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I'm starting to get the sense that no one's sure if the new (posthumous, unfinished) David Foster Wallace book is "funny" or not.
I'm starting to get the sense that no one's sure if the new (posthumous, unfinished) David Foster Wallace book is "funny" or not.
I can tell you as a person who has not and will probably never read it I think it's plenty "funny."
I just bought it yesterday, and I'm actually kind of terrified to start it. John Jeremiah Sullivan makes a point about the perils of unfinished-ness in his GQ review, when he says "Every word you read and don't like, you think, 'Well, he would have changed that.' Whereas everything that does work, that's the real Wallace." A big part of Wallace's project was to get us to look and think outside of ourselves, so the idea that the unfinished nature of the book could compel us to retreat into our most comfortable and warm and fuzzy preconceptions of the author is a little unsettling. Although I guess it's useful to be conscious of that from the very start.
Maybe he wasn't sure yet, either.
This is like being unsure if being kicked in the balls is painful or not. I mean, if you laugh it's funny
Please bear in mind there are people (and I use the term loosely) who laugh at Jeff Dunham.
Did they really gather together or was this an IM/web meeting thing?
Getting together seems old. I need time and place when they imply that.
This part-
All: [Laughter]
Sounds like they were in a room or something, or was it really a bunch of lols and hahahas that was combined into All: [Laughter]?
I mean All: [Laughter] is more like a screenplay right? Can you say All: [lols]? I don't think I'll rest until I know.
"Rivka Galchen, Matthew Gallaway, David Gordon, Darin Strauss, Charles Yu, and Deb Olin Unferth read The Pale King simultaneously in the week before its release, and then joined The Daily Beast via phone, from locations across the world, to participate in this virtual roundtable."
From the intro. Copy and pasting seems dickish, but it's not! I just want you to be able to rest!
Not dickish at all. I still don't see that? I really wanted to picture them together in a room but it didn't seem that was the case. For some reason I never considered a phone.
You're too kind, scrolly.
@boy: you couldn't seem dickish if you tried!
I feel like people are always afraid to call their personal Bibles (or other sacred texts) "funny."
I quickly hammered out a few sentences but then suddenly stopped. Why? Because I realized I was laughing. I was laughing at my own words. This is some pretty funny shit, I thought. I tried to write another sentence but burst out laughing before I could even get the period down. I wiped the tears from my eyes and composed myself. A period. Another sentence. More laughter. My sides hurt. I'm killing myself, I thought. Finally, after a long moment of silence, I took a deep breath, wrote one last sentence and clicked print. I took the single page from the printer and gave it a quick read. Yes, I thought, this really is some funny, funny shit. I carefully folded the paper into thirds and slid it into the envelope. Soon, within a matter of days, the MagnaCorp Dynasty Human Resources Dept. would have my resume.
I could barely keep my eyes open. Seventy-four resumes in a row! Former Team Leader at Dante's Village, Summa Cum Laude from the University of Spain, four-time letterman in Races, how can I distinguish one from the other? By what rubric might I separate the wheat from the chaff? I took a long drink of my hot water and stared at the window-washers cleaning the building next door. One of the window-washers appeared to be waving to me, waving me over. Hello, I thought, what's this? I hurried over to the window. The window-washer and the assistant window-washer were pointing frantically at the MagnaCorp Dynasty sign on the side of my building some ten floors beneath me. Was one of its bulbs out? Was it hanging crooked? It looked fine to me. I made a big "shrug" to the window-washer and the assistant window-washer and returned to my resumes, which were now all on the carpet. I lowered myself to carpet and splayed out, a bit like a big infant, and recommenced perusing them, looking for that special one that would fill the position of Team Leader's Mate. I rolled around a little on the floor. This was fun! Oddly enough, I'd never even lain out on my own carpet before, lo though I'd been Human Resource Director's Man for over eleven years. Oopsy, I knocked over a wastebin with a flailing trouser! Hua, I gurgled, hua hua. The resumes flew around the room like white crows! Needless to say, many months later, at the annual Christ's Mate Party, that jerk-off Window-Washer's Assistant wouldn't leave me alone, pushing his finger in my chest, enunciating, in his exaggerated whisky-tones, "We were trynna say, bud, that the sign was UPSIDE DOWN and cuz yer always lookin at it from above, you dint even know the diffrence." I stared right through this impudent buffoon, looking instead at the breasts of a beautiful White Crow's Mate from the third floor – Canthy, I believe her name was – who was gorging herself on the canapes on the other side of the room.
As one of the participants in this "roundtable discush," I can confirm that it took place over the phone so the "lolz" were actually laughter (via speaking on the phone, as ppl still do once in a while circa 2011). With the understanding that convening a group of literary nerds/publicity whores (speaking for myself ONLY, although I have long considered DFW a hero/inspiration, so I feel comfortable saying that I went in with some integrity, the exact amount being debatable/subjective) is not exactly a recipe for a raucous affair. Also the fact that I personally was a bit frazzled because in between waking up at 7:30 (or well, more like 7:48) and the phone call at 9:00 am, the gas meter in my house managed to break (but omg Con Edison miraculously appeared in like twenty minutes?) and one of the cats threw up (repeatedly) among other issues, none of which is very relevant except I will say that if you're a fan of DFW, you should absolutely read the book (it doesn't have to be this second, of course), which at least in spots is both hilarious AND painful in the way much of his writing is, and if you're not a fan (or find the hype a bit nauseating, which is certainly a reasonable position to take at this juncture), then go enjoy some donuts or something.
Awesome.
What's funny is that for all the talk nobody has yet explained Infinite Jest. Will somebody, eventually, do you think? Or will it really be an infinite jest?