/lit/ - Literature

>>15141267
Had this in mind desu

Did David Foster Wallace ever discuss his writing routine or writing zen mode habits? I've read a lot of his stuff but have never caught an explanation of this particular subject. For a guy who held jobs, socialized, fucked a lot of women, and was generally social, his output was pretty monumental in terms of word count, especially in the 90s before settled in to middle age, got depressed, wrote depressing short story compilations, then necked himself.

>>12354749
He's good-looking. He didn't give a shit about his appearance later on so had lots of stubble and straggly hair, but it's messy and cute in a nerdy way.

Anyone have any estimates ? genuinely curious desu senpai

Can I skip the parts with Gately and the French candadian stuff?

>10 page section about moving a mattress.

>>9738974
Look at him. So young and confident!

Who's writing the IJ of the internet age? Who's young and really good?

>>9377624
Never read it
It sucks
Rare Dave

Things went sideways when he decided he wanted to look like the owner of a comic book store for the rest of his life

>>9290222

Pretty decent. Not enough being displayed here to give us a fair idea of what we'd be in for, but a good start nonetheless.

>>9274411

>>8461652

this one was from sci

need more college days dfw

Do you believe in God?

>>8051665

>>7791208

Reminder not to take this too seriously.
>The list was not my idea. It was the idea of the publisher, the editor, and my agents. I fought it. I finally gave up. I hated it. I did it off the top of my head. I left out a lot of things that should be there and I probably put in a couple of things that I now would like to kick out. I kept it out of the Italian and the Swedish translations, but it’s in all the other translations—about 15 or 18 of them. I’m sick of the whole thing. All over the world, including here, people reviewed and attacked the list and didn’t read the book. So let’s agree right now, my dear. We will not mention the list.

>>7181392
>It would have been improved it it used footnotes instead of endnotes, but whatever.

>He doesn't know why they're endnotes instead of footnotes

You have to flip back and forth because it emulates watching a game of tennis.

better Pynchon than him.

definitely

>DFW sucks. Completely narcissistic. He failed to give constructive feedback since he was so busy going off on tangents about himself/his own writing.

>I took this class because of Prof. Wallace's reputation as an author. What a mistake! This guy just likes to hear himself talk, and he won't shut up. He knows how to play the part of a enigmatic "genius" all right, but most of my classmates were

>while people can complain about DFW's teaching style. I've never had a prof. put so much effort toward each student's learning. he is a brilliant writer and hardworking teacher. he is tough as**** and can hurt students' feelings, but all that he does is for the students' benefit. Only those with fragile egos don't like him.

i'd let him broom my system

>Irony and cynicism were just what the U.S. hypocrisy of the fifties and sixties called for. That’s what made the early postmodernists great artists. The great thing about irony is that it splits things apart, gets up above them so we can see the flaws and hypocrisies and duplicates. The virtuous always triumph? Ward Cleaver is the prototypical fifties father? "Sure." Sarcasm, parody, absurdism and irony are great ways to strip off stuff’s mask and show the unpleasant reality behind it. The problem is that once the rules of art are debunked, and once the unpleasant realities the irony diagnoses are revealed and diagnosed, "then" what do we do? Irony’s useful for debunking illusions, but most of the illusion-debunking in the U.S. has now been done and redone. Once everybody knows that equality of opportunity is bunk and Mike Brady’s bunk and Just Say No is bunk, now what do we do? All we seem to want to do is keep ridiculing the stuff. Postmodern irony and cynicism’s become an end in itself, a measure of hip sophistication and literary savvy. Few artists dare to try to talk about ways of working toward redeeming what’s wrong, because they’ll look sentimental and naive to all the weary ironists. Irony’s gone from liberating to enslaving. There’s some great essay somewhere that has a line about irony being the song of the prisoner who’s come to love his cage.

The Pale King.