/lit/ - Literature

It's pretty good, actually. You should read it.

It's just an enjoyable book, I had a lot of fun with it and was sad to finish it.

Hey man, enjoy life. The publisher sure is from all the free advertising

>reads a book “over 10” times
>reads several dozen papers on it
>claims to not like book

>>13722158
The only meme is you.

I've read Ulysses and half of Gravity's Rainbow (no, I didn't give up, I'm reading it now), and so far I've had pretty good experiences with the memes of /lit/. Looking forward to reading this later this year.

David Foster Wallace was a straight-A student, not an artist. Infinite Jest is a novel buy a guy doggedly pursuing an A+. There's tons of cleverness in it—a thousand pages worth—but no genius. Great art is transcendent; it seems to come from beyond. That's why we still talk about genius, because great art isn't readily explainable. Nothing in Infinite Jest seems to come from beyond. It's a plainly mortal achievement. That's why lots of young guys are attracted to it. They see the reverence its paid and think, "With enough coffee, maybe I could do that." A hundred years from now the only class that'll be teaching Infinite Jest is Marketing.

David Foster Wallace was a straight-A student, not an artist. Infinite Jest is a novel by a guy doggedly pursuing an A+. There's tons of cleverness in it—a thousand pages worth—but no genius. Great art is transcendent; it seems to come from beyond. That's why we still talk about genius, because great art isn't readily explainable. Nothing in Infinite Jest seems to come from beyond. It's a plainly mortal achievement. That's why lots of young guys are attracted to it. They see the reverence it's paid and think, "With enough coffee, maybe I could do that." A hundred years from now the only class that'll be teaching Infinite Jest will be Marketing.

>>13722886
I haven't read it yet but if that's true then is it really such a bad thing? Like Ulysses is brilliant and Joyce is a genius... but I can't begin to imagine what it was like to have his mind. If what you say is true, then that could make the art feel more "human". It could have a deeper emotional impact to know that someone "like you" wrote it.

>>13722886
>It's a plainly mortal achievement

good job outing yourself as someone who completely missed the point of most of DFW's work

>>13722916
It's not the worst thing in the world. Enjoy it all you want. I enjoyed it for what it was, but it's not a great book.

>>13722956
The point of Wallace's work was that his work is mediocre? The job of the artist is to make great art. Just because an artist announces he's an ordinary guy doesn't mean we treat his ordinary achievements as extraordinary.

>>13722886
Interesting take desu. I agree with >>13722916
though. Art can either be beautiful via transcendency or by being incredibly human and expressive, and IJ does the latter. GR does the former. Maybe that's why most people hate one and love the other, different sensibilities.

honestly, Infinite Jest is the Trout Mask Replica of literature. two equally large demographics either adore or despise it, while a minority of people (including me) think that it's good but not good enough to deserve the attention it gets nor good in any conventional way

>>13723083
>me? yes i'm better than everyone else

>>13723252
>includes disclaimer about which camp I'm in
>HOW DARE YOU PICK A SIDE!!!! YOU'RE SO PRETENTIOUS!!!!!!!!!!!

>>13722916
A man can feel the sublime in a typhoon. Its power is immanent to his soul. One need not be a sailor or a meteorologist.

>>13722886

Plausible.

>>13722158

Nerd. A meme, what's that again? something dank? some richard dawkins thing? whatever. haven't read the book but lots of people seem to like it. is that what a meme is? a thing people like?

>>13722877
>Doggedly pursuing an A+
>the only class that'll be teaching Infinite Jest is Marketing

If you had a review website I would hang out there.

>>13722158
Someone didn't get the joke... You think 4chan was serious? That this pile of trash was better than the 99 other books on the chart?

>>13723083
Both are enjoyable low-level introductions into experimental art.

>>13722886
David Foster Wallace was essentially a clout martyr.

Everyone is claiming this was a random suicide, but it's clear what was actually happening: his killers were driven to take his life solely for the sake of clout. They wanted infamy of their own and found it in hanging a 46-year old.

As David was taking his final breath, he was surrounded by /lit/izens taking video and pictures of him. Why? For clout. No one was taking his pulse, no one was calling 911, everyone was standing around with their phones out as his body was clinging to life.

The moral lesson of David's life story should be a cautionary tale of the horrors of postmodern literature and how it's fucked our society beyond belief.

RIP DFW. See you in Heaven...

>ITT retards and lying faggots

>>13722158
>didn't get it
>read it 10 times, and academic papers

you truly are a moron my friend.

>>13722158
You skipped the footnotes, haven't you, anon.

>>13725172
>be me
>attentionlet
>somehow skipped several footnotes
>one of them was Himself's filmography
>fuck

I read it once and really enjoyed it. Might even reread it some day.

>not realizing that the author's "infinite jest" was wasting your time with this long ass pointless book
>not realizing /lit/'s "infinite jest" was tricking people into reading this book (though unaware and unintentionally)

This book is like the monk joke, just retards who didn't get it and pretend to actually like it keep the joke going without realising that's what they're doing. (By get it I mean understand that this book is long, pointless, and shitty, and that by reading it you've had a joke played on you.)

>>13722158
>be postmodern author
>my main characters name is Oedipa
>whole book is about getting a haircut
>throw in a sturm und drang reference or two
Midwits: wow this is brilliant, I like this and am therefore very intelligent.

>>13722158
Isn't the joke in the title itself? It's just a jest bro

>>13725631
>whole book is about getting a haircut

>>13725631
>>whole book is about getting a haircut
Is this a real book? If so what is it?

>>13722158
I actually like this book a lot. I read it at age 15, then again at 18 and again at 23 and each time it brought me something new and helped me.

I don't really consider it literature, to make an analogy it's like experimental pop music, it's like Silver Mount Zion or something. It's not Bach or Moby Dick, it's not high art or whatever.

I don't think that is really a problem it just is what it is and I like it for its expressiveness and relatability, and the variety and range of its situations are intoxicating, and he said a bunch of stuff that his generation and ours were grappling with but couldnt put clearly into words, exactly how pop musicians do.

It's a jumbled mess of a book but it's not bad, you are just expecting it to be something it isn't.

>>13725902
Cosmopolis by DeLillo
Rich guy gets in his limo and the whole book is him going to get a haircut but getting stopped along the way. I think it was supposed to be an allusion to the Odyssey but it was just cringy occupy garbage.