i should go read up on this more. a lot was written about his archives and I didn't check any of that stuff out carefully enough
― markers, Tuesday, 27 July 2010 19:13 (thirteen years ago) link
To be fair though, when you submit an undergraduate thesis chances are you're not thinking about whether opportunistic publishers are going to cash in on it after you become really famous.
― There's Money To Be Made in Ice Cream (EDB), Tuesday, 27 July 2010 19:20 (thirteen years ago) link
oh I didn't know it was an undergrad thesis, that's p fucked up
― puff puff post (uh oh I'm having a fantasy), Tuesday, 27 July 2010 19:22 (thirteen years ago) link
the thought of anybody reading my undergrad thesis has me literally sweating...it was such a mailed in piece of shit from a burnout
like there are times when I fantasize about offering to redo the whole thing to my prof, just to clear the whole thing from my conscience
― You’re going off of her word that the farmer’s wife is the farmer’s wife? (dyao), Tuesday, 27 July 2010 19:22 (thirteen years ago) link
― You’re going off of her word that the farmer’s wife is the farmer’s wife? (dyao), Tuesday, July 27, 2010 3:22 PM (52 seconds ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink
hahaha 10000000000000000000000x otm. still afraid to talk to my thesis advisor
― max, Tuesday, 27 July 2010 19:23 (thirteen years ago) link
lol
― markers, Tuesday, 27 July 2010 20:03 (thirteen years ago) link
xpost - I might be talking out of my ass here, but I think there are distinctions between (a) things that are archived and on-record in school libraries, and (b) things that are on-record but sort of sealed unless you become a notable enough figure that there's some public interest in seeing it?
nah dude anyone can go read it and possibly make a copy
http://fcaw.library.umass.edu:8991/F/75L2BX8B7C8748Q255MJ7QXVT4CP5NMS7LB8RU8VSCXL3FMPQD-07357?func=full-set-set&set_number=111224&set_entry=000030&format=999
― Mr. Que, Tuesday, 27 July 2010 21:32 (thirteen years ago) link
what does Item Status Library Use Only mean? just can't check it out?
― markers, Tuesday, 27 July 2010 21:46 (thirteen years ago) link
http://artsbeat.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/09/14/unfinshed-david-foster-wallace-novel-gets-cover-and-release-date/
LETS DO THIS
― markers, Wednesday, 15 September 2010 04:34 (thirteen years ago) link
Little, Brown said it will release “The Pale King” on – when else? – April 15.
― markers, Wednesday, 15 September 2010 04:35 (thirteen years ago) link
started the the Lipsky book last night...OMFG i want to KILL LIPSKY
obv a lot of this is fascinating esp cuz the stuff i was reading was DFW on the eve of Infinite Jest coming out and the book tour, etc...really great stuff but goddamn Lipsky is such a douchebag...everything in brackets in this book should be shot in the head.
worst thing so far:
he makes some aside early on after DFW uses the word "lonely" like "[He uses "lonely" a lot]
then later after the word comes up again (for only like the 2nd time), he brackets:
[the word lonely, again; interesting]
OH REALLY SIGMUND FUCKING FREUD...I CAN JUST SEE YOU STROKING YR BEARD AND GAZING DOWN AT YOUR NOTEPAD...WHY HOW FASCINATING THAT THE GREAT WRITER WHO BATTLED WITH DEPRESSION AND EVENTUALLY KILLED HIMSELF USED THE WORD LONELY, HOW FUCKING REVEALING....THANKS FOR POINTING THAT OUT...FUCK YOU.
― skreet walking cheeduh widda head fulla facepalm (upper mississippi sh@kedown), Tuesday, 9 November 2010 18:04 (thirteen years ago) link
(still it's way worth it just for the dfw freestyling thoughts stuff)
― skreet walking cheeduh widda head fulla facepalm (upper mississippi sh@kedown), Tuesday, 9 November 2010 18:05 (thirteen years ago) link
the lipsky stuff gets worse.
― bows don't kill people, arrows do (Jordan), Tuesday, 9 November 2010 18:06 (thirteen years ago) link
yeah, i set this aside due to cares earlier this summer, but the lipsky stuff was really, really, really grating.
― BIG MUFFIN (gbx), Tuesday, 9 November 2010 18:07 (thirteen years ago) link
(just finished this last night btw)
― bows don't kill people, arrows do (Jordan), Tuesday, 9 November 2010 18:08 (thirteen years ago) link
he's so bitter & jealous, both in '96 and now that he's aware that people are only reading his book for DFW, not for him.
― bows don't kill people, arrows do (Jordan), Tuesday, 9 November 2010 18:11 (thirteen years ago) link
couldn't even finish the lipsky book
― HOOS tremendo...steen ridically (BIG HOOS aka the steendriver), Tuesday, 9 November 2010 18:12 (thirteen years ago) link
http://www.newsweek.com/2010/11/19/david-foster-wallace-s-personal-files.html
― dick roach (schlump), Sunday, 28 November 2010 11:39 (thirteen years ago) link
I read Consider the Lobster earlier this year and it was pretty solid... kinda feel like i should give his fiction another shot, maybe short stories just aren't my thing... but whenever I read a description of IJ my eyelids slam shut
― http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ipr-wS5iBv0 (Princess TamTam), Sunday, 28 November 2010 15:14 (thirteen years ago) link
He's a great writer of prose, imo, a great, great stylist. Also obviously a great, great human being. I'm not saying anything new here obviously
― jeevves, Monday, 29 November 2010 08:55 (thirteen years ago) link
http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b00y6ggl
― schlump, Sunday, 6 February 2011 12:33 (thirteen years ago) link
In April The Pale King, Wallace's final, unfinished novel will be published. Few literary novels have been more eagerly anticipated in recent years. Its great subject is Boredom.
heh its about a guy reading Oblivion
― My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic (Princess TamTam), Sunday, 6 February 2011 12:39 (thirteen years ago) link
BAM
― max, Sunday, 6 February 2011 14:50 (thirteen years ago) link
did anyone listen to this? was it good?
― just sayin, Tuesday, 8 February 2011 14:55 (thirteen years ago) link
intending to stream and tape it while it's in the archive for a week; was sorta anticipating that fervid wallace fans would rip it and save me the trouble. i will report back
― schlump, Tuesday, 8 February 2011 14:59 (thirteen years ago) link
yea worth listening to imo
― johnny crunch, Tuesday, 8 February 2011 15:43 (thirteen years ago) link
This is excellent - really enjoying it - thanks for sharing ....
― BlackIronPrison, Tuesday, 8 February 2011 16:53 (thirteen years ago) link
just started re-reading Infinite Jest...goddamn the first 100 page are epic. a lot funnier than i remember too
kinda weird though, i don't think i had ever read pynchon when i read IJ the first time, didn't realize what a debt DFW owed him
― pajamagram sam (upper mississippi sh@kedown), Tuesday, 8 February 2011 17:43 (thirteen years ago) link
heh, i'd JUST read pynchon (for the first time) when i first read it, and the second time i was surprised how un-pynchonesque it was
― thomp, Tuesday, 8 February 2011 17:44 (thirteen years ago) link
i am a fan of this guy. i don't like his short stories very much because they're usually about his less valid preoccupations (How Can We Make Art Now That We Know About Sarcasm? seemed to be a big one) but his essays are wonderful and infinite jest is utterly overwhelming and gorgeous and i don't even care how much of an obvious stoner that makes me. so thanks for this!
― difficult listening hour, Tuesday, 8 February 2011 17:49 (thirteen years ago) link
I think this radio thing makes him sound kind of doofy -- "Tennis was a constant in the life and art of David Foster Wallace" -- oyy. So does 'How Can We Make Art,' etc., which is a caricature, although one with something in it, sure.
― thomp, Tuesday, 8 February 2011 17:59 (thirteen years ago) link
oh yeah it is a total caricature. i mean, i read "octet" with interest and pleasure and i don't think it's a good story but i don't mean to write it off. i just think that some of the chains he tries to escape with short stories like that aren't actually there.
― difficult listening hour, Tuesday, 8 February 2011 18:03 (thirteen years ago) link
kinda want to get infinite jest for my kindle due to huegness but i think the endnote thing would be even more annoying?
― ullr saves (gbx), Tuesday, 8 February 2011 22:48 (thirteen years ago) link
Probably yeah.
It is perhaps my favourite novel written in english tho so read it.
― À la recherche du temps Pardew (jim in glasgow), Tuesday, 8 February 2011 22:51 (thirteen years ago) link
i would have thought it would be easier? like you could just click on the link + go straight to the note rather than having 2 bookmarks like w/ a normal copy
― just sayin, Tuesday, 8 February 2011 22:56 (thirteen years ago) link
yeah i figured that, too? footnotes would suck, but endnotes seem manageable
― ullr saves (gbx), Tuesday, 8 February 2011 22:57 (thirteen years ago) link
Would endnote to page 457 or whatevs be easy enough (i don't own any sort if reader)?
― À la recherche du temps Pardew (jim in glasgow), Tuesday, 8 February 2011 23:04 (thirteen years ago) link
it would be cool if the footnotes just popped up in a new window over the text...
reading my old paperback from the 90s with the blue sky cover...always have to keep 2 bookmarks going but it's not too bad
― pajamagram sam (upper mississippi sh@kedown), Tuesday, 8 February 2011 23:14 (thirteen years ago) link
it would almost be worth reading it on a kindle just to increase the text size, esp for the long endnotes
(i'm assuming this is the sort of thing you can do on a kindle)
― bows don't kill people, arrows do (Jordan), Tuesday, 8 February 2011 23:17 (thirteen years ago) link
i could deal with the text size of the end notes, but the lines were so long at that size. reading paragraphs in the endnotes was hard work, kept losing my line.
― caek, Tuesday, 8 February 2011 23:22 (thirteen years ago) link
I am going to read through some of the handwritten drafts of IJ in the Ransom Center archive at UT-Austin next month. Awed, grateful, etc.
― Control Z, Wednesday, 9 February 2011 08:32 (thirteen years ago) link
IJ not available for kindle as far as I can see :/
― Stevie T, Wednesday, 9 February 2011 08:36 (thirteen years ago) link
http://www.amazon.com/Infinite-Jest-ebook/dp/B000S1M9LY
― just sayin, Wednesday, 9 February 2011 08:42 (thirteen years ago) link
Hmmm, doesn't come up in my search results, even if search .com rather than .co.uk
― Stevie T, Wednesday, 9 February 2011 08:48 (thirteen years ago) link
are you working on wallace, ctrl-z?
― difficult listening hour, Tuesday, 8 February 2011 18:03 (Yesterday) Bookmark
yeah i don't know — I first read that at fifteen and it made a huuuuuuuuuuuge impression on me, because at fifteen I spent a lot of time struggling with similar what-is-the-use-of-irony questions? And I read that collection again a few months later and it didn't make such an impression, and I read it again last year and it was one of the pieces I enjoyed least. So there's that. I mean, it helped me because I came across it at a time I needed to read it, so I feel charitable to it for that reason: that there will be people who need to read it, and that I imagine he needed to write it, to.
― thomp, Wednesday, 9 February 2011 10:42 (thirteen years ago) link
Also between my two readings of it a few months apart 'The Depressed Person' had morphed from 'mostly horrifying' to 'mostly hilarious', or possibly the other way around.
― thomp, Wednesday, 9 February 2011 10:43 (thirteen years ago) link
I was looking at IJ yesterday and thinking, I should probably read this, at last.
But then I see Gareth, of all people, at the top of this thread, saying the book doesn't go anywhere and DFW is 2d. Possibly this is reassuring.
― the pinefox, Wednesday, 9 February 2011 11:39 (thirteen years ago) link
Gareth is wrong on both of those points.
― Matt DC, Wednesday, 9 February 2011 11:42 (thirteen years ago) link
I mean you could only say it "doesn't go anywhere" if you're unfamiliar with the concept of a story beginning at the end, but it covers a pretty vast amount of ground in between. I don't think it's two-dimensional either, all the main characters are well drawn, he clearly has a lot of sympathy for some of them, his portrayals of depression and addiction are excellent.
That said, I'm not sure you'd like Infinite Jest.
― Matt DC, Wednesday, 9 February 2011 11:44 (thirteen years ago) link
clicky if you can't navigate the BBC site
― zappi, Wednesday, 9 February 2011 19:48 (thirteen years ago) link