm going to read 1100 pages, I want something I can look at and feel accomplished. The in-line dictionary might be incredible though... I have a quick question about chronology in IJ. I've gotten past page 223 the chronology of subsidized time which has given me some sense of place, but how much would people recommend you pay attention to each date/year marker in the book? It seems silly to ask but is the chronology something that makes sense directly through the text, or do you have to juggle all the of the dates in your head as you read to really understand? Furthermore, the symbol that seems to represent a chapter or section break- the thing that looks like a crescent moon- is that simply artful, or is there meaning in that? Jewmanji fucked around with this message at 15:47 on Apr 20, 2011 |
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Apr 20, 2011 15:44
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Jewmanji posted:but how much would people recommend you pay attention to each date/year marker in the book? It seems silly to ask but is the chronology something that makes sense directly through the text, or do you have to juggle all the of the dates in your head as you read to really understand? Furthermore, the symbol that seems to represent a chapter or section break- the thing that looks like a crescent moon- is that simply artful, or is there meaning in that? I don't think it's a huge matter that will drastically affect how you understand the book, but maybe just take a little bit of time to figure out the basic time in which the three main threads occur (ETA / Ennet at about the same time, Marathe + Steeply a few months earlier)
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Apr 20, 2011 16:43
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Jewmanji posted:Furthermore, the symbol that seems to represent a chapter or section break- the thing that looks like a crescent moon- is that simply artful, or is there meaning in that? Those breaks are meaningful, and delineate the novel into a structure somewhat like a Sierpinski triangle of plots/themes. Elegant Complexity goes into this in much more detail, but don't worry about that until your first re-read or so. Just manage to orient the main plots in time relative to each other, and you won't miss anything. The structure of episodes is like a cool little Easter egg, but not essential to the work at all (though I'd love to hear arguments to the contrary since it can only further inform such a deep and rewarding text).
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Apr 20, 2011 18:33
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