So I had ten thoughts for nearly every sentence in “Infinite
Jest” but I’ll see what I can do where to keep it down to just ten total.
1. I don’t understand it. I think I do a bit but not enough.
There is tennis here, and drug abuse, and politics, and movie making, and a
group of cross-dressing spies, and a group of wheelchair-bound Quebecois
assassins, and Boston gangs, and cockroaches, and, and, and, and, and. I guess
I feel the need to get this out of the way: I read this book and understand
(mostly) the story and have a pretty good idea what the point is, but then
maybe not. Part of the story involves a film so compelling that once people
watch even a second of it they are doomed to watch the film over and over until
they die of starvation or something. That may not be to far from how some
people feel about the book. I can see someone spending his or her life trying
to understand this monster of a novel.
2. Everything is so painfully genuine. I never read a David
Foster Wallace book before and was shocked by the utter lack of irony. Pot
addiction, a subject rife with irony and dismissiveness, is held to the same
standard as anything else. I mean, that’s just one silly little example but the
whole thing is so genuine it made me question the way I go about my life. Why
do we rely so much on irony and sarcasm? Why not just be genuine?
I may be overstating it a bit but in this sense this book
changed my life- or at least it gave me the desire to change my life. The book
makes it clear that irony and sarcasm are tools for people to avoid the
genuine- the extensive AA scenes especially. Like so:
“What passes for hip cynical transcendence of sentiment is
really some kind of fear of being really human, since to be really human is
probably to be unavoidably sentimental and naïve and goo-prone and generally
pathetic.”
3. This isn’t like anything I’ve read before. You don’t so
much read “Infinite Jest” as much as explore it. Reading it is like being
dropped in a dark cave and then you just poke around the corners a bit,
discovering a little something here and there before realizing that the cave is
enormous and far more complex than you were ready for. I remember reading a
footnote of a footnote and having several seeming unrelated story threads all
of a sudden come together in a moment of blinding clarity that, at the same
time, added to the complexity of the story. In this way it is the opposite of
those books you turn your brain off to read. Which is, of course, a good thing.
4. The language is amazing. For the first time in a long
time I was constantly going to the dictionary to look up words. According to
“Infinite Jest by the Numbers” Wallace used a vocabulary of 20,584 unique words
to write the 577,608-word novel. Beautiful words like ephebes or semion or
sobriquet. Or fantod. Twain and Hemmingway made some good arguments about
keeping writing simple. Wallace gives a great argument on having a more
in-depth vocabulary. Likewise the sentences were a joy to read simply on a
sensory level. They sounded pretty and fluid. I read some sentences aloud over
and over just because it was a joy to say and hear.
5. I’m convinced that Wallace knew everything, which means
of course he must have studied like a mad man. I’ve come across a story about
Wallace taking an advanced tax law class so he could write his novel “The Pale
King.” Wallace doesn’t just say one character is in AA, he creates a boiling,
ripping world where every aspect of AA culture is studied down to the small
specks of coffee grounds in the cup. Now go back and read point one. Every
different theme and idea has the same depth. Mix that with the beauty and
intelligence of the writing and the compellingness of the story... Man, I wish
more people wrote like that.
6. It makes me want to be better. There is a story told in
the novel:
“This wise old whiskery fish swims up to three young fish
and goes, 'Morning, boys, how's the water?' and swims away; and the three young
fish watch him swim away and look at each other and go, 'What the fuck is
water?' and swim away.”
In the spirit of being totally honest without irony or
self-conscious sarcasm, that blows me away. That simple little joke, when
combined with the rest of the story obviously, has so much insight to the
world. What is water indeed.
That led me to a commencement speech Wallace goes more in
depth to what this story means to him. It’s one of the best speeches I’ve
listened to. Rather than go on about it you should just watch it.The short version is HERE with all sorts of insperational images. The better version with the whole, unedited speech is here
7. “Infinite Jest” is achingly sad. It deals with depression
and substance abuse in complete reality, which is odd because the story is
nearly sci fi at times. Take this quote:
“The so-called ‘psychotically depressed’ person who tries to
kill herself doesn’t do so out of quote ‘hopelessness’ or any abstract
conviction that life’s assets and debits do not square. And surely not because
death seems suddenly appealing. The person in whom Its invisible agony reaches
a certain unendurable level will kill herself the same way a trapped person
will eventually jump from the window of a burning high-rise. Make no mistake
about people who leap from burning windows. Their terror of falling from a
great height is still just as great as it would be for you or me standing
speculatively at the same window just checking out the view; i.e. the fear of
falling remains a constant. The variable here is the other terror, the fire’s
flames: when the flames get close enough, falling to death becomes the slightly
less terrible of two terrors. It’s not desiring the fall; it’s terror of the
flames. And yet nobody down on the sidewalk, looking up and yelling ‘Don’t!’
and ‘Hang on!’, can understand the jump. Not really. You’d have to have
personally been trapped and felt flames to really understand a terror way
beyond falling.”
Or this:
“The truth will set you free. But not until it is finished
with you.”
This all the more tragic looking at Wallace’s life and
death. He hung himself in 2008 after years of dealing with depression.
8. At the same time, “Infinite Jest” has a real message of
hope- but it’s hidden away and only clues pop up. Make no mistake, when you
find those clues and assemble them together you get an amazing picture of what
the story is actually about but it’s below the surface. Like life then, I
guess.
9. The worldbuilding here is wonderful. It’s our world, more
or less, but in a future where the U.S. is in a cold war with Canada and just a
bunch of weird stuff has happened. None of it is spelled out. No clumsy
dialogue given by some character to explain the entire history of this dystopian
world. It comes out naturally like it would. I’ve never had a conversation
where I’ve given an overview of the history of the United States just in case
no one was familiar, but if someone was to hang out with me for a few years
they would get an idea from little bits and pieces I threw in.
10. I’m devastated that it’s over. It just ends, nearly in
mid sentence. Reading this book was, again, like exploring a vast cave full of
wondrous things both beautiful and horrific and I was pulled out of it before I
was through exploring. I nearly threw my iPad (from which I read it) across the
room when it ended. My jaw was agape and my wife asked if I was ok. I went back
and re-read the first chapter and a few things fell into place, but not enough.
I was almost done solving a huge riddle when the floor fell out from under me.
I was left only with the clues available to me and what do
ya know, I was able to construct what I believe is a viable ending. So, yeah, I
have to read it again. I have to. After I’m done with the hundred book
challenge obviously but, yeah.
How odd it that? I read a 1,079 page book and ended up wishing
there was much, much more while at the same time acknowledging it had all the
story it needed.
Coming up: I’m going through “Naked Lunch” and wondering if
I can get 10 points out of that pile. I also started “Slaughterhouse Five” the
other night and am more than halfway done. I feel a sigh of relief because I’m
pretty sure I’m done with the long ones.
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