Milestone Reached: Page 73 (7%)
Chapters Read:
| Chapter | Beginning Page | Synopsis |
|---|---|---|
| YEAR OF GLAD | 3 | Hal interviews at the University of Arizona; in a flashback, Hal eats mold as a child. |
| YEAR OF THE DEPEND ADULT UNDERGARMENT | 17 | Erdedy awaits a delivery of pot. |
| 1 APRIL — YEAR OF THE TUCKS MEDICATED PAD | 27 | Hal speaks with a “professional conversationalist”. |
| 9 MAY — YEAR OF THE DEPEND ADULT UNDERGARMENT | 32 | Hal, sharing a room with his older brother Mario, receives a call from the eldest brother Orin |
| YEAR OF THE DEPEND ADULT UNDERGARMENT | 33 | A medical attaché discovers that his wife is out, and so selects an unmarked entertainment cartridge to watch. |
| YEAR OF THE TRIAL-SIZE DOVE BAR | 37 | Clenette describes Wardine, Wardine’s mother, and Roy Tony; Bruce Green falls in love with and eventually woos Mildred Bonk. |
| YEAR OF THE DEPEND ADULT UNDERGARMENT | 39 | Hal and Mario reminisce about their father (Himself) and his death; medical attaché continues to watch cartridge. |
| OCTOBER — YEAR OF THE DEPEND ADULT UNDERGARMENT | 42 | Orin kills roaches and wishes he could get rid of last night’s “Subject”. |
| YEAR OF THE DEPEND ADULT UNDERGARMENT | 49 | Hal smokes pot in the Pump Room. |
| AUTUMN — YEAR OF DAIRY PRODUCTS FROM THE AMERICAN HEARTLAND | 55 | Don Gatley accidentally kills a man while robbing his home. |
| 3 NOVEMBER — YEAR OF THE DEPEND ADULT UNDERGARMENT | 60 | Jim Troelsch–a student at the Enfield Tennis Academy (ETA)–is sick; someone has a nightmare about a face in the floor (told in first-person). |
| AS OF YEAR OF THE DEPEND ADULT UNDERGARMENT | 63 | The history of ETA and its founder James Orin Incandenza (father to Hal, Orin, and Mario). |
| DENVER CO, 1 NOVEMBER YEAR OF THE DEPEND ADULT UNDERGARMENT | 65 | Orin glides into Mile High Stadium in a Cardinals costume; Michael Pemulis talks to his “Little Buddies” at ETA about drugs; Hal relates a dream that he used to have nightly. |
| YEAR OF THE DEPEND ADULT UNDERGARMENT | 68 (continues to page 85) | Kate Gompert is in the hospital, speaks about the depression her addition to pot engenders. |
New Characters:
Characters in bold appear to be major.
YEAR OF GLAD (page 3)
- Harold (Hal) James Incandenza: Protagonist. Student at the Enfield Tennis Academy; son of James Orin Incandenza and Avril Incandenza; younger brother to Orin Incandenza and Mario Incandenza.
- Dr. Charles Tavis: Hal’s mother’s “adoptive brother”; accompanies Hal to University of Arizona interview.
- Avril Mondragon Tavis Incandenza (“The Moms”): Wife to James Orin Incandenza, Mother to Orin, Mario, and Hal. Dean of Academic Affairs at ETA; grammarian supreme.
- Aubrey F. deLint: ETA prorector.
- Kirk White: University of Arizona Varsity Coach.
- Mr. Sawyer: University of Arizona Dean of Academics.
- Bill: University of Arizona Dean of Athletics.
- Unnamed: Dean of Admissions, Dean of Composition.
YEAR OF THE DEPEND ADULT UNDERGARMENT (page 17)
- Erdedy – Pot addict, who swears that each pot binge will be his last.
- Unnamed: Female who promised to deliver pot to Eldedy.
1 APRIL — YEAR OF THE TUCKS MEDICATED PAD (page 27)
- “Conversational Professional”: Possibly Himself in disguise.
9 MAY — YEAR OF THE DEPEND ADULT UNDERGARMENT (page 32)
- Mario Incandenza: Older brother to Hal; has some sort of deformity.
YEAR OF THE DEPEND ADULT UNDERGARMENT (page 33)
- Unnamed: Medical attaché (first to watch the mysterious, unnamed cartridge), Medical attaché’s wife.
YEAR OF THE TRIAL-SIZE DOVE BAR (page 37)
- Clenette Henderson: Relates the story of Wardine.
- Wardine: Clenette’s half-sister and friend who is beaten by Roy Tony.
- Reginald: Wardine’s boyfriend.
- Roy Tony: Dealer; Wardine’s mother’s “man”.
- Delores Epps – Clenette’s friend.
- Columbus Epps – Delores’ brother, killed by Roy Tony four years ago (over Clenette’s mother).
- Unnamed: Wardine’s mother.
- Bruce Green: Husband to Mildred L. Bonk; father to Harriet Bonk-Green.
- Mildred L. Bonk: Wife to Bruce Green; mother to Harriet Bonk-Green.
- Tommy Doocey: Harelipped pot-dealer (possibly the source of Erdedy’s pot).
- Harriet Bonk-Green: Mildred and Bruce’s daughter
OCTOBER — YEAR OF THE DEPEND ADULT UNDERGARMENT (page 42)
- Orin Incandenza: Eldest Incandenza brother. Plays football, sleeps with “subjects”, hates roaches.
AUTUMN — YEAR OF DAIRY PRODUCTS FROM THE AMERICAN HEARTLAND (page 55)
- Donald “Don” W. Gately: Enormous guy (over 6 ft., close to 300 lbs), thief, murderer (albeit by accident), and “active drug addict”.
- Guillaume DuPlessis: Homeowner killed by Gately.
- Trent ‘Quo Vadis’ Kite: Gately’s “associate”.
3 NOVEMBER — YEAR OF THE DEPEND ADULT UNDERGARMENT (page 60)
- Jim Troelsch: Ill member of the 18s B squad at ETA.
AS OF YEAR OF THE DEPEND ADULT UNDERGARMENT (page 63)
- Dr. James Orin Incandenza (“Himself”): Husband of Avril, father to Orin, Mario, and Hal. Founder of ETA, filmmaker, inventor. Died in The Year of the Trial-Sized Dove Bar.
DENVER CO, 1 NOVEMBER YEAR OF THE DEPEND ADULT UNDERGARMENT (page 65)
- Michael Pemulis: Member of the 18s B squad at ETA; friend to Hal and Mario.
YEAR OF THE DEPEND ADULT UNDERGARMENT (page 68)
- Kathrine “Kate” Ann Gompert: Pot addict, depressive. First seen in hospital.
- Unnamed: Kate’s doctor.
- Gerhardt Schtitt: Head Coach and Athletic Director at E.T.A. Old; borderline fascist; friends with Mario.
Vocabulary: We we originally planning to have a weekly “vocab dump” as part of the summaries, but that now strikes us as unnecessary. For one thing, most readers appear to have have taken to heart the suggestion that IJ be read with the OED at hand. For another, the Infinite Jest Wiki lists most 37¢-words and definitions by page number, and the Infinite Jest Vocabulary Glossary is also available for perusal.
Sources consulted during the compilation of this summation: the Infinite Jest Character Profiles (author unknown), Ben’s Infinite Spreadsheet, Dr. Keith O’Neil’s Infinite Jest Reader’s Guide, and Steve Russillo’s Chapter Thumbnails.
Re: the conversationalist “possibly” being JOI: it’s totally him, and I don’t think there’s much left open for us to leave this as a tentative ID.
1) He’s wearing a disguise as well as one of JOI’s vests;
2) His own son recognizes him;
3) JOI has a film about this very set-up (It Was a Great Marvel That He Was in the Father Without Knowing Him where “A father [...], suffering from the delusion that his etymologically precocious son [...] is pretending to be mute, poses as a ‘professional conersationalist’ in oder to draw the boy out” (992-3). That’s released in March of the Year of the Trial-Size Dove Bar which is the year after the Year of the Tucks Medicated Pad (in which the event takes place).
Just a word of warning as somebody who’s read the book before: you need to be willing to connect the dots here, since there are a number of times where DFW will bring things right to the cusp of understanding without making things explicitly clear, even though all of the clues are present (not to make this sound too much like a puzzle [re: the last entry here, since I'm totally down with that too]).
AND it was April 1st… definitely Himself.
See my IS progress at http://bungle.posterous.com/
Agreed that it is definitely JOI – you pointed out all of the clues – he also says in regard to his own father’s silence to him as a boy “And who after all this light and noise has apparently spawned the same silence?”
man, why did i write all this stuff down myself?
I think you all mean Ken Erdedy for the pg 17 recap, as opposed to Steve.
Corrected, thanks.
What a fantastic write up! These will, no doubt, go far in aiding the reading process as the pages fly by. Thanks.
I think Mario is Hal’s older brother
Holy smokes, you are right. I honestly thought it was Orin, Hal, and then Mario–probably because I envision Mario as a tiny, Owen Meany like figure.
Also: am I correct that we have yet to actually meet Arvil Incandenza, or am I forgetting an appearance?
Uh, the incident with the mold.
Ha! Oh yes, that.
That was a great scene.
Hal and Mario are only separated by a year which may be why the confusion. If I’ve got the dates right, their births are roughly:
Orin: 1983
Mario: 1991
Hal: 1992
This is pretty fantastic. I was thinking of doing this the *next* time I read IJ. Your notes ought to make blogging this much easier. Cheers.
Wardine is actually Clenette’s half sister, isn’t she?
I don’t think Gately’s associate during the DuPlessis robbery is exactly unnamed; at least two endnotes during this passage (13 and 16) identify him as Trent ‘Quo Vadis’ Kite.
[...] which leads me to believe I will be able to finish this sucker ahead of time. And skimming the weekly summary posted on the IS website, I know I’m actually retaining [...]
oh, and did we get Erdedy’s name in the text yet? Remember discussing this with my roommate… she thought it was a flashback on Hal waiting for pot. I thought it was someone yet unnamed.
Erdedy’s name is mentioned in the text, yes. In the third sentence of the section. “Erdedy thought she would have come by now.”
He’s named. We get his last name but not his first name.
I too kinda find Erdedy-as-narrator a little bit of a spoiler as I’m pretty sure he remains unnamed.
Also I’m a little bummed there isn’t going to be a vocab dump, I was looking forward to it. I for one just can’t stop at every unknown word (especially in a book so full of them)–the purposefully disconnective end notes are difficult enough for my distracted-reader brain as it is. I plan on going through the word lists when I finish, but having it laid out a little more regularly would be kind of nice… just sayin’.
He does not, but he’s not a narrator either. It’s third-person limited narration from Erdedy’s point of view and he’s clearly named as the pot addict on pg. 17
First three sentences of that section:
This is exactly why we’ll be doing the summaries: it’s so easy to overlook a name in the wall of text, or (in my case) mix up the order of siblings, etc.
Yeah, I noticed E.’s name now (and fine OK not as “narrator” as such, whoops); this is indeed exactly the reason why the summaries are so helpful.
–I’ve actually bookmarked p. 17 now, as there seem to be some interesting foreshadow-y things going on there I just breezed over.
“Where was the woman who said she’d come. She said she would come. Erdedy thought she’d have come by now.”
(page 17)
As far as the narrator is concerned.
Ok this is my first time reading this (and non of my friends have ever read it) so if i’m right no one can blame me for spoiling. I’m taking a stab at saying that the unnamed video that is being watched by the medical attache is non other than J.O Incandenza’s own final film Infinite Jest. According to the footnotes there is very little assurance that it was in fact ever viewed and “radical experiments in viewer’s optical perspective and context”. Furthermore we realize right from the get-go that Hal has some form of impediment (vocal and physical) I believe this has come from watching his fathers movies as well.
Well I guess no matter how tough this book gets for me I have to stick with it just to see if I”m right.
any thoughts????
That’s correct, yes.
I suppose Dustin’s comment is OK because it was just speculation, but I am really disappointed to have spoilers appearing in the comments. Please keep it in your pants from now on.
Er, at least as far as the attache is concerned. Hal’s problem is another story entirely and not necessarily IJ.
That seems clear to me. I think it is a bit of a guess still but hard not to make that guess.
I am reading the 1997 version, but I was looking at the newer version (with Dave Eggers’ foreword) and it says right on the cover that IJ is the mysterious Entertainment that the attaché watches…which to me seems like a major spoiler! Maybe I was just very slooooow but I was on like page 500 and hadn’t figured that out yet.
That’s a great wiki. I do beloved it’s going to be a constant companion from here on out.
This was a great summary; thanks, Matt! The only, relatively small, frustration I’m finding is that it’s very, very difficult to match page numbers with Kindle locations. I was psyched when I saw that your syllabus included locations, but sadly, now, through a monster of your own making, I expect locations to accompany all references to page numbers. Sorry, amigo, them’s the breaks!
I can’t belive how fun this whole venture is. I shouldn’t admit this, since I actually have a degree in English from a bona fide university, but I hadn’t even heard of Infinite Jest before this whole Infinite Summer thing began. However, reading it now with everyone here is making it feel like a movement of sorts and an amazing journey. I’m glued to #infsum and the FB group. All in all, it’s great fun, and I do hope that this is a small glimpse of the possible future of books and reading and the internet. tyvm!!!
and I do hope that this is a small glimpse of the possible future of books and reading and the internet.
Hear hear! I’m wondering what we’re all going to read together next summer.
Thanks for the summary. Reading it over brought back many pleasant memories. I’m having trouble keeping all the threads in my head right now… this will certainly help!
PROFESSIONAL CONVERSATIONALIST: This is my second reading of /IJ/, and this time around I noticed that the narrative is coalescing for me quite satisfyingly (as also one of the commentators described). For example this scene: once you cut through the jargon and .37-words, you see here a mentally addled man trying desperately to communicate with his son. That line, “…Who’s lived his whole ruddy bloody cruddy life in five-walled rooms,” strikes me as a poignant description of a life lived with mental illness; i.e., how a chemically impaired brain might shut out or obfuscate basic, normal communication.
MARIO INC AS OWEN MEANY: I think Mario is kind of Owen Meany-ish. HE DOESN’T TALK LIKE THIS, but his basic good-heartedness and kindness and goodness in the face of horrific handicaps (OK, that last isn’t exactly OM …) is one of this novel’s biggest engines of pathos. Mario is without question one of my top five favorite novel characters ever.
INFINITE SUMMER: This is a ton of fun. I’m having a blast with this, a true nerds-paradise blast.
Hey, thanks for the shoutout! I’m glad my spreadsheet is being used, as that will hopefully inspire me to keep it updated. Looks like others before me have gone about it in a similar if more thorough fashion…
[...] 29, 2009 · Leave a Comment Infinite Summer gave me a nice shout out in the reference section to the admittedly much-easier-on-the-eyes summary they’re putting together. Their character [...]
[...] then there are very, very informative and helpful posts at the Infinite Summer blog, such as this weekly summary, which lists chapters that the group has read so far with a plot synopsis for each one, as well as [...]
[...] may just pick up the book again to keep up with all the commentary on this site, including awesome weekly summaries of plot points and new characters, reading tips, and guest posts from writers who are also [...]
Can’t help wishing I hadn’t read the above comment (and confirmation) about the mysterious entertainment cartridge — that was a major spoiler for me!
I wish I hadn’t seen it also. I am probably going to stay away from the comments from now on. The summary was very helpful, though.
I don’t know what to make of the superscript numeral 1′s that sometimes show up — e.g., on p. 82 with “Lieber Gott” — they don’t have anything to do with endnote 1. Anyone know?
Apparently this is a misprint. See http://infinitesummer.org/forums/viewtopic.php?f=19&t=162 and http://infinitesummer.org/forums/viewtopic.php?f=12&t=83.
Thanks for the Wiki link — very helpful! By the way, I think the definition for ONANNCAA in pp. 3-27 constitutes a spoiler, because we don’t know what ONAN stands for yet (do we?).
[...] may just pick up the book again to keep up with all the commentary on this site, including awesome weekly summaries of plot points and new characters, reading tips, and guest posts from writers who are also [...]
[...] the end of the reading week, Infinite Summer is posting a Weekly Summary that will, I imagine, prove endlessly helpful as the reading progresses. Also, the way the IS [...]
[...] It also sets the framework for tackling Infinite Jest as part of a sort-of book club, with weekly commentary of the read portions, a glossary and a wiki that lists any weird shit (grammar-wise only. [...]
[...] an Infinite Summery from 2009. just read the next 10 pages (up through 73) and then you won’t feel spoilered. they do a [...]