/lit/ - Literature

>>4703391
>When does the story start coming together?

About 700 pages in.

>>4703393
Jesus christ.

>>4703399

also (minor spoilers) at the end, the different plot threads never truly come together

pro-tip: read the first chapter right after finishing the book

>>4703401
Is it worth finishing, or should I go read something else?

>>4703404

It's actually quite fun. Maybe about 100-200 pages in, things will make more sense and the different characters' pace in things is more clear. If you're that far in and you still aren't getting it, you can leave it for another time, I guess.

I've always saw this as a book of interconnected episodes rather than a grand narrative which it's only trying to be (deliberately).

>>4703410
>pace in things
place in things

>>4703393

not true.

If you have amazing retention and recall of 80% of the things you've read, the story will start to come together about 200 pages in.

If you are an average reader, like me, the story will noticeably come together about 400 pages in

>>4703399

But good luck fighting the feeling that 90% of what you read is going completely over your head. At least for the first 500 pages

>>4703391
>story

>>4703391
Read it. Feel bad afterwards because you read it to say you did.

Just read the goddamn book

>>4703499
Who said that's why I read it you pretentious neanderthal.

>>4703391
It was standard operating procedure for Wallace to set up unclear/disorienting situations, scenes, even acronyms without explaining them at first. The reader is meant to feel unclear for awhile. Eventually Wallace did make things more clear. One case in point with IJ is all the 'Year of ...' headings. Just stay with it. Also, page 233 is helpful; don't look ahead, though, just take it all in the way it's presented and let it reveal itself as it's designed.

>>4703996
That's why everyone reads it

>>4704039
Nah, I'm reading it because a professor of mine said it was good and I'm trying to get into some more contemporary stuff.


Just because you're a douche doesn't mean all of us are.

You're supposed to actively participate in the text and work to understand it - Wallace absolutely detested passive entertainment and wanted readers/audiences to put forth some amount of effort and break away from the modern, televisual approach of interacting with entertainment.

The fungus is really important.

I honestly believe that all IJ fans are suffering from literary Stockholm syndrome. After wasting several months of their lives trying to read this book, they have to rationalize to themselves why it was worth it.

>>4704196
I agree with this.

>>4704196
>literary Stockholm syndrome
I remember that article:
http://www.themillions.com/2011/05/the-stockholm-syndrome-theory-of-long-novels.html

>>4703424
yfw by this logic i am the greatest reader of all time

>>4704196
>I belive that since i think something is bad I have to justify the fact that someone has a different opinion than me.

>>4704196
>I honestly believe that all
that's because you're an idiot

>>4704226
>>4704216
found em

>>4704231

Yes indeed you found someone who does not share your opinion. Sure le trolled us

>>4704196
>they have to rationalize to themselves why it was worth it.
Why wouldn't reading Infinite Jest be worth it?

>>4703391
It really isn't that bad for too long. Definitely starts coming together around 200 pages in, which sounds daunting maybe, but a lot of the opening chapters are just setting up tone and setting. Pay attention to the Incandenzas and Gately. Michael Pemulis and Joelle a.k.a. Lady Psychosis are probably the next most important characters. Just read it as though the first few hundred pages are separate little character studies that all take place in the same little world. It's not hard for that long.

http://faculty.sunydutchess.edu/oneill/Infinite.htm

Every few chapters or so glance at this just to refresh your memory.

>>4703393
This guy is bullshitting you.

>>4703404
Yes, it's beautiful and he has a good sense of humor.

>>4704196
Have you actually read it?

>>4704082
I don't think he detested entertainment. It seemed more like he understood its value, but also recognized that indulging in it led to a sort of weird addiction and stupification of the the addict.

I thought IJ was very entertaining.

>>4704196
I honestly believe that anybody that doesn't have the mental capacity to read and enjoy it rationalize to themselves why it's not worth reading.

>>4703399
you might as well go ahead and put the book down w. that response. pick it back up when you're serious.

>>4704196

I liked the novel hugely but part of me really agrees with you

>>4704196
I read Atlas Shrugged when I was 13 but even then I knew it was shit

Why does this book have a reputation for being difficult? Most of the chapters are short and bite-sized with lots of variety between them so you don't get bored. Lots of fun shenanigans take place. It's even a great read-aloud.

It's not even that long anyway, most trilogies are longer.

One of the fun parts of Infinite Jest is being presented with bits of information over the course of the story and piecing together the world, characters, their relationships, etc. If that doesn't sound appealing to you then you might not like IJ.

You should get a good sense of things before the halfway point, but the different threads start to really come together only near the end, which gets pretty exhilarating until you hit the Zone of Butthurt.

>>4704196
>After wasting several months
It took me a month, and I'm a slow reader and didn't spend that much of my time reading.

>>4707211
It's long, DFW uses big words, and the plot is less than straightforward, but still it shouldn't be hard for anyone who is serious about literature. It's a fun and enjoyable book, not some impenetrable slog.

>>4704655
I read it and enjoyed it. but honestly I think that it's way overblown, that DFW took himself way too seriously, that he should have stuck to short stories and essays, and that Infinite Jest is basically just WASP-y, neo-Puritanical anti-drug propaganda delivered by a huge cast of characters that all sound the same wrapped up in a Pynchon plot imitation that is far less plausible than anything Pynchon wrote.

>>4707227
>but still it shouldn't be hard for anyone who is serious about literature

It shouldn't be hard for anyone who can read. You don't have to be serious about literature to get it.
I mean that negatively though. IJ is far too concerned with being great literature to actually be great literature.

Has anyone else noticed that the "/lit/-approved" door-stopping pillars of 20th century English literature get progressively easier and more dumbed down?
Ulysses is dense and difficult, but has the most to say about people, art, culture, history, and identity; Gravity's Rainbow is digressive and disorienting, but even if the story is fragmented and the parade of characters never seems to end, every part is basically a variation on the same themes and motifs, like a jazz piece, and GR is extremely telling of the nature of mid-20th century war, politics, economics, and society, and how those all affect the individual; and Infinite Jest is decentralized, but it's message is basically "TV is bad, irony is bad, drugs are bad," and the story is pretty straightforward and easy to understand despite the omission of several key plot points in order to make the story seem "experimental," but in reality is comes off like watching Lost, where you're pretty sure the creator doesn't really know what he's doing.

Why does /lit/ fap over this book so much?
Is it really that good ?

>>4707279
no

>>4707263
I've definitely noticed the large gaps in difficulty. And while I think the ideas also get simpler I feel you oversimplify Infinite Jest's message. It says a lot about what it means to be a human in our age and for me it was the most immediately relevant of the Big Three.

>>4707263
Have you stopped to consider that society has been progressively dumbed down so the literature follows?

>>4703391

>>4707263

I thought the message was "I, David Wallace, know lots of words".

>>4707424
Actually I'm from /fit/ so I'm attractive and physically aesthetic. Also I have a non autistic sense of fashion.

>>4707432

apparently you have an appalling level of self-confidence considering i just posted that pic for shits and giggles and it was not aimed at you in any way.

>>4707443
>Appalling level of self-confidence
What's so appalling about it?

> i just posted that pic for shits and giggles and it was not aimed at you in any way.

This is 4chan. Everything is considered a person attack at first.

>>4704196
>being so pleb you can't enjoy a relatively pleb book

>>4704203
>>4704196

Thanks for the term, this is how I feel about lots of French philosophy, but the term will help me explain it to people better.

Stockholm syndrome: the disease which makes people like people I think they shouldn't like

>>4707239
Great lit doesn't have to be hard to understand.