Comments on: David Foster Wallace, 1962-2008

By: Ed Scripsi

Ed Scripsi — Mon, 15 Sep 2008 17:59:04 +0000

So true. Not many writers can hook a reader while simultaneously making them feel all squirmy and uncomfortable. Other great DFW moments: “Host” in the New Kings of Nonfiction collection, and that piece about TV from A Supposedly Fun Thing I’ll Never Do Again. His style is so personable and gratifying (how the hell he manages to get away with dropping “like” like a valley girl while sustaining these focused academic inquiries–I sometimes got the feeling that he used all that vernacular as if to say look, it’s all right to really, really think about this stuff. But most of all, you really come away from pieces like these, about media and so forth with a new angle on aspects of American life that are so ubiquitous they often go unconsidered. So it goes.

By: Norm De Plume

Norm De Plume — Mon, 15 Sep 2008 16:51:27 +0000

Good point as always, Scripsi. I used “dirty” as synonym for “descriptive of sexual acts and organs” in order to emphasize how amazing it was that this guy listened to and appreciated the rest of the CD. But in doing so I ended up misrepresenting what the article- and by extension, DFW- was really all about.

It’s amazing that Wallace’s nonfiction does all of the things you say, but it still manages to be an immense pleasure to read. And I think one thing that especially makes this loss so terrible and sad is the fact that as far as I can tell he was only getting better.

By: Ed Scripsi

Ed Scripsi — Mon, 15 Sep 2008 15:56:59 +0000

For the record: There is absolutely nothing dirty about the AVN awards essay. I need to mention this because it typifies one of the many aspects of Wallace’s genius. It is a thorough exposition of exactly what the pornography industry does to all involved, from performers to consumers–never gratuitous, and never stooping to titillation or any such nonsense. There, as in “Brief Interviews with Hideous Men”, he stares unswervingly into some seriously, seriously dark stuff and, as in the title piece of Consider the Lobster, written for of all magazines, Gourmet, he asks whether this or that aspect of American Culture, from eating Lobster to pornography, is ethical–always allowing his readers their own conclusions, and taking them outside of their assumptions and indoctrinations. This is a terrible and sad loss.

By: Norm De Plume

Norm De Plume — Mon, 15 Sep 2008 15:40:29 +0000

You’re probably right. And you know the coroner will go on and on about how great it was, even though he stopped reading it after the first 100 pages.

By: Julie

Julie — Mon, 15 Sep 2008 15:27:38 +0000

I was so sad to hear he’d died. His nonfiction is some of my favorite stuff (Consider the Lobster, obviously; A Supposedly Fun Thing I’ll Never Do Again, particularly pertinent after my own nightmare cruise; and don’t forget his own McCain 2000 story). I was looking forward to reading whatever project he had in store next.

For some gallows humor (er..), you know he left a 600 page suicide note with footnotes. You just know it.