Comments on: A Baker’s Dozen of My Feelings about David Foster Wallace’s Infinite Jest

By: Michael

Michael — Tue, 14 Jul 2009 01:18:18 +0000

and Leah, read past the first 10 pages and maybe you will change your mind.

By: Michael

Michael — Tue, 14 Jul 2009 01:17:01 +0000

Thank you. No. 9 is absolutely, unflinchingly true.

By: Fred

Fred — Thu, 02 Jul 2009 08:45:19 +0000

“Feeling No. 9: Mutability. I had to choose carefully to whom to recommend this book. No one who knew me was allowed to hate it. If they hated it, they hated me”

This perfectly describes my feelings toward recommending my absolute favourite book to friends. My method involves advising other books that are a bit like IJ in some respects first, and then hear their reaction before making the big step.

By: Andrew

Andrew — Tue, 24 Feb 2009 00:41:29 +0000

What a wonderful essay. I especially love this part:

It’s as if he comes out of his book and shakes you until you’re dizzy, yelling at you all the time, “I GET IT. I GET YOU. YOU ARE NOT ALONE HERE.”

Because I have felt that way about writers before, with Michael Chabon in particular.

By: Leah

Leah — Tue, 10 Feb 2009 20:28:06 +0000

I am not finished with Infinite Jest. I’m not even close. It’s a slog, and a tough one at that. The only possible negative thing I can say about it, though, is a particularly long passage that I believe is to be attributed to a young, black female character. I get that the character is uneducated, and therefore spells things wrong, that’s not the problem. The problem is the grammar. No black person, no matter how ghetto, actually talks like that! It’s the only flaw I’ve encountered in this book. I’m sorry, sorry, sorry, but white people always mess up ghetto patois. Now, I’m an upper middle class educated black female, but I’m related to people like this one character… I get it. I won’t let the passage ruin the book for me, as the passage was thoughtfully written, and is incredibly poignant. It ought not ruin the book as a whole. I was just personally bothered by it. I wonder if other black readers found this so?

By: Brian

Brian — Sun, 08 Feb 2009 23:17:50 +0000

I like how your feelings sometimes sort of morph into thoughts or conclusions or values or virtues or a kind of contemplation on the book.

I love your comment, “IJ is the anti-passivity.”

By: Dylan

Dylan — Sun, 08 Feb 2009 05:39:23 +0000

I definitely actively conceptualize some of my friends as people I would recommend this book to, and struggle to get them to realize that not only is it my favorite book, it would become theirs also as soon as they read it.

By: jennifer

jennifer — Fri, 06 Feb 2009 23:09:56 +0000

This is a great post and everything I was trying to say when I would rant drunkenly about it right after I finished it. Well, except the part about the mold.

By: LEZS

LEZS — Fri, 06 Feb 2009 21:53:53 +0000

A most excellent and inspiring review.

By: Chris

Chris — Fri, 06 Feb 2009 16:15:15 +0000

A former colleague of mine solved the problem of trying to fit IJ into his briefcase by cutting the binding into two, although I pointed out that while reading the first half of the recently bifurcated novel, he would still need the second half for the footnotes.

BTW, anyone know of any good Eschaton simulations for the iPhone?