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Trying to Review the Lipsky/Wallace Book
Although Of Course You End Up Becoming Yourself: A Road Trip with David Foster Wallace
by David Lipsky (Available now from Broadway Books)
I’m trying to write a full review of this book right now, but it’s proving difficult.
First, I must admit that unlike many of my literary colleagues, I am not and never have been a fan of DFW’s writing, so my reading of this text is biased accordingly. I actually only requested a copy of this book for review because so many people I respect recommended it, and because I figured that perhaps by reading it I might be seduced into reconsidering my position.
Unfortunately, it didn’t really change my opinion or offer any compelling reason to reconsider Wallace’s work. (Except for maybe Broom of the System, which Wallace seems to have come to dislike because of the heavy theoretical influence, which is actually the reason I think I would probably like it).
Going back to this thing about me not being a fan, I think that’s really important. If, for instance, someone were to come out with a posthumous book-length interview transcription with Alain Robbe-Grillet or Gilles Deleuze, I would savor every line in much the same way I sense others savor these lines. But for a reader who isn’t already in love with DFW, the book isn’t that appealing. I found it uninterestingly repetitive, and I got an uneasy “someone trying to capitalize on the death of a famous person” feeling from it. I mean there are these parts where DFW asks Lipsky not to include something in the interview and there it is on the page, which sort of feels icky – but at the same time it works to give us a more well-rounded picture of DFW – but then again, dude was a real dude, not a “well-rounded character.”
Also, it made me feel really, really bad for DFW. It made him seem so sad, so lonely. Here’s a couple lines that, for me, characterize the overarching sentiment of the book, this is DFW speaking:
That story at the end of [Girl With Curios Hair], which not a lot of people like, was really meant to be extremely sad. And to sort of be a kind of suicide note. And I think by the time I got to the end of that story, I figured I wasn’t going to write anymore. (61)
I just don’t know about this book.
Have you read it? What did you think?
Tags: david foster wallace, david lipsky
I have not read ‘Although of Course’ yet, but I encourage you to read ‘The Broom of the System’. It is incredible, and yes, it has a lot of theory and philosophy in it.
It is a tiring book, in ways. I mean, believe me, as a big DFW fan I lapped the whole thing up, but there are only so many ways you can ask “So, isn’t it great to be you?—to be this famous?”
While it’s by no means compulsory to like Wallace in order to have credibility concerning your literary tastes and acumen, I always find it curious when people say that they don’t like Wallace. What is it you don’t like, exactly? That he could write on a multitude of topics in a multitude of voices while stretching and wearing out the possibilities of the English language? Is that what bothers you? His ambition? That he was funny, humane and sometimes touching? I mean, if the subject matter just doesn’t interest you, fine, but what was it about him as writer that makes you say, Not for me?
Lipsky’s book is revenge. A money grab. And a corpse rape. The worst thing Lipsky could have done, which is make sure that the book was as much about Lipsky as it was Wallace, is exactly what he did. Lipsky is a mental midget next to Wallace, and every editorial insertion is just more evidence as to why Lipsky never really made it as a novelist.
Ouch! Lipsky contributes to the wallace-l listserv, and I really think he’s a genuinely sweet guy. I think he did his best to leave himself out of the book while still making it semi-coherent.
I mean, making it -really- about him might have involved making into a memoirish travelogue thing. “My crazy road trip with a raving genius.” Instead he just transcribed the whole interview.
And I can understand not liking Wallace. His command of the multiple topics he wrote about—while still fairly advanced—is generally overestimated. And in his fiction he’s not always the best with characterization.
Mr. Higgs,
I think a good review would probably point out just what you’re saying: it’s a book written primarily for his fans. Those unfamiliar with his work would be better off reading some of his books before considering Although Of Course. Those would simply aren’t that interested in his work. . . well, I’m not sure there’d be much in it for them.
Also, setting aside his career as a novelist (which I know nothing about), Lipsky has been pretty successful as a journalist. He received a National Magazine Award for the piece on DFW that he wrote last year. (And IMO it truly was a terrific piece of journalism—only magazine I’ve ever held on to as if it were a book.)
Dude’s not exactly chopped liver.
“His command of the multiple topics he wrote about—while still fairly advanced—is generally overestimated.”
Please expand on this. On what subjects was his comprehension remedial? Math? Philosophy? Logic? Tennis? Grammar? Addiction? Depression?
I don’t know if I’d call it “remedial,” but people smarter than I have explained his flubs in math, grammar, and philosophy/lit-theory. Again, he was still a fairly knowledgeable guy, just not the Authority he oftentimes made himself out to be. And he fudged facts in several of his nonfiction essays.
I think this is the thing that’s made it hardest for me to approach his fiction fairly. That and the intense love several people (yourself included) for whom I have much respect feel for him. On the one hand I find his attempts at mastering the universe a little annoying (and at the same time sympathetic: I’d like to do the same thing, I’m just not nearly smart enough) and then on the other hand he’s got too much to live up to.
So, basically, Wallace just wasn’t as smart as your friends, and, by proxy, you, although he pretended to be. Okay. Sounds like a good reason not to like a writer. Carry on.
Who are you talking to here? No one here has said anything like that. Demi loves Wallace. I’m more ambivalent, but, yeah.
I made it through about 3/4 of INFINITE JEST when I first read it last year. Although I do plan on giving it another try (at some point in the near future, I promise!) I am excited to read ‘Although…’ because I am very much intrigued by DFW’s thoughts and wish to delve more into those, especially as they presented here in a more condensed format :p
Haha, yeah. To be a true Renaissance Man is impossible today, but I think DFW gave it as good a go as can be made. And supposedly he actually made semi-groundbreaking (?) work with his philosophy thesis as an undergrad, so maybe he was something of a true polymath.
what people don’t seem to understand is that a lot of the time david was poking fun at the way readers sort of fall to the default of believability in specialized information if said information is delivered with enough of an authorial tone. like in IJ for instance. he’s thumping you w/ big bits of information that are an amalgam of half-truths, completely made up shit, whole truths, and other, but if it sounds legit enough, readers put full faith in it. it’s obvious that the made-up tech jargon is completely of his imagination, so why wouldn’t you believe others are? i mean, it’s fiction right? no one person could know that much about such a wide array of topics, and david in interviews himself admitted that he was really good at fudging enough to make things sound legit on face value. it’s like when someone stands up in a room and announces some arbitrary factoid to back up a statement. if he or she has enough steely-eyed determination behind it, people usually roll with it.
wow. speaking of grammatical messes. just woke from a nap. hope that made sense.
No, Wallace was definitely smarter than me, and probably smarter than anyone I know. And the people I’m referring to are not my friends. I would love to refer you to specific links, but the essays and articles I’m thinking of I have read over the course of several years over at Wallace-L, and its archives are a freaking pain in the ass to search. (And I have not saved or bookmarked them.)
One mathematician on Wallace-L wrote up a thorough explanation of Wallace’s math flubs in both IJ and Everything and More. His grammarians has been contested frequently by the linguistician (ie prof of linguistics) that goes by languagehat, as well as many of those who congregate in the general webspace surrounding Language Log. (Plus, some of the grammar stuff he prescribes can be debunked on your own: he holds tight to some fairly arbitrary rules.) And someone on Wallace-L who’s conversant in Theory has claimed his Hix article was fairly fudgy on some of the nuances of lit theory.
Aside from that, he made up people he never knew in his Tennis/Mathematics essay, was guilty of “secondhand plagiarism” in the Language essay (he didn’t cite a source he discovered a source within), relayed a fictional anecdote in the Porn essay, and generally flirted with the standards of truth in nonfiction on several occasions.
Of course, I’m forgiving toward him on many, many of these issues, and on the grammar stuff I frequently disagree with his detractors. I think he’s a terrific author, and his better stuff has a fair shot at becoming a permanent part of our literary heritage. Seriously, I think this guy is the bomb. I’m not trying to hate on him.
his grammarianism*
This is very true, and IMO this toying w/ specialized language is one of the more appealing aspects of IJ. A remarkable amount of the time he is dead-on, but there are some totally deliberate screwballs thrown in there.
I have not read ‘Although of Course’ yet, but I encourage you to read ‘The Broom of the System’. It is incredible, and yes, it has a lot of theory and philosophy in it.
Might as well say that I think much of the intense love his fans have for him stems from the fact that he was an absolutely top-notch tragedian. Certain parts of his best fiction just fucking HURT. He was pretty enamored with Dostoyevsky from like the start of the 90’s onward, and I think old Fyodor’s aptness for uncanny tragedy and sorrow definitely rubbed off on DFW.
Also, he was pretty damned wise. (Not all tragedy writers are wise—I’m not certain that Dostoyevsky was wise.) There are parts of IJ that will never leave me, whether because of their sheer sadness, or their pragmatic how-to-carry-on-with-life kind of wisdom.
I have no idea if that makes it easier to approach him, but it’s at least a context for my appreciation. I still believe that his better moments are worth sifting through the sometimes lame gags, as well as the master-the-world stuff.
linguistician? linguist?
Thanks!! I knew the right term was just barely escaping me. . . . in my head I felt like the word for the vocation must be something affixed to ‘linguistics.’ Didn’t think to drop the suffix. . . I blank on this stuff sometimes. I used to be much better at grammar and spelling, but since I’ve been taking meds for depression I, for whatever reason, have a really really hard time reasoning a lot of this stuff out. Sometimes I make so many idiom errors that it’s like I came to English as a second language.
It is a tiring book, in ways. I mean, believe me, as a big DFW fan I lapped the whole thing up, but there are only so many ways you can ask “So, isn’t it great to be you?—to be this famous?”
While it’s by no means compulsory to like Wallace in order to have credibility concerning your literary tastes and acumen, I always find it curious when people say that they don’t like Wallace. What is it you don’t like, exactly? That he could write on a multitude of topics in a multitude of voices while stretching and wearing out the possibilities of the English language? Is that what bothers you? His ambition? That he was funny, humane and sometimes touching? I mean, if the subject matter just doesn’t interest you, fine, but what was it about him as writer that makes you say, Not for me?
Lipsky’s book is revenge. A money grab. And a corpse rape. The worst thing Lipsky could have done, which is make sure that the book was as much about Lipsky as it was Wallace, is exactly what he did. Lipsky is a mental midget next to Wallace, and every editorial insertion is just more evidence as to why Lipsky never really made it as a novelist.
Ouch! Lipsky contributes to the wallace-l listserv, and I really think he’s a genuinely sweet guy. I think he did his best to leave himself out of the book while still making it semi-coherent.
I mean, making it -really- about him might have involved making into a memoirish travelogue thing. “My crazy road trip with a raving genius.” Instead he just transcribed the whole interview.
And I can understand not liking Wallace. His command of the multiple topics he wrote about—while still fairly advanced—is generally overestimated. And in his fiction he’s not always the best with characterization.
Mr. Higgs,
I think a good review would probably point out just what you’re saying: it’s a book written primarily for his fans. Those unfamiliar with his work would be better off reading some of his books before considering Although Of Course. Those would simply aren’t that interested in his work. . . well, I’m not sure there’d be much in it for them.
Also, setting aside his career as a novelist (which I know nothing about), Lipsky has been pretty successful as a journalist. He received a National Magazine Award for the piece on DFW that he wrote last year. (And IMO it truly was a terrific piece of journalism—only magazine I’ve ever held on to as if it were a book.)
Dude’s not exactly chopped liver.
“His command of the multiple topics he wrote about—while still fairly advanced—is generally overestimated.”
Please expand on this. On what subjects was his comprehension remedial? Math? Philosophy? Logic? Tennis? Grammar? Addiction? Depression?
I don’t know if I’d call it “remedial,” but people smarter than I have explained his flubs in math, grammar, and philosophy/lit-theory. Again, he was still a fairly knowledgeable guy, just not the Authority he oftentimes made himself out to be. And he fudged facts in several of his nonfiction essays.
I think this is the thing that’s made it hardest for me to approach his fiction fairly. That and the intense love several people (yourself included) for whom I have much respect feel for him. On the one hand I find his attempts at mastering the universe a little annoying (and at the same time sympathetic: I’d like to do the same thing, I’m just not nearly smart enough) and then on the other hand he’s got too much to live up to.
So, basically, Wallace just wasn’t as smart as your friends, and, by proxy, you, although he pretended to be. Okay. Sounds like a good reason not to like a writer. Carry on.
Who are you talking to here? No one here has said anything like that. Demi loves Wallace. I’m more ambivalent, but, yeah.
I made it through about 3/4 of INFINITE JEST when I first read it last year. Although I do plan on giving it another try (at some point in the near future, I promise!) I am excited to read ‘Although…’ because I am very much intrigued by DFW’s thoughts and wish to delve more into those, especially as they presented here in a more condensed format :p
Haha, yeah. To be a true Renaissance Man is impossible today, but I think DFW gave it as good a go as can be made. And supposedly he actually made semi-groundbreaking (?) work with his philosophy thesis as an undergrad, so maybe he was something of a true polymath.
what people don’t seem to understand is that a lot of the time david was poking fun at the way readers sort of fall to the default of believability in specialized information if said information is delivered with enough of an authorial tone. like in IJ for instance. he’s thumping you w/ big bits of information that are an amalgam of half-truths, completely made up shit, whole truths, and other, but if it sounds legit enough, readers put full faith in it. it’s obvious that the made-up tech jargon is completely of his imagination, so why wouldn’t you believe others are? i mean, it’s fiction right? no one person could know that much about such a wide array of topics, and david in interviews himself admitted that he was really good at fudging enough to make things sound legit on face value. it’s like when someone stands up in a room and announces some arbitrary factoid to back up a statement. if he or she has enough steely-eyed determination behind it, people usually roll with it.
wow. speaking of grammatical messes. just woke from a nap. hope that made sense.
No, Wallace was definitely smarter than me, and probably smarter than anyone I know. And the people I’m referring to are not my friends. I would love to refer you to specific links, but the essays and articles I’m thinking of I have read over the course of several years over at Wallace-L, and its archives are a freaking pain in the ass to search. (And I have not saved or bookmarked them.)
One mathematician on Wallace-L wrote up a thorough explanation of Wallace’s math flubs in both IJ and Everything and More. His grammarians has been contested frequently by the linguistician (ie prof of linguistics) that goes by languagehat, as well as many of those who congregate in the general webspace surrounding Language Log. (Plus, some of the grammar stuff he prescribes can be debunked on your own: he holds tight to some fairly arbitrary rules.) And someone on Wallace-L who’s conversant in Theory has claimed his Hix article was fairly fudgy on some of the nuances of lit theory.
Aside from that, he made up people he never knew in his Tennis/Mathematics essay, was guilty of “secondhand plagiarism” in the Language essay (he didn’t cite a source he discovered a source within), relayed a fictional anecdote in the Porn essay, and generally flirted with the standards of truth in nonfiction on several occasions.
Of course, I’m forgiving toward him on many, many of these issues, and on the grammar stuff I frequently disagree with his detractors. I think he’s a terrific author, and his better stuff has a fair shot at becoming a permanent part of our literary heritage. Seriously, I think this guy is the bomb. I’m not trying to hate on him.
his grammarianism*
This is very true, and IMO this toying w/ specialized language is one of the more appealing aspects of IJ. A remarkable amount of the time he is dead-on, but there are some totally deliberate screwballs thrown in there.
you could’ve fooled me that this “faux authoritative” tone was intentional. there are all these bits in IJ that describe the physical make-up of the nationwide ONATA TP content delivery system that was rife with factual errors w/r/t basic IT jargon.
if these kinds of “errors” (don’t even get me started on the bastardizations of calculus peppered throughout) are intentional, what’s the point of a narrative device like that? to deceive unwitting readers? to work as a trickster third person?
Might as well say that I think much of the intense love his fans have for him stems from the fact that he was an absolutely top-notch tragedian. Certain parts of his best fiction just fucking HURT. He was pretty enamored with Dostoyevsky from like the start of the 90’s onward, and I think old Fyodor’s aptness for uncanny tragedy and sorrow definitely rubbed off on DFW.
Also, he was pretty damned wise. (Not all tragedy writers are wise—I’m not certain that Dostoyevsky was wise.) There are parts of IJ that will never leave me, whether because of their sheer sadness, or their pragmatic how-to-carry-on-with-life kind of wisdom.
I have no idea if that makes it easier to approach him, but it’s at least a context for my appreciation. I still believe that his better moments are worth sifting through the sometimes lame gags, as well as the master-the-world stuff.
linguistician? linguist?
Thanks!! I knew the right term was just barely escaping me. . . . in my head I felt like the word for the vocation must be something affixed to ‘linguistics.’ Didn’t think to drop the suffix. . . I blank on this stuff sometimes. I used to be much better at grammar and spelling, but since I’ve been taking meds for depression I, for whatever reason, have a really really hard time reasoning a lot of this stuff out. Sometimes I make so many idiom errors that it’s like I came to English as a second language.
i just finished my review of the book today. i procrastinated on the review for so fucking long because i love DFW too much and care too much about what other DFW fans think. i smoked a bowl just to calm the fuck down and not doubt myself to pieces. also, the book wasn’t very good. lipsky was (and is) a tool, and he made DFW incredibly nervous and incredibly bored with pedestrian questions. but DFW still offers up some brilliant, and sad, answers. reading what he has to say about writing makes me excited to write.
as john d’agata said: essay etymologically stems from attempt and has no allegiances to ‘truth.’ let’s not even go down that slippery slope, but do you know how many non-fiction books use aggregate characters or futz with timelines? a fucking lot. look at the copyright page (don’t know the real term) and there’ll be a little caveat in the form of small print. it’s common practice in feature writing. hard news is where it’s frowned upon. again, dfw himself said that in his essays he was often working behind a schmuckier, stupider persona.
@zuysa, how could it have “fooled you” when he’s talking about an alternate reality w/r/t technology that doesn’t exist. why is it a fictional technique? read what i just wrote. the book’s as much about dissemination of information as it is addiction, loneliness, etc.
Sure. I (as a fan) am forgiving toward much of this. However, I can understand how some wouldn’t be; after all, the pieces ran in magazines before they were in a book, and in the mags they were sold as ostensible journalism. Also, DFW routinely never informed his editors about the fictional fudging of some of his essays, which isn’t the most honest thing in the world. . . .
And this still doesn’t cover his goof in the Language essay, where his failure to cit the secondhand source makes him look pretty foolish because, as it turns out, the secondhand source itself cited the passage incorrectly, and therefore (If I recall) DFW claimed to have used an impossible source.
His essays were frequently factually sloppy. Even giving him the fan’s benefit of the doubt, there’s really no way around that fact.
The calc flubs are pretty definitely intentional. DFW’s understanding of mathematics was advanced enough that even he wouldn’t make such basic mistakes. Also, the French in IJ consistently makes no fucking sense at all. “Notre rai pays” or whatever is total gibberish. There’s no real consensus on why he did this, but the entire book is relayed by a fairly unreliable third-person narrator (thus all the “her eyes were either blue or dark brown” kind of stuff), so maybe it’s something going on there. . . .
i just finished my review of the book today. i procrastinated on the review for so fucking long because i love DFW too much and care too much about what other DFW fans think. i smoked a bowl just to calm the fuck down and not doubt myself to pieces. also, the book wasn’t very good. lipsky was (and is) a tool, and he made DFW incredibly nervous and incredibly bored with pedestrian questions. but DFW still offers up some brilliant, and sad, answers. reading what he has to say about writing makes me excited to write.
as john d’agata said: essay etymologically stems from attempt and has no allegiances to ‘truth.’ let’s not even go down that slippery slope, but do you know how many non-fiction books use aggregate characters or futz with timelines? a fucking lot. look at the copyright page (don’t know the real term) and there’ll be a little caveat in the form of small print. it’s common practice in feature writing. hard news is where it’s frowned upon. again, dfw himself said that in his essays he was often working behind a schmuckier, stupider persona.
@zuysa, how could it have “fooled you” when he’s talking about an alternate reality w/r/t technology that doesn’t exist. why is it a fictional technique? read what i just wrote. the book’s as much about dissemination of information as it is addiction, loneliness, etc.
Sure. I (as a fan) am forgiving toward much of this. However, I can understand how some wouldn’t be; after all, the pieces ran in magazines before they were in a book, and in the mags they were sold as ostensible journalism. Also, DFW routinely never informed his editors about the fictional fudging of some of his essays, which isn’t the most honest thing in the world. . . .
And this still doesn’t cover his goof in the Language essay, where his failure to cit the secondhand source makes him look pretty foolish because, as it turns out, the secondhand source itself cited the passage incorrectly, and therefore (If I recall) DFW claimed to have used an impossible source.
His essays were frequently factually sloppy. Even giving him the fan’s benefit of the doubt, there’s really no way around that fact.
The calc flubs are pretty definitely intentional. DFW’s understanding of mathematics was advanced enough that even he wouldn’t make such basic mistakes. Also, the French in IJ consistently makes no fucking sense at all. “Notre rai pays” or whatever is total gibberish. There’s no real consensus on why he did this, but the entire book is relayed by a fairly unreliable third-person narrator (thus all the “her eyes were either blue or dark brown” kind of stuff), so maybe it’s something going on there. . . .
For what it’s worth, Aaron, I completely agree with you. Every Wallace-detractor I’ve ever met either hadn’t read his books, or they’d tried to and had some weird aversive reaction they could never explain convincingly.
i’m a lurker here but i wanna address this bit about questioning DFW’s grammar chops.
first, i have no opinion on DFW’s writing. read two or three stories in GWCH a long time ago and remember thinking they were good, but they didn’t make a huge impression on me.
i went to illinois state university when DFW was there and had him for two undergrad classes over the course of a year. this was 10 or 11 years ago. one of those courses was called Grammar for Writers. DFW kind of took a shine to me for whatever reason–gave me a copy (outside of class) of age of wire and string, gave me encouraging advice (what he called “sally jessy raphael advice,” actually) about my writing, etc. i literally spent hours and hours talking about grammar with the guy.
i’ve now been a pro copyeditor for eight years. i’ve met dozens, maybe hundreds of people whose job it is to work closely with language and style, real nuts-and-bolts stuff. this includes authors of grammar books (ie, supposed Authorities). and i’m not sure i’ve yet met anyone who rivals DFW’s knowledge and understanding of the mechanics of english.
now wallace was a prescriptivist, so peeps at places like language hat and language log would inherently have a problem with his view of the language; linguists are almost unavoidably descriptivists. but DFW understood keenly the descriptivist view and certainly could have engaged them in depth on whatever objections they had to his prescriptions. if questioned on those arbitrary rules you talked about, he’d offer a persuasive defense of them, and he’d give legitimate consideration to anyone’s objections to those rules (while probably having already considered those potential objections on his own). some of the hardass positions he held can be questioned, no doubt, but i promise you he was aware of it when that was the case and had given plenty of thought to the issue. in short, DFW’s grasp of grammar was absolutely, inarguably of an authoritative caliber and was not lacking in any way. had he merely wanted to be considered a Grammar Authority, he’d have had zero trouble building his career around that.
@gene earlier you said: ‘david was poking fun at the way readers sort of fall to the default of believability in specialized information if said information is delivered with enough of an authorial tone’
i replied: ‘you could’ve fooled me that this “faux authoritative” tone was intentional. … what’s the point of a narrative device like that? to deceive unwitting readers? to work as a trickster third person?’
you replied: ‘how could it have “fooled you” when he’s talking about an alternate reality w/r/t technology that doesn’t exist. why is it a fictional technique? read what i just wrote. the book’s as much about dissemination of information as it is addiction, loneliness, etc.’
i was “fooled” in the sense that after i realized he was playing loose with jargon to make himself sound authoritative (i don’t feel like i can say “narrator” because the story is essentially told via his own voice) i started to question just about everything he was telling me in the text. there’s some seriously great fiction scenes throughout IJ but…
my biggest beef with it has always been that just isn’t properly edited. entire essays could be written about what’s wrong with that book (as i’m sure has been done) and i agree that it’s about dissemination of info, addiction, loneliness (and more), but the book is “written” in a way that is flatly impenetrable to the average reader.
technique aside, i’ve always kind of thought that when one of the nobel lit committee members said that american writers were too ‘insular’ to be relevant to world literature, that he was talking about writers like DFW. ones that seem to write for themselves at not the world at large.
there’s a whole essay in that as well (“To Thine Self Write Through: Ego vs. Society in Novel Narrative Structures”) but i’ll end by saying i really liked DFW’s essay on mccain.
thanks, Vic
i liked it, brett.
where is/will be your review, lorian? do u have a blog?
@zusya DFW stated many times that he was writing with the intent to engage readers, albeit with their active participation. so i don’t think one could say that he intended in any way to write for himself. while IJ has lots of American signifiers and feels very American, whatever that means, it has been translated and celebrated all over the world (it recently made a big splash in Germany).
I think IJ’s length, density, scope, cast of characters, complicated plot, etc. could be considered “somewhat to quite difficult” for the average reader, but the text itself, how it’s written, from line to line, is not, on average, at all what I would call “flatly impenetrable to the average reader.” I feel like there is frequently a “brain voice” (this is a character/author thinking in their head) or a “conversational voice” that “drifts” in and out of the tone or style of the writing, and that keeps the writing strangely accessible, however complicated the section.
re: the insularity of U.S. Writers according to the Nobel committee: my understanding is that the insularity they refer to has to do with “responding to World Literature,” that is, “engaging in a dialogue, advancing the form of literature, via one’s writing, showing an awareness of the literary advancements, ‘dialogues’ going on in other countries through various contemporary writers and their works.”
i don’t think they were referring to U.S. writers as making their works too difficult or inaccessible for their readers. on the contrary, i could see “someone” making the opposite claim against contemporary U.S. writers, that their works are, on average, and in general, not very ambitious, don’t challenge their readers, and are generally lazy, boring, tired, misguided, and/or uninspiring.
cool story, but surprising to me. the biggest problem i had with IJ was its readability, which i thought was seriously hampered by a nigh-fanatical adherence to the “correct” way of structuring a sentence.
my favorite tense?: pluperfect subjunctive. just like the sounds of the words. i would have considered myself a grammar authority would i had been having had to study it religiously. ;)
@stephen i wasn’t aware the book had made it to germany, but this made me laugh: http://publishingperspectives.com/?p=8617
Translator Ulrich Blumenbach labored for six years on the 1,552-page tome. During that time, Wallace refused all of Blumenbach’s efforts to communicate with him, and as of Wallace’s September 2008 suicide, the two had never met or spoken. In an August Spiegel interview Blumenbach pondered Wallace’s rebuff: “I believe that he was a reflective, cosmopolitan man, but also very America-centered and insular.”
i’d reply to all your other points but i need to get some sleep. i’m seriously considering writing an essay on IJ when i finish it. it’s made me sad not because of its content but because of what books like it represent about the State of Lit.
and re: “contemporary U.S. writers… on average … in general, not very ambitious, don’t challenge their readers …. generally lazy, boring, tired, misguided, and/or uninspiring.” … man. don’t even get me started on this. i look out my window at night and wonder just who in the hell is even trying anymore.
and then someone gets raped or mugged or murdered or worse on the street down below and i wonder what the hell i even have to be complaining about.
Hi Aaron,
Sorry for the delayed response. I’ll try to address your question…
First, I have to disagree with you about DFW “wearing out the possibilities of the English language” — if he was doing anything close to that, I would certainly be a fan. Gertrude Stein, Ben Marcus, Joyelle McSweeney, Gary Lutz, Blake Butler, Vanessa Place, William Burroughs…these are some writers who are or have approached “wearing out the possibilities of the English language” – writers who, in my opinion, are in a whole other category of artistic excellence that DFW just isn’t part of. From what I’ve read, DFW is a story writer, not a language writer. And I don’t care for stories; I care for language.
I favor literature that treads liminal spaces, explores genre boundaries, pushes linguistic limits, raises ontological and/or epistemological questions, reframes legibility, opens different doors, finds new windows, etc. DFW’s program of writing realism with footnotes doesn’t tickle any of those fields for me.
For what it’s worth, Aaron, I completely agree with you. Every Wallace-detractor I’ve ever met either hadn’t read his books, or they’d tried to and had some weird aversive reaction they could never explain convincingly.
i’m a lurker here but i wanna address this bit about questioning DFW’s grammar chops.
first, i have no opinion on DFW’s writing. read two or three stories in GWCH a long time ago and remember thinking they were good, but they didn’t make a huge impression on me.
i went to illinois state university when DFW was there and had him for two undergrad classes over the course of a year. this was 10 or 11 years ago. one of those courses was called Grammar for Writers. DFW kind of took a shine to me for whatever reason–gave me a copy (outside of class) of age of wire and string, gave me encouraging advice (what he called “sally jessy raphael advice,” actually) about my writing, etc. i literally spent hours and hours talking about grammar with the guy.
i’ve now been a pro copyeditor for eight years. i’ve met dozens, maybe hundreds of people whose job it is to work closely with language and style, real nuts-and-bolts stuff. this includes authors of grammar books (ie, supposed Authorities). and i’m not sure i’ve yet met anyone who rivals DFW’s knowledge and understanding of the mechanics of english.
now wallace was a prescriptivist, so peeps at places like language hat and language log would inherently have a problem with his view of the language; linguists are almost unavoidably descriptivists. but DFW understood keenly the descriptivist view and certainly could have engaged them in depth on whatever objections they had to his prescriptions. if questioned on those arbitrary rules you talked about, he’d offer a persuasive defense of them, and he’d give legitimate consideration to anyone’s objections to those rules (while probably having already considered those potential objections on his own). some of the hardass positions he held can be questioned, no doubt, but i promise you he was aware of it when that was the case and had given plenty of thought to the issue. in short, DFW’s grasp of grammar was absolutely, inarguably of an authoritative caliber and was not lacking in any way. had he merely wanted to be considered a Grammar Authority, he’d have had zero trouble building his career around that.
thanks, Vic
i liked it, brett.
where is/will be your review, lorian? do u have a blog?
@zusya DFW stated many times that he was writing with the intent to engage readers, albeit with their active participation. so i don’t think one could say that he intended in any way to write for himself. while IJ has lots of American signifiers and feels very American, whatever that means, it has been translated and celebrated all over the world (it recently made a big splash in Germany).
I think IJ’s length, density, scope, cast of characters, complicated plot, etc. could be considered “somewhat to quite difficult” for the average reader, but the text itself, how it’s written, from line to line, is not, on average, at all what I would call “flatly impenetrable to the average reader.” I feel like there is frequently a “brain voice” (this is a character/author thinking in their head) or a “conversational voice” that “drifts” in and out of the tone or style of the writing, and that keeps the writing strangely accessible, however complicated the section.
re: the insularity of U.S. Writers according to the Nobel committee: my understanding is that the insularity they refer to has to do with “responding to World Literature,” that is, “engaging in a dialogue, advancing the form of literature, via one’s writing, showing an awareness of the literary advancements, ‘dialogues’ going on in other countries through various contemporary writers and their works.”
i don’t think they were referring to U.S. writers as making their works too difficult or inaccessible for their readers. on the contrary, i could see “someone” making the opposite claim against contemporary U.S. writers, that their works are, on average, and in general, not very ambitious, don’t challenge their readers, and are generally lazy, boring, tired, misguided, and/or uninspiring.
Hi Aaron,
Sorry for the delayed response. I’ll try to address your question…
First, I have to disagree with you about DFW “wearing out the possibilities of the English language” — if he was doing anything close to that, I would certainly be a fan. Gertrude Stein, Ben Marcus, Joyelle McSweeney, Gary Lutz, Blake Butler, Vanessa Place, William Burroughs…these are some writers who are or have approached “wearing out the possibilities of the English language” – writers who, in my opinion, are in a whole other category of artistic excellence that DFW just isn’t part of. From what I’ve read, DFW is a story writer, not a language writer. And I don’t care for stories; I care for language.
I favor literature that treads liminal spaces, explores genre boundaries, pushes linguistic limits, raises ontological and/or epistemological questions, reframes legibility, opens different doors, finds new windows, etc. DFW’s program of writing realism with footnotes doesn’t tickle any of those fields for me.
Wha??? DFW as a story writer, and not a language writer? “Realism with footnotes”? Those are two of the most off-base statements I’ve ever heard about his writing.
Also, how can you not care for stories?
no, realism (especially with footnotes) doesn’t and can’t explore genre boundaries, raise ontological and/or epistemological (to say nothing of metaphysical) questions, nor does it open different windows. in fact, when i think of the term realism, i usually think of really boring domestic stories where nothing is revealed and no doors are opened.
fuck man, there is really great stuff out there under the term “realism” that in fact is not at all “realism.” but we keep calling it that. and this so-called realism keeps getting harassed as the “opposite” of real, innovative, literature that pushes boundaries. and i don’t know, it just seems weird. because i write what i think of as a kind of realism (but i call it and think of it something else entirely) but i don’t necessarily favor it, think it’s better, or think only it can pull off, i don’t know, accurate depictions of a person’s psychology. shit. can we please get over this ridiculous fucking distinction between socalled “realism” and language/real-art-writing? yes, a lot of books in barnes and noble suck dick, but that doesn’t mean all writing that looks remotely like “realism” (dfw in this case) should be called that or thought of as somehow lacking innovation or, jesus diarrhea, pushing linguistic limits. really though, in my opinion, this is a terribly limited view of literature, placing a whole aesthetic above all others. it might be what you like better, but “whole other category of artistic excellence” just sounds silly, man, even if it’s just your opinion. i don’t get the need to quantify and categorize like this.
i’m sorry if i sound like a dick here, but i kind of feel like it’s time to get dickish about this sometimes.
Wha??? DFW as a story writer, and not a language writer? “Realism with footnotes”? Those are two of the most off-base statements I’ve ever heard about his writing.
Also, how can you not care for stories?
no, realism (especially with footnotes) doesn’t and can’t explore genre boundaries, raise ontological and/or epistemological (to say nothing of metaphysical) questions, nor does it open different windows. in fact, when i think of the term realism, i usually think of really boring domestic stories where nothing is revealed and no doors are opened.
fuck man, there is really great stuff out there under the term “realism” that in fact is not at all “realism.” but we keep calling it that. and this so-called realism keeps getting harassed as the “opposite” of real, innovative, literature that pushes boundaries. and i don’t know, it just seems weird. because i write what i think of as a kind of realism (but i call it and think of it something else entirely) but i don’t necessarily favor it, think it’s better, or think only it can pull off, i don’t know, accurate depictions of a person’s psychology. shit. can we please get over this ridiculous fucking distinction between socalled “realism” and language/real-art-writing? yes, a lot of books in barnes and noble suck dick, but that doesn’t mean all writing that looks remotely like “realism” (dfw in this case) should be called that or thought of as somehow lacking innovation or, jesus diarrhea, pushing linguistic limits. really though, in my opinion, this is a terribly limited view of literature, placing a whole aesthetic above all others. it might be what you like better, but “whole other category of artistic excellence” just sounds silly, man, even if it’s just your opinion. i don’t get the need to quantify and categorize like this.
i’m sorry if i sound like a dick here, but i kind of feel like it’s time to get dickish about this sometimes.
i write for bookslut, stephen
i write for bookslut, stephen
thanks, lorian. i will look for that then.
thanks, lorian. i will look for that then.
I’m not a particularly huge fan of Wallace’s work. Haven’t read much of it to be honest. But I found the Lipsky book engrossing. Could it have used some serious line-editing, especially in the gratuitous section towards the end where Lipsky’s asking him what movies he’s into? No doubt. Does Lipsky’s obsessional, envy-reeking return to questions about Wallace’s celebrity status get annoying? Very much so. Although Wallace handles the repetitiousness in a hundred different and compelling ways. But I do think the book catches him at an interesting time in his trajectory as a writer and person. And, aside from the neurotic, though completely understandable caution with which Wallace answers Lipsky’s questions, it’s a bracingly honest book. That tension though, the push-and-pull between slightly annoying interviewer and hyper-sensitive, combative interviewee, was part of the great pleasure of this book. And for all I’ve heard (also reinforced by some of the comments on this post) about Wallace being a big huge intimidating brain, what came across most powerfully for me was the humor, the heart, the extemporaneous imagination and wit, which were, yes, all connected to the brain. Wallace says it best: “One of the things about being a writer is you’re able to give the impression–both in the lines and between the lines–that you know an enormous amount. That you know and have lived intimately all this stuff. Because you want it to have that kind of effect on the nerve endings.”
I’m not a particularly huge fan of Wallace’s work. Haven’t read much of it to be honest. But I found the Lipsky book engrossing. Could it have used some serious line-editing, especially in the gratuitous section towards the end where Lipsky’s asking him what movies he’s into? No doubt. Does Lipsky’s obsessional, envy-reeking return to questions about Wallace’s celebrity status get annoying? Very much so. Although Wallace handles the repetitiousness in a hundred different and compelling ways. But I do think the book catches him at an interesting time in his trajectory as a writer and person. And, aside from the neurotic, though completely understandable caution with which Wallace answers Lipsky’s questions, it’s a bracingly honest book. That tension though, the push-and-pull between slightly annoying interviewer and hyper-sensitive, combative interviewee, was part of the great pleasure of this book. And for all I’ve heard (also reinforced by some of the comments on this post) about Wallace being a big huge intimidating brain, what came across most powerfully for me was the humor, the heart, the extemporaneous imagination and wit, which were, yes, all connected to the brain. Wallace says it best: “One of the things about being a writer is you’re able to give the impression–both in the lines and between the lines–that you know an enormous amount. That you know and have lived intimately all this stuff. Because you want it to have that kind of effect on the nerve endings.”