empty mirror
remember the jackalope
um....
SPOILER ALERT!
(kinda)
SPOILER ALERT!
(kinda)
David Foster Wallace RIP
- Thread starter Melmoth
- Start date
YES, SPOILER ALERT!
It's Joelle that says the master copy is buried with him, when she's being interviewed by Steeply near the end. She says at his request all of his masters were buried with him. But that also confused me, because there was the suggestion earlier that the Antitoi brothers unknowingly had the master copy in their shop, but they just thought the tape was blank because it wasn't compatible with their players.
I read a quote from DFW somewhere that despite the book ending as it does, the reader should know enough to be able to 'project forward' what happens next -- so I guess it's possible that Gately does survive and the grave-digging scene does actually occur.
It's Joelle that says the master copy is buried with him, when she's being interviewed by Steeply near the end. She says at his request all of his masters were buried with him. But that also confused me, because there was the suggestion earlier that the Antitoi brothers unknowingly had the master copy in their shop, but they just thought the tape was blank because it wasn't compatible with their players.
I read a quote from DFW somewhere that despite the book ending as it does, the reader should know enough to be able to 'project forward' what happens next -- so I guess it's possible that Gately does survive and the grave-digging scene does actually occur.
Dr. Benway
Member
It has been a while since I read Infinite Jest, but didn't the mad stork say to Hal while pretending to be the professional conversationalist that he had the master cartridge of the entertainment inside his skull? would go some way to explaining both the microwave and Gately's fever dreams of digging up the head
woops
is not like other people
I think that's going too far. I understand he wrote an actual suicide note. However bleak his life now appears, there's a lot of humour and companionship in his writing - especially the earlier stuff - after IJ the jokes get further apart.
The commencement speech has been edited for the book, removing one of the sentences about suicide, by someone who evidently knows best about these things.
Hey Barebones, I dunno if you saw this but this page asks some of your questions plus a few more. It's too long since I read it to try answering any of them myself though.
Godness knows if I dreamt this or read it somewhere, but I also got the idea that the entertainment master tape was buried INSIDE HIMSELF'S SKULL!!! Oh, I should read it again.
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don_quixote
Trent End
well i read infinite jest over the past two weeks and loved it loved it loved it, but have been left with loads and loads of questions (which could have been answered here, but i'll shoot my bolt anyway)
what did gately do to the state attorneys (if i recall correctly) wife to make her bleach her lips and for him to call him the most evil man alive?
what did gately do to the state attorneys (if i recall correctly) wife to make her bleach her lips and for him to call him the most evil man alive?
don_quixote
Trent End
cough
[more spoilers]
and i couldn't agree more about the gately hospital sequence, and the whole passage about lenz murdering animals and the eschaton game hahaha
but i really want to read it all again and really dont have the time, because doing the whole thing in, well, 10 days, is a bit too fast. i did read the first chapter again because i was like well what the fuck was up with hal, and that BIT. and the way you consider tavis and delint after all you know about their relationship with hal...
god but there must be so much more than the first chapter like this hey?
and the funniest bits for me, permulis and the poster of the king saying "yes im paranoid - but am i paranoid enough?" and the hugs not drugs black guy and erdedy, hahaha
[more spoilers]
and i couldn't agree more about the gately hospital sequence, and the whole passage about lenz murdering animals and the eschaton game hahaha
but i really want to read it all again and really dont have the time, because doing the whole thing in, well, 10 days, is a bit too fast. i did read the first chapter again because i was like well what the fuck was up with hal, and that BIT. and the way you consider tavis and delint after all you know about their relationship with hal...
god but there must be so much more than the first chapter like this hey?
and the funniest bits for me, permulis and the poster of the king saying "yes im paranoid - but am i paranoid enough?" and the hugs not drugs black guy and erdedy, hahaha
empty mirror
remember the jackalope
^ gately sent the DA a photo of himself (masked) with their toothbrush(es?) in his asshole
(sorry for the bad grammar)
just read a supposedly fun thing i'll never do again
it was (supposedly) fun but some of it is pretty dated (particularly the bit on david lynch----writtten before the ubiquity of cell phones)
the first essay on tennis was illuminating w/r/t IJ
and the titular essay was fucking amazing
(so too his coverage of an Illinois state fair)
a (rather staid) essay on television is also relevant to readers of IJ
(sorry for the bad grammar)
just read a supposedly fun thing i'll never do again
it was (supposedly) fun but some of it is pretty dated (particularly the bit on david lynch----writtten before the ubiquity of cell phones)
the first essay on tennis was illuminating w/r/t IJ
and the titular essay was fucking amazing
(so too his coverage of an Illinois state fair)
a (rather staid) essay on television is also relevant to readers of IJ
don_quixote
Trent End
oh yeah!! forgot about that. cheers
Tweak Head
Well-known member
This is a great thread ... shame I only just found it. I read IJ and loved it; started reading again over the Summer and it made a whole lot more sense second time around. There was a project called Infinite Summer, which was reading the book over this Summer. They've moved on to Dracula now ... but the archives are available here. It has a bunch of links to other relevant sites as well as roundtables, comments and guides.
Unfortunately I got a bit distracted and my reading stalled. I'm soldiering on. I highly recommend IJ. If you want to try DFW but are put off by IJ's sheer heft, try some of the essay collections already mentioned such as "Consider the Lobster" and "A Supposedly Fun Thing ...". As people have pointed out, there are some fairly dense tracts in there but most of it is very entertaining and beautifully written. The title piece from "A Supposedly Fun Thing ..." is hilarious.
I haven't yet read Brief Interviews With Hideous Men, but I think someone - the guy from the Office USA - just made a film of it. There was talk of a film version of IJ too ...
Someone upthread referred to the commencement speech, now published as This Is Water, and suggested that it was influential on IJ. In fact, it forms the base for his unfinished novel, The Pale King. This novel will now be published next year. This Wiki page has links to some published extracts.
This Is Water is definitely worth buying or tracking down. It's tragic that a guy with the insight to write that still could not bear to live.
Unfortunately I got a bit distracted and my reading stalled. I'm soldiering on. I highly recommend IJ. If you want to try DFW but are put off by IJ's sheer heft, try some of the essay collections already mentioned such as "Consider the Lobster" and "A Supposedly Fun Thing ...". As people have pointed out, there are some fairly dense tracts in there but most of it is very entertaining and beautifully written. The title piece from "A Supposedly Fun Thing ..." is hilarious.
I haven't yet read Brief Interviews With Hideous Men, but I think someone - the guy from the Office USA - just made a film of it. There was talk of a film version of IJ too ...
Someone upthread referred to the commencement speech, now published as This Is Water, and suggested that it was influential on IJ. In fact, it forms the base for his unfinished novel, The Pale King. This novel will now be published next year. This Wiki page has links to some published extracts.
This Is Water is definitely worth buying or tracking down. It's tragic that a guy with the insight to write that still could not bear to live.
empty mirror
remember the jackalope
jenks
thread death
Just been looking at these visual representatives of IJ:
http://www.brainpickings.org/index.php/2010/12/10/infinite-jest-visualized/
His last novel is due out shortly - I should imagine there will be much hoo-ha over it. I just really hope it's good!
http://www.brainpickings.org/index.php/2010/12/10/infinite-jest-visualized/
His last novel is due out shortly - I should imagine there will be much hoo-ha over it. I just really hope it's good!
Tragic, but understandable. I don't understand how you could be anything but terribly miserable in order to find the motivation to spend a large part of your life writing things down. If you were happy and attractive, what possible reason could you have to?
baboon2004
Darned cockwombles.
Because no human being is as simple as 'happy and attractive'?
Besides, I can see that you might make an argument for happiness not being conducive to novel-writing, but attractiveness has nowt to do with it.
I do find this a very interesting point of debate though (I'm not even a DFW fan). With ref to Tweakhead's comment, as someone very wise said (I forget the exact quote), any person who's not realised that in many ways the world is not a very nice place, really hasn't yet matured into an adult. Which is not to say it's not full of wonder of course, but to say that insight and misery may sometimes be very interconnected.
Plus, from what I've read (again, not a fan as such), he suffered from a debilitating illness for 20 years.
Does the above make sense? I'm tired and I'm not sure, will review tomorrow.
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baboon2004
Darned cockwombles.
Wasn't that one, though Kafka obviously had wise things to say about most situations. Maybe it was some line in a journal article that stuck or something...
sure, the misery quotient has a direct relationship to clarity with which one perceives the world and his/her place in it.
lol girlfriend is reading I.J. in German upon my recommendation and I've just spent the entire dinner listening to her exasperated complaints about it
lol girlfriend is reading I.J. in German upon my recommendation and I've just spent the entire dinner listening to her exasperated complaints about it
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