/lit/ - Literature

>>22189686
Not me I’m even a racist sexist douchebag in public. What you see is what you get

>>22189691
Post a video of you punching a pregnant nigger woman or I won't believe you.

>>22189686
Did you even read infinite jest op? It's not "sincere" in the slightest

It’s a defense mechanism. A map of their territory, if you will.

I think it's fundamentally wrong to seek sincerity or authenticity in works of art. Those are things you seek in real life, with real people in real situations. Art is for something else. If you try to make art your principle source of sincerity and authenticity it will always betray you, no matter the era.

>>22189714
Why?

>>22189726
Because art is a subjective experience the goal of which is to soften the pain of being alive. "Sincerity" is impossible since the artist is basically weaving an illusion to distract the reader/viewer for a few hours. The only sincerity the artist can possibly have is the sincere desire to get published and make enough money not to starve. Pic related actual sincerity

>>22189726
Because art is a form, with standards to which practitioners aspire. It's evaluative. It's something to be judged, and to be judged by. That is not the environment in which to find genuine, capital-A authenticity, or experience direct, human-to-human sincerity.

>>22189741
>>22189747
You're conflating words with meaning. You care about the labels not what they're communicating, you're not sincere.
When you lie you're not sincerely communicating. Being insincere is about misdirecting or hiding the truth, it's a form of lying, you're not trying to let the truth come out. In the case of actors, writers and people using their imagination; if the goal is to express meaning then the interaction is sincere. If the goal is to misdirect or hide or whatever then it's not. By this logic, there is such a thing as being sincere in a work of art. Sincerity is real in art.

>>22189703
you're retarded. if you read infinite jest and thought it wasn't sincere in any way then you have to be completely braindead.

a big chunk of the book concerns the topic of sincerity/authenticity in human experience versus self-consciousness and irony. of course, that's just thematic.

if you thought the writing itself wasn't sincere, then i don't know what to tell you other than you're an idiot. no, it isn't the standard-fare novel sincerity, but wallace essentially appropriates the post-modernist tools he's ideologically railing against and uses them to express authentic sentiment instead of using them standardly as ways to parody and insult and satirize. it's his whole shtick.

>>22189741
Art is more than the experience.

>>22189763
Shut the fuck up you whiny little bitch. >Muh sincerity
You're just redefining everything to fit some idiotic child-like trust function in your head cannon.

>>22189741
i'd disagree that the goal of art is to soften the pain of being alive. i think it's more about understanding the pain, or more generally understanding human experience.

since the thread is about wallace, go listen to his speech on Kafka on youtube, also published as a written work under the title "Laughing with Kafka". crudely, it's about how one of the great aspects of kafka is how his stories are humorous in a unique way that draws attention to pain instead of distracting from it.

>>22189763
>In the case of actors, writers and people using their imagination; if the goal is to express meaning then the interaction is sincere.
That's a pretty low bar for being sincere, and one incidentally in which all of the fiction someone like DFW (and presumably also OP) would class as "insincere" would easily pass.

I'm not responding to you infantile zoomers until you grow up.

>>22189686
>Zoomers and millenials are afraid of sincerity, of authenticity. It's honest and vulnerable, and they can't stand that so they cake everything in multiple layers of irony and self deprecating humor.
No that's Gen x and Millennials. Zoomers are therapy-addicted headcases and internet attention whores.

>>22189796
Damn, who is she?

>>22189796
Gen-x was big on sincerity, our irony was very sincere and not at all the irony of the boomers which was more an exercise in form, The problem with our irony was precisely that it was sincere, we did not consider that it would be viewed in a context outside of the ironic.

>>22189747
Human to human interaction is also evaluative, just like art, so I don't see why art wouldn't be able to be sincere under your description, since you think human to human interaction can be. There's no reason in your reply why art wouldn't be able to as well.

>>22189812
that sounds like the opposite of what dfw was saying. gen x irony was a cultural continuation of the radical irony in the 60s used to satirize and insult the old world, but in the gen x culture the irony was used as a way to seem cool and detached and insincere, to not attach yourself to anything lest it be attacked and therefore your own beliefs attacked. to adopt that irony was to only make yourself a destructive force, since the irony was almost always used to insult and satirize. what wallace did was to transfigure that irony and use it in a productive way.

>>22189821
Not at all, DFW wrote IJ for the following generations because he saw our flaw, that our irony would be viewed as calculated instead of as a sincere reaction to the world we grew up in. We did not cultivate our irony, it was an emotional reaction and very sincere but also shortsighted. But we are all shortsighted in our youth and that shortsightedness is important despite its flaws.

>>22189827
It's an emotional reaction to defend against sincerity. Gen X irony might have communicated something emotional and deep about Gen X, but it wasn't "sincere", it was to avoid sincerity. DFW's whole thing is that that kind of irony is used as a way to avoid sincere belief, which protects you from the risk of having your sincere beliefs attacked, but it leaves you isolated and alone because irony is almost always an insulting or satirizing force.

Oh look, we're shitting on generations again.

>>22189841
No, it was sincere and not at all avoidance of the sincere. Our irony was only known to us, it was our language and that is how it was shortsighted. DFW understood this and understood how it would play out for coming generations who would not understand our context. He addressed this in TPK, what do you think about when I say sweater puppies or that something is "so Beatles?" Those ideas are nothing more than slang to me just as the irony of my generation is just slang to you but that irony of gen-x speaks a great deal to those of us of gen-x and is very sincere. This is the shortsightedness of youth, we can not see that the context will not carry through because the context is part of who we are.

>>22189863
Dude, his whole shtick was how irony was a destructive force in the culture of his time and how it engendered loneliness and authentic experience/belief/sense-of-self. It's in like every interview he's ever done.

There's some disconnect between what we're talking about here, I think one of us has gotten something confused. Can you give some examples of Gen X irony? I'm thinking we might agree and are just arguing semantically or something, but I'm not sure.

>>22189686
zoomers are way more sincere than millennials anon, it's just that everything they say is bland and superficial.
Millennials cake everything in irony, and once you take it out is also bland and superficial.
That said, DFW is good but aging badly. Oblivion is his best book and the one that shows what he could have been as a writer if he kept living.

>>22189893
That was not his shtick at all and not what he says in his interviews or his writing, that is the reductive meme which was applied to him so people could feel better about themselves and feel like they are better than everyone else.

>>22189893
>Can you give some examples of Gen X irony?
I forgot to address this. Give an example of gen-x irony and I will do my best to provide the context which you miss. For me to just provide it on my own is an exercise in futility, just as I can not provide the context or understanding for a phrase like "so Beatles."

>>22189908
>>22189917
Dude, I'm sorry but you're wrong. I don't think you're an idiot or anything, but you're absolutely mistaken about DFW's beliefs on the topic.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FjuZcN4SO7I

In that little clip above he essentially lays the entire thing out. Unless I'm sorely mistaken, you're saying the exact opposite thing about Gen X irony.

>>22189741
>the pain of being alive
Loser mentality.

>>22189928
I am not saying the opposite, I am saying that the context of the irony is lost on the generations which precedes and follows. Our irony was not sincere outside of our generation and would be insincere to other generations who lack our context. Wallace is talking about it from the context of a writer and author in that bit, not from the context of a generation. This is the whole thing he delves into with parents/parenting in IJ and goes into more directly with TPK, the divide between generations. We are only sincere within our own generation which is part of the problem, we get our own "in jokes."

>>22189704
>A map of their territory, if you will.
What are you talking about?

>>22189686
Okay, I am going to say, in my case, you are correct. I have lived my life as you say. So, how do I embrace sincerity and authenticity?

whiny faggot thread

>>22189816
>Human to human interaction is also evaluative, just like art
Not really.

>>22190071
Though I suppose I should add, for clarity: To the extent that real human-to-human interaction *is* evaluative in a manner comparable to that of art (e.g. overt political gestures on the public stage, behaviour on first dates, anything anyone says during a television interview, etc), to that extent it is also a poor place to look for real sincerity.

>>22189956
Start with the eschaton scene. It’s all there.

>>22190316
You never actually show comprehension, you are still just regurgitating my posts. You decision to be more vague about it was wise but it is telling of your not actually comprehending yet.

>>22190316
Hm…just went and reread it. That’s interesting. I never really picked up on that. But still not seeing how it connects to the larger themes, etc.

If people were sincere they would kill and rape on the streets like a Fist of the North Star mook. Insincerity is the only way you can cope with modern living.

>>22189686
Agreed. It doesn't feel as bad when someone laughs at you if you laugh first. Listening to Conan the Barbarian lately, and there's never witty jokes in any climactic moment. And it makes it much better than any crap slopped onto your tray these days. It does make you take it seriously.

>>22189714
That's so fucking stupid. Art should be able to portray all emotions. Even the grim and serious.

I think zoomers and millenials aren’t sincere because the world we live in is something like a sick joke. Only a clown would take it seriously.

>>22190401
He can not actually respond beyond cryptic allusions, the one time he tried he had to delete the thread (janny). OP is only marginally related to the map/territory thing but here is the source of the map/territory shit where I go over it with another anon and it should help you get how it all ties into theme.
>>/lit/thread/22021750

and the thread he deleted just because drink has made me feel antagonistic towards his methods.
>>/lit/thread/22160767

>>22190510
Don’t understand and don’t really care 2bh about what you’re talking regarding you and him. You both sound kind of autistic or something. I just want to know about the map theme. The first thread kind of helps but doesn’t really set it within the rest of the book. It just seems kind of like isolated events with no through line.

>>22190565
Like I said, I am a bit drunk. I provided the thread so you could narrow things down and ask questions so I do not have to write a massive essay to explain it all. I don't know what you are missing and I am not going to attempt to guess at that or try and cover all bases.

Why do my family members just randomly insult each other and fake giggle about it like they haven't had screaming matches a few days prior

>>22190593
>Like I said, I am a bit drunk.
Ah, that’s fair.

>I provided the thread so you could narrow things down and ask questions so I do not have to write a massive essay to explain it all. I don't know what you are missing and I am not going to attempt to guess at that or try and cover all bases.
I guess I don’t understand the overarching theme in regards to the totality of the book? Like is it your assertion, or am I misreading it from the first anon, that this is the overall theme?

Also, from the thread you posted: (I’ll say “you” as I assume it’s you in the posts I’m reading) how do you know the wraith is the narrator?

When you said not everything happens, how do you know and what is the implication in regards to the story?

What’s the significance of John Wayne in a mask? You said Hal “supposedly” remembers this. I guess that’s important, again what makes you say that and what is it’s function overall?

Sorry if if that’s too many q’s, I’m a little fascinated with this idea.

>>22189796
Right, zoomers are completely detached from television as a cultural bedrock in the same way that it was for about three generations prior. They have an app-oriented worldview, trying to use pronouns and diagnoses as self-customization tools to help the world make itself more comfortable for them, or using ultraniche genres and capsulized infographic aesthetics to package their personality. The recent trend of immediately recommending that everyone go no-contact at the first sign of interpersonal incompatibility is a symptom of the decreasing patience we've all gained from a decade of apps intuitively customizing themselves to our personal preferences, except zoomers who have grown up in this system are neurologically wired for it in a way older generations aren't.

>>22190614
Map/territory is not the theme, it is the acknowledgement of the banal fact that we are not what we present to the world and a useful literary device. Theme is more about the why this is and the ramifications.
>how do you know the wraith is the narrator?
By that I just mean that they are one in the same, not that the character of the wraith is the narrator, hence that bit about JOI which followed, Like every character in the novel the narrator also has a map and a territory and they do not align, we figure out what is truth by figuring out how they do not align. Compare the narrator in Chapter 2 (Erdedy) to the narrator at the end when Gately is in the hospital, he has changed a great deal. During Erdedy we get no footnotes and meticulous narration examining what Erdedy is going through. During Gately we get a somewhat confused narrator that often adds in little clarifications, heavy use of free indirect speech and gives an abundance of often irrelevant footnotes. This change is gradual and paying attention to it tells us a great deal. What does this mean regarding the first person sections of Hal at the start and end of the novel? Are they first person or has the narrator taken the free indirect speech to the extreme? The section with Hal at the end offer as much insight into Hal as they do the narrator.
>how do you know and what is the implication in regards to the story?
Think I mostly covered the how above, implication is that it allows you to remove the spectacle and know what happened in the missing year but more importantly it supports theme, the narrator is human and just as flawed as everyone else.
>What’s the significance of John Wayne in a mask?
He is a grim machine, the map has replaced the territory, ontological erasure.
>“supposedly”
For Gately this is a dream, the two accounts do not line up and we have nothing to support either or that it ever happens. And we also know the idea of the tape being in his head is JOI drunken schizoness which Hal also knows (see the professional conversationalist which also offers some support to JOI/Wraith/narrator being the same but we can also chalk that up to the issues the narrator is facing and general decline and this is more supported by the evolution of the narrator throughout the novel. )
>Sorry if if that’s too many q’s
Ask away, just expect some rhetorical/leading questions and some drunkenness, my editing with likely fail at time and I will probably skip the odd bit of important info, words, sentences, what hav eyou.

>>22190739
>By that I just mean that they are one in the same, not that the character of the wraith is the narrator, hence that bit about JOI which followed
That is to say, the wraith is a creation of the narrator, probably.

>>22189963
Just be yourself bro lol

>>22189812
>My cowardice was actually very brave

>>22190759
>my irony missed the point

>>22190739
>>22190747
Wow, this is really good anon. This is one of the best effort posts I've seen in awhile.

I think I'm still confused on a couple points.
Who is the narrator? You said the narrator and wraith are one in the same, but that the wraith the character is not the narrator, and then the wraith is the creation of the narrator (probably). How do those all align?

>Think I mostly covered the how above, implication is that it allows you to remove the spectacle and know what happened in the missing year but more importantly it supports theme, the narrator is human and just as flawed as everyone else.
Really nice. Ok, I got that. But I'm not sure exactly how you know not everything happens. The best I can make out is we're dealing with an unreliable narrator?

>For Gately this is a dream, the two accounts do not line up and we have nothing to support either or that it ever happens. And we also know the idea of the tape being in his head is JOI drunken schizoness which Hal also knows (see the professional conversationalist which also offers some support to JOI/Wraith/narrator being the same but we can also chalk that up to the issues the narrator is facing and general decline and this is more supported by the evolution of the narrator throughout the novel. )
Oh wow, that really changes how I view the novel. So if this part never happens...I don't even know what to ask. I guess what is DFW trying to accomplish by putting in two conflicting accounts of that event but that ultimately neither occur.

Finally, what is your thoughts on the fractured structure of the book? I know DFW says he based it on some kind of fractal triangle (the name escapes me), but what is the significance of that.

Oh and one more, any thoughts on the theory about the book floated by the guy who created reddit?

>>22190785
Shit, I just thought of two more if you can handle more.

The narrator seems more involved in the story than normal (at least I think that's what you're suggesting). Does that mean the narrator has a map/territory? And if so what is it?

And this whole thing got me thinking that map/territory is made explicit/objective by the Quebec wheelchair assassins. Is there something there or am I off?

I don't know about you guys, but I crave sincerity and earnestness. I want people to be wholly, authentically, themselves (to a point). I don't want people to harm others or themselves. I want to be able to see a world where we can love, be loved, support eachother, and be kind. I am tired of this notion that rugged individualism and violence are the human norm. I am exhausted by constant irony masking peoples' true intentions. I may be an outlier, but fuck it. I want humanity to evolve further. I want us to move past our base instincts. I want to have us taking care of eachother so we can achieve greater things.

This is extremely idealistic, but I let everyone I come into contact with that these are my thoughts. Genuine, heart on my sleeve, thoughts. And I try to abide by them, no matter how difficult it is. Do I falter? Of course I do. No one is perfect. But I believe wholeheartedly that everyone should strive to try and be better than the person they were the day before.

Frankly we have better things to worry about right now.

>>22190785
>Who is the narrator?
The narrator is the narrator, beyond that we can not really know. We can make a decent case for Hal being the narrator as the narrator's evolution follows Hal's closely but then we would have to write off much of the book as just Hal daydreaming because most of it are things he could not possible know, which works with theme but I prefer the narrator being separate and feel it works with theme better. But we can't know for sure.
>The best I can make out is we're dealing with an unreliable narrator?
Very much so, we get clues regarding how reliable the narrator is at any given time with stuff like the free indirect speech and footnotes. In general you should always assume a narrator to be unreliable unless you are reading premodernists stuff, you just set yourself up for a trap if you give the narrator your blind faith.
>but that ultimately neither occur.
We can't really know and that is what is important, we can not support it in anyway so we should treat that information as suspect and when weighed against the rest of the novel it becomes more suspect. It serves a purpose to the novel but I will leave that for you to figure out.
> fractured structure of the book
I am a big fan of fractured narratives and structure in general so I love it. The fractured structure of IJ is largely an illusion caused by the footnotes, read it without the footnotes, it becomes fairly straightforward and easier to understand in some ways. The Sierpinski gasket structure is fairly loose, much of it was lost when he reworked the novel, he talks about this in some of the interviews.
>The narrator seems more involved in the story than normal
That is an effect of the free indirect speech, in the early parts he is more your standard 3rd person narrative, give Erdedy a browse.
>Does that mean the narrator has a map/territory? And if so what is it?
Yes, his map is being a narrator, what we expect of him and he starts out as a very good and reliable narrator, his territory like Hal's is unknown, the Hal bits at the end shed light on it and is part of what supports Hal as narrator.
>is made explicit/objective by the Quebec wheelchair assassins.
He uses them and Steeply heavily to explore the idea. The AFR are fighting the paper invaders, an invasion which is only of the map and has no connection to the territory. Steeply purposefully reinvents his map so his territory can never be known. On and on it goes, that whole plotline is endless with map/territory stuff.

>>22189741
Debasing art especially statues is actually highly intelligent.
It asks the question: am I ugly? Not to yourself but to God. Would you debased yourself? Why? These questions and many more people may never know the answer.

>>22190852
Forgot the bit about the reddit guy, don't know his theory so provide a link or quick rundown.

>>22190852
Amazing. Seriously, thank you. I don't have nay other questions other than the other guy's theory. I need to ruminate on all this. I'm going to have to go reread the whole novel now.

>>22190856
http://www.aaronsw.com/weblog/ijend
Yeah, just your thoughts on this, it's probably one of the more popular theories out there, at least from what I've read.

>>22189686
oldest take in the modern world
new sincerity is a platitude

>>22190868
Lol, I never knew that theory came from the reddit guy. It is fixating on plot and missing the point. What happens to Hal is the same thing that happened to JOI and JOI saw that it was happening to Hal but was too far gone to do anything about it (professional conversationalist again and young Jim chapters). Every character in IJ is ultimately the same and DFW gives us the same basic info for all of them, watch for this when you reread it. The other big bit of symbolism DFW uses is not speaking and it is just as important as the map/territory.

>>22190883
>The other big bit of symbolism DFW uses is not speaking and it is just as important as the map/territory.
Can you elaborate on that? Is it connected to map/territory or another thing altogether?

>>22190899
Everything is connected, nothing is in isolation when it comes to IJ. Professional conversationalist, again. Hal speaks, Himself says Hal does not speak. How could this tie into map and territory?

>>22190918
I’m drawing a blank…maybe Himself’s territory is he can’t communicate with his son and his map is diverting that by saying Hal can’t speak?

>>22189686
This is probably one of the more pretentious things to say on /lit/. Not everything has to be sincere, and yet can be filled with authenticity. Stop being a dumbass boomer and learn to mentally grow up already.

>>22190928
Hal's map is delivering the goods/meeting expectations and when he speaks he is always trying to meet those expectations (grief concealer), his words are meaningless because they are not him (the territory) just what people expect of him (the map). So the question is, why does his (and everyone else's with the exception of Mario) map and territory not align and how did that disconnect happen (Young Jim and half the book)? Its not the mold. The other question is why does Mario's map and territory align perfectly? Its not because retard. These are the questions you want to answer when you reread it.

>>22190948
>Its not because retard.
Well, it sort of is, but it is not because of some mental issue of his own.

>>22190948
>Hal's map is delivering the goods/meeting expectations and when he speaks he is always trying to meet those expectations (grief concealer), his words are meaningless because they are not him (the territory) just what people expect of him (the map).
Christ, you really understand this book. How many times have you read it? Did you do your thesis on it or something?

>So the question is, why does his (and everyone else's with the exception of Mario) map and territory not align and how did that disconnect happen (Young Jim and half the book)? Its not the mold. The other question is why does Mario's map and territory align perfectly? Its not because retard. These are the questions you want to answer when you reread it.
Anon, I'm begging you, please just tell me. I'm a midwit who'd never pick up on it, and I'd rather have all this in mind while I read it. (I'm saving all your posts in a doc file, btw)

test

>>22190965
>Christ, you really understand this book. How many times have you read it? Did you do your thesis on it or something?
kek. I have no idea how many times i read it. Life sucked and then I ran out of money for booze and needed to find something else to distract me from life so I set myself to picking apart IJ since that was unlikely to run out anytime in the foreseeable future like my booze money did.
>I'm a midwit
Nah. You read through the other thread and identified the questions you needed to ask to understand so you are doing pretty good. You can do this, anon, it may take a few reads but you will get there and you will be a better reader for it. You don't need to understand everything to understand IJ and I am willing to bet that after a second read you will get pretty close to there, infuriatingly close, you will be able to see it but not quite be able to put it into words and it will make you want more, you will want to understand and you will and that desire for understanding will carry over to all of your reading along with skills you gained and the increased comprehension. You can do this and you will.

Before I used IJ to escape life I was one of those that reduced IJ to "everything is an addiction!" We all start out as retards when it comes to this stuff, you need to put in the time if you want to move past it.

>>22189686
It isn't about being afraid, it's about not caring. Not wanting it at all. They're more plugged in to the simulations, what good is the human experience anymore?

>>22191019
All right, cheers anon for the effort you put into your posts.

>>22189686
100%, but it applies to Gen X as well, hence why Wallace talked about it. This is why I hate RedLetterMedia

>>22189686
>Zoomers and millenials are afraid of sincerity, of authenticity. It's honest and vulnerable, and they can't stand that so they cake everything in multiple layers of irony and self deprecating humor.
> Zoomers and millenials were trained to wish for stories to be campy and non-serious because it helps deflect criticism
personally i feel self deprecating humor is not so much deflection of criticism as its some sorta coping mechanism, its easier to deal with absurdity of life by distancing yourself from situations and finding the underlying humor of situations
and its not about being not vulnerable or sincere, rather just a way of looking at what you are going through from another POV
not unlike actively going through something shitty vs way letter having a laugh telling the story how much it sucked
not to defend the kinda quippy writing, not a big fan, i dont watch a lot of modern tv/movies

>>22191072
Why should millennials go to hell?

>>22189894
The Pale King proves that Wallace ultimately couldn't surmount his self-inflicted "inability" to be sincere. If hed just accepted post-irony like Frazen he'd have survived. He couldn't do it abd was convinced he was a fraud - the dangers of so-called "sincerity"

>>22191126
I don't think you have read either Wallace or Franzen.

>>22191154
How do you modify your statement given the sincere truth that I've read both?

>This but unironically
What would DeadFish(in)Water think of this

>>22191163
He'd put it in a footnote but it would still be ironic

>>22191156
I don't unless you offer more than memes.

>>22189686
hehexd

>>22189769
dfw was not sincere. sincerity tend to be bland, sappy or just terrible and crazy. dfw try to put an overarching academic know-it-all coldness in everything he write. i talk in a pure instintive way, his writing appear clever and brilliant in some places but never really sincere because the narrator appreciate too much a self awareness, precisely what he criticize about irony is in all his writings, his reluctance to appear really sappy and bland and intellectualize every sappy and bland thought he have as some grandiose platitudes about humanity. i dont know, sincerity is henry miller, some bukowski, jean genet, i know. they tend to be messy, but thats what sincerity is about. dfw whole persona shine through his writing as too vain to be sincere. we all are vain in some way or another, that dont make you a bad writer or even a bad person, im just pointing out that sincerity is not one of this attributes.
>>22189714
sincerity in real life it always betray you too. you should try it and you inevitably understand that sincerity is uncomfortable and inopportune almost always. you probably would argument that sincerity is not saying whatever you feel/ think, which is the first step to justify your own insincerity and why you probably would be offended when you see an unfiltered sincerity in real life. which comes to your first notion that sincerity is only for real life with real people and real situations that probably are situations and people who are suited to you.

>>22191175
How insincere of you

>>22191126
It's more like he can't be honest with himself and genuinely believe in something without having a voice in his head telling him that it's cringe or stupid to do so, and making fun of him. But Pale King has some spectacular passages where he seems to be getting over himself. In Oblivion, except for the Mister Squishy story, all the other are written by a Wallace that finally seems to focus on writing something rather than how his writing will be perceived.

I always think about the passage in "This is Water" where he talks about trying to have empathy for someone by imagining that her husband is dying of bone cancer (or some other kind of cancer). This is such a "television" image. It's something you see in movies and cheap tv series. By reading everything from IJ to Interview to the Broom of the System it feels like his imagery is colonized by television, which is his true problem: not the ironic stuff, but the serious stuff that feels like it's a "wholesome" moment out of a sitcom. Reading the Pale King while watching the first seasons of The Office will show you what I'm talking about.

DFW was good but there's a way great authors can have philosophical outreach and make you feel the truth of a certain world vision. I'm thinking about the weird mummy stuff in IJ and the "mother as reincarnation" bits, the storytelling part of PK and almost all the stories in Oblivion. The Soul is not a Smithy seems very much about him realizing this and kind of trying to deal with this tendency of making stuff cartoonish and stupid while outside he sees/feels death and horror. He could have dwelled with these ugly emotions and elaborate on these, as many writers have made, but instead he meanders for pages in (very entertaining) passages about tennis games, characters with weird hats or names, ridiculous political conspiracies, etc. Ultimately fun to read, very smartly written, but it's a lot of work to say relatively little.
It's sad to see how even a great mind like his can be colonized by television, which is ultimately propaganda. He should have stopped watching anything entirely - and maybe through the end of his life he did - and spend some years out of the US to detox.

>>22189741
I would say being alive isn't generally very painful, but literature focuses on conflict and tragedy, intensifying the pain of life and adding meaning to it. In real life pain is just uncomfortable sensations.

>>22191207
how old are you, anon? Because most people start getting chronic diseases and pain in their 30s, and this accounts mostly for physical pain, don't even get me started on mental pain once you start having to go to work to survive

>>22191197
>By reading everything from IJ to Interview to the Broom of the System it feels like his imagery is colonized by television.

Certainly difficult to believe in truth when everything is an illusion. I think this is a particularly American problem in the classic Hunter Thompson sense that Americans both love and hate the American dream - dream being a key word here

>>22191092
idk i dont suggest that
terminal irony poisoning to me is just sad, people who contribute nothing sincere ever and can only make light of any situation or react with irony are like hurt animals to me, i feel bad for them

>>22191207
>I would say being alive isn't generally very painful
Come back when you grow up

>>22191217
>>22191229
>Be urbanite trash
>complain about your existence

Naturally sincerity would mean lowbrow. Was IJ his way to avoid sincerity being stuck in the lowbrow?

>>22191234
>get told the sincere truth
>can't handle it flayling about with extemporizations
Next DFW right here folks. How ironic

>>22191240
You should complain about the conditions that lead you to be a mechanized bugman sapped of life and vitality instead of assuming this is somehow correlating our existence with a never ending spiral of pain and suffering.

DFW’s problems was he knew he couldn’t live up to the greatest writer ever and the one whom he was constantly, to his mental detriment, compared to.

>>22191244
You doubled down?

>>22191246
Updike?

>>22191247
I don't argue with smarmy faggots.

Bump

>>22192529
It's over. Look at where the "sincerity" got this thread. Bunch of whiny zoomers complaining about nothing, burned out millenials still humping the American Dream, and crippled Gen Xers tragically self aware that their protests were pointless.

>>22189686
>muh sincerity
This is the ivory tower intellectual equivalent of some kid in his early 20s deciding to be radically honest with his thoughts and feelings at all times by verbalizing them. Vulnerability is not a virtue.

>>22192579
We got some decent discussion even if most of the thread was memes by people who either never read him or lack comprehension. It was kind of a pathetic bump but some more worthwhile conversation could still result.

Go ahead and be sincere. See what it gets you.

>>22189686
>of authenticity
DFW was against authenticity. Sincerity doesn't mean being authentic. He's saying we should become Romantics, Idealists, Sentimentalists, and Romanticism isn't authentic, go back to the classic Westerns instead of the parodies.

>>22191185
what if he was just sincerely academic and self-aware.