
Well, duh (1996) - vo2maxer
https://www.lrb.co.uk/the-paper/v18/n14/dale-peck/well-duh
======
ryanyde
They totally missed the mark on this one: "What’s meant to distinguish
Infinite Jest (the book) from various artefacts that precede it is the
conflation of entertainment with drug addiction, and this notion is, I think,
fundamentally flawed."

It's now pretty clear entertainment can be neurologically addictive, as
evidenced by the social media companies and their abilities to predict
improved engagement.

On top of that, we've now got an attention + an opioid addiction.

If anything, DFW was just very early at predicting the medium term state,
complete with national secession movements.

Not bad for a 'verbose' fiction writer.

~~~
ses1984
Also I'm quite sure the idea of conflating entertainment with drug addiction
precedes IJ, it can be traced back at least as far as the idea that religion
is the opiate of the masses.

~~~
otabdeveloper4
Here's the full quote:

> Religious distress is at the same time the expression of real distress and
> the protest against real distress. Religion is the sigh of the oppressed
> creature, the heart of a heartless world, just as it is the spirit of a
> spiritless situation. It is the opium of the people.

That is, "opium" here is references a painkiller; religion is viewed as a way
to deaden pain and suffering. It's not about addiction.

~~~
ses1984
I highly doubt the idea of opium was invoked without intention to reference
its addictive nature.

------
locusofself
I had a ton of fun reading Infinite Jest, it took me two months of reading
daily but after a while I couldn't wait to get home from work to read it (I
didn't have a kid yet mind you). There are many things about it that are
dissatisfying, frustrating even maddening. But there are so many points of
brilliance it makes the whole thing worth it. The ambitiousness, audacity and
shortcomings are part of it. I felt similarly about Pale King, DFW's
posthumously published unfinished novel. Was it a great book? No. But there is
about a 50 page section in the middle that makes the whole damn thing worth
it.

~~~
pokler
What 50 page section? Are you referring to the Eschaton game? If so, its not
in the middle, nor is it 50 pages.

~~~
ses1984
The 50 page section refers to Pale King I think.

------
nwienert
Seems the author is oftentimes taking whats meant to be a purposefully
sardonic reflection of American culture to be an actual direct attempt at
humor by DFW.

A good example of this is his point that the "level of humor" in the book is
low because of a reference to "butt products". The joke isn't, "butts, haha",
the joke is the satire that yea, that would be true... I mean, have you seen
Instagram? Or SuperBowl ads?

~~~
BLKNSLVR
"both, most importantly, work up an elaborate – and elaborately digressive –
plot which deliberately ends as unsatisfactorily as possible."

I've only read about DFW's work, I haven't actually read them yet. But the
quote above, in addition to your first sentence, sounds exactly like what DFW
would be attempting to demonstrate an unspoken life parallel, or that it's
about the journey not the destination, but even so, once the destination is
reached the journey is pointless and forgotten.

There's definitely an unrealized expectation at the base of this review.

------
andbberger
Well that's just like your opinion man. Infinite Jest is a masterpiece imo.

My favorite book of all time and oddly prescient in many ways.

For instance, I'm aware of at least one startup developing the vid-chat masks
Wallace wrote up with a straight face. See also snapchat filters.

~~~
smitty1e
I haven't read IJ, but the review made it sound like a sober variation on the
"Illuminatus Trilogy".

------
throwlaplace
here's a hack for reading infinite jest: use two bookmarks - one in the main
story and one in the endnotes. here's another hack that is tougher: read it in
less than a week. you simply cannot appreciate the book if you do not have all
of the different plots and characters fresh in your head (BTW I make the same
recommendation for all long classics eg war and peace).

about the merit of the book: it is one of the few books that i've read that
evoked a visceral reaction in me - i _felt_ manic and strung out (like many of
the characters) while reading it. social commentary aside i think that passes
bar for worthwhile literature.

~~~
scubbo
I shudder to imagine the experience of reading Infinite Jest in physical form.
Having an ereader that could jump back-and-forth between the main text and the
endnotes was invaluable.

~~~
throwlaplace
One thing about long books on e-readers is you don't have the psychological
satisfaction of feeling like you're making it through the book (which you can
feel by the number of pages that change hands with the paper book)

~~~
barryhoodlum
There's one footnote that ends up being a punchline, about five words long.
The few seconds spent flipping from the page to the footnote lent it a certain
comedic timing that would usually be impossible to portray in a book. That
really stood out in my mind and I don't think it'd be quite the same by
clicking a hyperlink.

------
ppod
Not a very convincing criticism in my opinion. I liked the plot, but even if
you don't like the plot or themes, I think the ideas, the sentences, the
verbal invention and playfulness are the best things about the book. But,
theme-wise, it's worth remembering that this basically pre-dates the modern
internet:

>“The moment he recognized what exactly was on one cartridge he had a strong
anxious feeling that there was something more entertaining on another
cartridge and that he was potentially missing it. He realized that he would
have plenty of time to enjoy all the cartridges, and realized intellectually
that the feeling of deprived panic over missing something made no sense.”

------
tptacek
The title of this piece is "Well, duh". The sentence from which this
submission's title is taken is _If nothing else, the success of Infinite Jest
is proof that the Great American Hype Machine can still work wonders, in terms
of sales._ ; the submission's title doesn't get the full intent of that
sentence.

Use the story title! It's in the guidelines!

Articles like this, it seems to turn out, are part of Dale Peck's schtick, as
you'll quickly learn from a Wikipedia page that seems to think these kinds of
takedowns are the most notable thing about him:

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dale_Peck](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dale_Peck)

I'm always there for a good takedown, and while I like DFW's writing I think
Infinite Jest is a rich, slow-moving, and inexplicably unharried target. But I
do think it's kind of funny that Peck opens by saying that Infinite Jest is a
book without much of a plot, in which not much happens other than a 700 page
conversation, and then spends 2 gigantic paragraphs trying to explain all the
details of the plot. Which, it turns out later, he actually enjoys, once the
puzzle pieces fall into place and reveal the book's underlying simplicity. OK
then.

The bit in Infinite Jest written in (attempted) African American vernacular is
truly awful, though. Peck is clearly right about that.

~~~
dang
OK, we've changed it above. The submitted title was "Infinite Jest is proof
the Great American Hype Machine can work wonders (1996)".

Since the submitter was attempting to use representative language from the
article, I figure they thought the original title was baity and were trying to
follow the guidelines by changing it.

~~~
tptacek
You're right. I dialed back my comment a bit. Thanks! And thanks to the
submitter for finding this.

~~~
vo2maxer
You’re welcome and thank you for the comment.

------
laxatives
Its weird because the only people who are going to respond to this type of
criticism are people who were so invested in Infinite Jest that they will read
this lengthy critique. So its going always going to be extremely biased and
poorly received by the biased audience, especially 20+ years later. So its
basically just a conversation starter for all the snobs who inhaled this book
and maybe a tiny minority who didn't enjoy it but are still motivated enough
to discuss it.

The criqitue is mostly well-written and there's some issues I agree with, but
they get pretty smarmy and smug by the end.

~~~
AlecSchueler
A Very astute observation, chum!

------
stazz1
The erudite of the LRB might never understand the simple and unexaggerated
beauty of Mark Twain nor David Foster Wallace. Perhaps the only thing less
appealing than a dissenting opinion is an op-ed to ride the coattails of
success and make a name for oneself through dissension. Yeah Shakespeare sucks
too, here's my card.

------
zethraeus
I resent the length of my time the author spent, verbosely and banally,
telling me that he resents the length of his time Wallace spent through banal
verbosity in Infinite Jest.

------
pasabagi
Very interesting review. I read infinite jest once as a teenager, and once a
couple of years ago - and yeah, on second reading, I could see it doesn't
really deserve its hype.

The one weirdness of the review is kind of related to the main weirdness of
Infinite Jest - why on earth is it related to Pynchon? I never really
understood the similarity. Sure, they're both digressive writers - but so is
everyone and their dog since Virginia Wolf. Why did Infinite Jest become _the_
postmodern novel?

I think ultimately, what killed Infinite Jest to me is, on second read, it
seemed dated. The driving concern - authenticity - seems to be one that sort
of faded in relevance in the late oughts, then merged fairly seamlessly into a
sort of teenage angst - a merger that's pretty well enacted by Infinite Jest,
to be honest.

~~~
i_am_proteus
For starters: Hal Incandenza's character development, or rather character
devolvement, is reminiscent of Slothrop in _Gravity 's Rainbow._

------
LZ_Khan
"And herein is Infinite Jest’s (the book’s) major theme: the United States has
become a culture addicted to entertainment, and like all addicts we pursue
that entertainment to our detriment."

It seems like the reviewer dislikes the book because he disagrees with this
notion, citing our attachment to entertainment is more of a choice than an
addiction. I however find this very profound and will be finishing the book
thanks to this review.

~~~
turingbike
I think you will also like this quote/thought then:

> The theory is this: Infinite Jest is Wallace's attempt to both manifest and
> dramatize a revolutionary fiction style that he called for in his essay "E
> Unibus Pluram: Television and U.S. Fiction." The style is one in which a new
> sincerity will overturn the ironic detachment that hollowed out contemporary
> fiction towards the end of the 20th century. Wallace was trying to write an
> antidote to the cynicism that had pervaded and saddened so much of American
> culture in his lifetime. He was trying to create an entertainment that would
> get us talking again.

\- [http://fictionadvocate.com/2012/09/19/the-infinite-jest-
live...](http://fictionadvocate.com/2012/09/19/the-infinite-jest-liveblog-
what-happened-pt-2/)

------
freewilly1040
_Infinite Jest is proof the Great American Hype Machine can work wonders_

Funnily enough I think DFW would agree, in an interview somewhere (I think it
was in Although Of Course You End Up Becoming Yourself) he talks about the
surreal experience of seeing all the hype and raves about his book immediately
after release, when he knew no one had actually had time to read it.

------
codingslave
I will agree with the writers sentiment about Infinite Jest. I read about 1/3
before deciding I could not make it the whole way through. I think a good
chunk of the reasons for the books popularity is the persona of DFW. His
personality, physical looks, melancholic and thoughtful disposition make a him
a quintessential writer. He looks the part very well, and produces this
obscure monstrosity called Infinite Jest. My impression is that tons of people
who read the book are never quite sure if its pure genius or complete non
sense. His persona tips them over the edge.

~~~
zadler
It’s an enjoyable read mostly. It doesn’t claim to contain profound social
commentary in every character and subplot. Of course his persona makes a
difference because it’s a fiction born of his imagination. DFW did have a
point though, about how we would become addicted to instant gratification, and
you can see a grain of truth to this in the contemporary internet and the
“attention economy”.

------
vo2maxer
I was intrigued by this comment, read the review, and posted it:

“Infinite Jest is one of my fave books — but it’s still fun to read this
vicious @LRB review from 1996.”

Tony O’Shaughnessy

------
bingotips
This is such an oversimplification of the book but I guess critics have to
criticize. I imagine that DFW would probably say the book failed the author of
this piece if this was his takeaway.

------
vo2maxer
It’s worthwhile comparing the criticism to other works such as James Joyce’s
Ulyssess. Take this quote from a review in the NYT:

Few intuitive, sensitive visionaries may understand and comprehend "Ulysses,"
James Joyce's new and mammoth volume, without going through a course of
training or instruction, but the average intelligent reader will glean little
or nothing from it- even from careful perusal, one might properly say study,
of it- save bewilderment and a sense of disgust. It should be companioned with
a key and a glossary like the Berlitz books. Then the attentive and diligent
reader would eventually get some comprehension of Mr. Joyce's message.

[http://www.openculture.com/2013/10/the-very-first-reviews-
of...](http://www.openculture.com/2013/10/the-very-first-reviews-of-joyces-
ullyses.html)

~~~
otabdeveloper4
"Ulysses" is trash, sorry. The equivalent of a three-hour long Simpsons gag
compilation marathon Youtube video, except for academics.

"Infinite Jest" is okay, but needs an editor badly.

~~~
vo2maxer
Other than The Simpsons allusion, can you be more specific in how James
Joyce’s “Ulysses” is “trash”? Quotes from the novel with your criticism are
welcomed. I’m interested in knowing how you came to this conclusion. No need
to be sorry. Thank you for the observation.

------
mplanchard
Like many others in the comments, I loved Infinite Jest, for many reasons, but
just to go into one in particular, I feel like David Foster Wallace’s
viciously smart, sardonic, ironic, and often deeply depressing sense of humor
is at its peak in IJ. There are so many things from the book that stick out to
me as being memorably funny: the woman with an artificial heart who dies
because a purse snatcher takes it, chasing the snatcher for several blocks
while yelling, “Stop her, she’s stolen my heart!” while onlookers laugh and
think it’s just some sort of couple’s tryst; the party for someone’s
dissertation defense where a bunch of pretentious academics are all doing this
kind of anti dance consisting of moving as little as possible so as to look
like you’re not dancing, but with a kind of jerking rhythm; the description of
the 90s TV special about a guy with paranoid schizophrenia afraid that the
government wants to inject radioactive fluid into his brain and that he’s
being chased by giant machines that will eventually catch him and consume him,
who for science is injected with a radioactive solution for a PET scan and
then stuck into the giant whirling scanner, a look of horror on his face as he
sees his worst fears coming to life; the Canadian government minister who dies
because he has a cold and cannot communicate with the person robbing his house
that he cannot breathe through his nose; the teen tennis player who wears all
black and is called The Darkness, meanwhile the other teen tennis player who
tries to get people to call him The Viking but no one does; the whole thing
with the wheelchair assassins and “to hear the squeak”; the absurdity of Helen
Steeply and the even more ridiculous absurdity of Orin falling for him/her;
Avril losing her shit and running around the yard with the mold her son ate
held aloft, screaming for help; and so on.

Plus this all often leading into scenes that are just relentlessly tragic.
Joelle freebasing way too much cocaine in the bathroom at that same party;
Poor Tony winding up having a seizure and swallowing his tongue on the T; the
viscerally accurate depiction throughout the book of addiction and depression;
Joelle’s entire life story; Himself’s slide into madness and suicide while
basically no one tried to help; the short bit of Himself talking to his
alcoholic father when he was younger; and so on.

In a way it reminds me of the show Bojack Horseman, with the mix of high brow
and low brow humor, unflinchingly dark narrative, and deeply flawed
characters.

All of which is to say: it’s not always an easy book, but it’s definitely
worth at least two reads, one to get the story and another to appreciate all
of the interleaving of the various stories throughout the book.

~~~
scandinavegan
Thank you for all the examples! I've read the book, but don't have all of it
in active memory, so I appreciate your list as it helped me remember different
parts. I have to look up the mold-eating part because I remember it as
hilarious.

Three other more or less absurd parts of the book that I enjoyed was the
(apparently true) concept of different sized arms of tennis players,
subsidized time (Year of the Whopper, Year of the Trial-Size Dove Bar, Year of
the Depend Adult Undergarment) _, and how half a state in the US is turned
into a giant landfill that waste is catapulted into.

The two things I remember vividly from reading the book is how funny it is,
and how it would take me a page or two in the beginning of each session to get
into the rhythm of the language. It's similar to Cormac McCarthy (I currently
read Blood Meridian), where the special cadence of the language makes both IJ
and BM very pleasurable to read.

_ [https://infinitejest.wallacewiki.com/david-foster-
wallace/in...](https://infinitejest.wallacewiki.com/david-foster-
wallace/index.php?title=Subsidized_Time)

~~~
mplanchard
You’re absolutely right. I can’t believe I forgot to list subsidized time and
The Great Concavity (or Convexity, depending on whether the speaker is
American or Canadian)! Thanks for the chuckle on my bus ride to work :)

------
IC4RUS
"Gore Vidal, who’s had his dick sucked more than a few times and been taken to
task for it, has written far more persuasively that the novel as an art-form
has become a cultural irrelevance, but you don’t hear him whingeing about
‘artistic invalidation’."

It's not too often that I see words like 'tentacular' and 'bathos' in the same
article as phrases about metaphorical dick-sucking (see above).

More seriously, I've been getting more into literature and literary critique
recently, and am a bit surprised about how personally affronted he seems by
the book - is this sort of reaction common in literary criticism?

~~~
vearwhershuh
The problem with any big book is that, at the end, the author has you over a
barrel: either you loved it and the author is a genius, or you hated it and
you are a sucker. Lots of people claim to love long, ponderous books just to
avoid being the sucker or for fear of appearing unsophisticated.

I prefer great authors who were serialized, e.g. dostoevsky. The works are
brilliant, but the individual chapters read well, so you rarely feel like you
have to just slog through the damned thing.

~~~
csallen
_> The problem with any big book is that, at the end, the author has you over
a barrel: either you loved it and the author is a genius, or you hated it and
you are a sucker. Lots of people claim to love long, ponderous books just to
avoid being the sucker or for fear of appearing unsophisticated._

I think this all the time. If you've made a huge commitment to something that
turned out to be worthless, it's tough to admit that to yourself and others.
So I'm a bit more skeptical when I hear positive reviews of long books,
colleges, investors, religions, marriage, having kids, etc.

------
Patrick_Devine
The first time I tried reading Infinite Jest I felt that I was dealing with
DFW's own personal trauma. I think I made it about 10% of the way through
before putting it down.

The second time I picked up the book, I made it all the way through and
thought it was absolutely brilliant. I see this in the same vein as Paul
Beatty's _The Sellout_. There's a lot of stream of consciousness, there's a
plethora of characters, and you have to really be paying attention to figure
out exactly what's going on. These books aren't for everyone, but they're
certainly important parts of American Literature.

------
luckydata
I do not like author X. A very, very long article about it. The end.

------
ydb
People love to hate David Foster Wallace. The irony is palpable when reading
critics of his writing; they at times perfectly channel Wallace in their very
critique of him. Heck, I was accosted (well, maybe the recipient of a snide
remark) on the subway in Boston while I was reading a DFW novel on my commute.
The person said that only coddled, white suburban men read his work -- when I
am _none_ of those things and sitting right on front of the person. I
immediately forgave the cynic, though, once I caught a peek of their Boston
University sweater hidden inside the crevasse of a parka's open zipper. :)

David Foster Wallace is the embodiment of a particular 20th and 21st century
zeitgeist, and one that if you read between the lines, predicts all the
ailments we will be facing in the decades ahead.

------
hnaa
Most of Infinite Jest is highly indebted to Wittgenstein's Mistress. Markson's
is the better novel.

------
ralfd
I am sympathetic to that review, as I didn't manage to finish the damn book.

------
adventskalender
I choose to believe that review, as I have only recently sold my unread copy
of IF on ebay.

------
ggm
Rang true. But true believers gotta believe just as haters gotta hate.

------
wmhorne
Funny, I found this book over a decade after it was published, having been
exposed to almost none of this "hype" whatsoever---and I still liked it. I
don't buy his thesis that its success was due only to the "hype machine." I
suppose I respect his opinion---or at least his right to having it---but I
simply do not agree with it or with many of the things he says.

> The novel has moved some 60,000 copies and racked up a stack of glowing
> reviews as thick as it is.

As far as I know, it wasn't nominated for a single major literary award that
year (at the very least, it didn't win any), and I wouldn't remotely agree
that the reviews were "glowing." A quick search finds two at best ambivalent
reviews: [^1] [^2]. Though their comments came later, Harold Bloom and James
Wood were highly critical of Wallace, the former declaring him to have "no
discernible talent." It feels terribly one-sided to mention only the stack of
positive reviews. IJ was by no means a universal critical success.

> ... both [The Broom of the System and Infinite Jest], most importantly, work
> up an elaborate – and elaborately digressive – plot which deliberately ends
> as unsatisfactorily as possible.

While I can't speak for Broom. which I didn't finish, I can say that my
reading of IJ's ending was that it was not at all deliberately unsatisfactory.
In fact, I felt it was the opposite: it's beautiful, and it marks the moment
when Gately finally gets out of his recursive cycle of addiction. I think it's
where the book (whose structure is itself fascinating---a circle and/or a
Sierpinski Gasket) ought to have ended, and while some could say it was
unsatisfactory for them, I don't think they could claim it was deliberately
so.

> There is first of all Hal Incandenza, a teenage tennis prodigy and marijuana
> addict who during the course of the book plays tennis and gets high a lot,
> and then tries to stop getting high – that’s his plot.

Isn't there a bit more to Hal's story? What about the struggle the ghost of
his dead father makes to connect Hal to the world and to feelings? To exit his
head, as it were? What about Hal's finding that same dad dead in the house up
the hill from his school dorm? What about his recession into himself and his
dislocation from language, his Kafkaesque inversion?

> Then there’s Don Gately, a former housebreaker and narcotics addict who goes
> straight before the book even opens and merely attempts to stay that way
> throughout the course of the novel – that’s his plot.

Nothing of his struggles to pray daily to a God he doesn't believe in, simply
in an effort to stay sober for another 24 hours? Nothing of his role as a
leader and mentor at the Ennet halfway house, or the scenes where he
transcends his identity as a witless muscle-for-hire criminal upon whose head
friends would close elevator doors for a laugh to connect with and care for
his community? (The scene where he, in a joke apron and chef's hat, he makes
pasta for the housemates brought me to tears.) Still nothing of his falling in
love with Joelle? Nor of his fight in the resident's defense, his
hospitalization, and his transition into a vivid memoryscape of his days as a
junkie and crook?

> All of which, I suppose, is just a polite way of saying that if the author
> of Infinite Jest shut off his word-processor and actually went to a wine-
> and-cheese party he might find out what the word ‘reading’ really means

He wrote it longhand and was a recovering alcoholic/addict. No word processors
or wine parties for him.

Yes, I have in certain ways fallen out of love with Infinite Jest, but I still
refute the claim that there was nothing there in the first place. There was
something in it for me when I read it alone in rural Thailand over a summer in
2013, and there's been something in it for many other readers I know, too.
This wasn't just because we were told something was there, but because we
found something there.

IJ's not perfect. It deserves critique, and it is certainly flawed. (Parts of
it do make me cringe.) But I admire it nonetheless. It took courage to write a
novel that strived towards the real---more, I'm afraid, than it required for
this LRB review.

[^1]: [https://www.nytimes.com/1996/02/13/books/books-of-the-
times-...](https://www.nytimes.com/1996/02/13/books/books-of-the-times-a-
country-dying-of-laughter-in-1079-pages.html)

[^2]: [https://www.nytimes.com/1996/03/03/news/infinite-
jest.html](https://www.nytimes.com/1996/03/03/news/infinite-jest.html)

~~~
perl4ever
"Nothing of his struggles to pray daily to a God he doesn't believe in, simply
in an effort to stay sober for another 24 hours?"

One of the novels that affected me the most as a teen, and turned out to have
even deeper meaning to me than I originally realized, I happened to look up on
Amazon a decade or two on, and was startled that some reviewers said things
like (paraphrasing) "this book sucks because all the characters are losers!"

------
sayrer
"ultimately the novels strike me as more crudités than smorgasbord"

...ok dude. :)

------
Invictus0
A real book "not worth the paper it's written on" simply falls out of print
and is not reviewed; it does not generate twenty more pages of overpretentious
literary diatribe decades later. Readers are advised to skip this article.

~~~
stupidcar
The article is a contemporary review.

~~~
apotatopot
That's exactly the point of the comment you're replying to.

