Wednesday, June 22, 2005
Infinite Jest - A Book Review of Sorts
I had never heard of Infinite Jest, until I picked it up by chance at the airport on my way to Vietnam. In fact I was only passingly aware of its author David Foster Wallace. However it turns out that it's a former 90's literary sensation. It's renowned for its length (1088 pages in my edition), its slightly nerdy clever-cleverness (over 100 pages of footnotes, some with their own footnotes), and its "anti-confluential" structure, in which the major plot strands and characters (almost) fail to intertwine. I'm not going to ruin it by giving anything more away about the plot. I thought it was the best book I've read in 2 or 3 years. I really enjoyed getting stuck into a book for 9 days on the trot; I wouldn't really recommend you tackle it as occasional bedtime reading. For one thing it's too heavy, even in paperback, to comfortably read in bed. If you know me, and you haven't read it, then I'm probably going to give it to you for christmas; that's how impressed I was. Here are some internet gleanings relating to the book, designed to convey my overawedness.
Listmania Lists featuring Infinite Jest:
Post-Modern, Turn-Your-Brain-To-Juggled-Tatters, Classics
Tough Reading!
I hate trees: great big fat post-WW2 novels
So you'd like to... be a dry pondorous intellectual
Amazon Statistically Improbable Phrases from Infinite Jest:
say her momma, entertainment cartridges, dawn drills, waste displacement, annular fusion, professional conversationalist, feral hamsters, new bong, ceiling bulged, red leather coat, appropriation artist, red beanie, addicted man, littler kids, little rotter, land barge, veiled girl, technical interview, police lock, oral narcotics, milk dispenser, goddamn lie, sober time, his racquet
Other handy links:
Infinite Jest Utilities Page, for accurate footnote navigation.
Infinite Jest Glossary, because DFW is a serious OED man.
Collection of DFW Interviews and Reviews
I had never heard of Infinite Jest, until I picked it up by chance at the airport on my way to Vietnam. In fact I was only passingly aware of its author David Foster Wallace. However it turns out that it's a former 90's literary sensation. It's renowned for its length (1088 pages in my edition), its slightly nerdy clever-cleverness (over 100 pages of footnotes, some with their own footnotes), and its "anti-confluential" structure, in which the major plot strands and characters (almost) fail to intertwine. I'm not going to ruin it by giving anything more away about the plot. I thought it was the best book I've read in 2 or 3 years. I really enjoyed getting stuck into a book for 9 days on the trot; I wouldn't really recommend you tackle it as occasional bedtime reading. For one thing it's too heavy, even in paperback, to comfortably read in bed. If you know me, and you haven't read it, then I'm probably going to give it to you for christmas; that's how impressed I was. Here are some internet gleanings relating to the book, designed to convey my overawedness.Listmania Lists featuring Infinite Jest:
Post-Modern, Turn-Your-Brain-To-Juggled-Tatters, Classics
Tough Reading!
I hate trees: great big fat post-WW2 novels
So you'd like to... be a dry pondorous intellectual
Amazon Statistically Improbable Phrases from Infinite Jest:
say her momma, entertainment cartridges, dawn drills, waste displacement, annular fusion, professional conversationalist, feral hamsters, new bong, ceiling bulged, red leather coat, appropriation artist, red beanie, addicted man, littler kids, little rotter, land barge, veiled girl, technical interview, police lock, oral narcotics, milk dispenser, goddamn lie, sober time, his racquet
Other handy links:
Infinite Jest Utilities Page, for accurate footnote navigation.
Infinite Jest Glossary, because DFW is a serious OED man.
Collection of DFW Interviews and Reviews
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