/lit/ - Literature

Is this worth reading for non-Americans?

>>6559896
>Am I dumb /lit/?
Yes, since you actually got suckered into reading it. The jest is on you.

>>6559901

I'm not American and I read it just fine. As long as you are at least vaguely familiar with the states and Canadian provinces.

>>6559896

you re-read the first chapter, right? He takes notes from Hemingway and Lot 49 with IJ, iceberg and whatnot. Orin was behind it all.

did the wheelchair assassins murder the ETA kids?

read the beginning again dumbass

or just look it up online

>>6560331

I don't think so or Hal would be dead?

>>6560331
>>6561005
Ometisogozaimasu, you just cracked the Jest.

>>6561026

Wat?

>>6560361

I did, to both. But like who was with Orin at the end and what exactly is going on with Gately?

>>6561762
orin was captured and interrogated. he released the entertainment.

gately is hallucinating as he is in incredible pain. alternatively, you could interpret that he gave into receiving drugs. he survives and goes on to dig up himself's head with hal.

>>6561767

But who was he with. He said do it to *her* who is he referring to? Just another "subject" of his?

>>6561777
I don't know if he was WITH *her*, but I always interpreted "do it to *her*" to mean "torture Avril"

>tfw i understood that the PGOAT ended up with the entertainment

>>6561792

How does that work?

>>6561777
it's up to your interpretation duder. you don't need someone to hold your hand. maybe give some sections a reread. i think it's avril.

>>6561805
meant to quote >>6561783

>>6561783
"Do it to her," 'her' = the purported hand model who is standing right there watching him get slowly covered in cockroaches. The gag is that Orin is so dumb and vain he still doesn't get that she betrayed him.

It all becomes a lot more clear once you get that the whole thing is narrated by the omniscient ghost of the suicide dad, following the apocalyptic war ignited by the Gentle adminisitration.

Infinite Jest, by David Foster Wallace, is the worst science fiction novel ever written. The truth is it might be the worst novel ever written, or at least published, but given the fact that Wallace has stiff competition from the burgeoning spawn of PC Elitist writers, not to mention his own PoMo kith, such as Rick Moody, Dave Eggers, and that ilk, I think I’ll stick with just calling it the worst sci fi has ever produced. Granted, I am not one who has read all the depth of sci fi offerings, but I’ve read enough to know that this so far undershoots the rest that by mere extrapolation it would be a titanic achievement for another author to do worse. Yes, there are the sword and sorcerer riff-raff, the cyber-punk crapola, and the remanent dross of the Golden and Silver Ages of sci fi still hanging around, and even those who’ve produced masterpieces, such as Richard Matheson and Ursula LeGuin, have been known to write horrorshow books in terms of quality, but this dystopian novel by Wallace is worse than them all. His book, only a decade old, is more outdated than many Golden and Silver Age sci fi books specifically because of his slang’s sounding as relevant as John Dryden’s courtly verse. Unlike Anthony Burgess’s A Clockwork Orange, the slang is based in the then-contemporary world, which makes it seem so 1990s trying to seem cool, rather than timeless. Even his use of emails, with outdated isp formats, seems to belie his lack of creativity. Not that his relentlessly PoMo use of product brand names, bumper stickers, redaction marks, and lengthy digressions on things as pointless as Hawaii 5-0’s relevance versus Hills Street Blues’, does not already belie his creative bankruptcy, but it’s worth noting. Of course, nothing comes of his discourses- they’re tossed in like olives in a salad, so Wallace can preen his learnedness to you, and dropped just as quickly- a habit that he too often indulges- bringing up and dropping things.

>>6559896
sorry that you dumb af lol

>>6561876

Is this pasta of some sort? Never read Wallace's fiction, can't tell

>>6561950
http://www.cosmoetica.com/B326-DES266.htm

>>6561777
also 1984
also nice trips

>Was Orin behind everything?
Orin was a passive cuck and handegg player who fucked his mother while maybe or maybe not knowing it was his mother. He released the entertainment in exchange for his life and was such an unoriginal shit he copied the ending of 1984.
>Who was the her?
Avril Incandenza pretending to be a Swiss handmodel. Possibly had sex with John Wayne in football regalia in order to acclimate her to the idea of having sex with her son. Or maybe no acclimation was required and she was a hoe.
>Did Hal and Gately meet?
Yes.

>>6563577

Attracted to his mother.....maybe. But give me a break, he would have surely known the difference between his mother and a "beautiful Swiss hand model". He took the master tape to harm his dad's detractors.

>>6563577
But Avril was fucking orin way back, Molly notkin tells steeply this, I always assumed it was orins name written in the car window


Also I assumed the Swiss hand model was Luria p

>>6563577
Also she's fucking John Wayne in cheerleading/ football attire out of some creepy mother son fantasy thing

>>6559896
How did you read the whole thing?
How does it compare with atlas shrugged?

>>6565196

>How did you read the whole thing?
Took me a while honestly, like 4 1/2 months.

>How does it compare with atlas shrugged?
No clue, never read it.

Wait so Orin and Avril fucked?

>>6561777
Do it to her is an orwell reference

>>6565620
Supposedly

>>6565620

Implied at various points, and Molly Notkins says she believes that they did. More likely that he had a love/hate sexual attraction to her.

>>6565620
>>6565620
no /lit/ is just badly lying

>>6565645

Also I should have mentioned Notkin was an airhead who had no idea what she was talking about.

>>6559896
http://www.aaronsw.com/weblog/ijend

>>6566323

Probably one of the better IJ ending summaries I've read. Thanks anon. Still sad we didn't get a better closure with Gatley and Joelle though :(