Warning: This post does not contain spoilers in the traditional sense of the word (i.e., information to which you have not yet been privy), but it does synthesize some data points to reveal a (IMO, non-critical) fact to which you may not have tumbled yourself. There are likely many more in the comments. If you prefer to make all the connections yourself, feel free to skip today’s entry.
Consider the following:
- On page 64 it says “Professor James O. Incandenza, Jr.’s untimely suicide at fifty-four was held a great loss in at least three worlds.”
- On page 157 the header is “WINTER B.S. 1960“.
- On page 159, James O. Incandenza, Jr.’s age is given as ten.
- One page 172, the (abridged) header is “TENNIS AND THE FERAL PRODIGY … IN THE YEAR OF THE YUSHITYU 2007 MIMETIC-RESOLUTION-CARTRIDGE-VIEW-MOTHERBOARD [etc.] … ALMOST EXACTLY THREE YEARS AFTER DR. JAMES O. INCANDENZA PASSED FROM THIS LIFE”.
- On page 223 we learn that the Year of the Trial-Sized Dove Bar fell three years before YY2007MRCVMETIUFI/ITPSFH,O,OM(s).
So, let’s see. James was 10 in 1960, so he was born in 1950 (or possibly 1949, if the passage set in 1960 transpired before his birthdate). He died 54 years later, in the Year of the Trial-Sized Dove Bar. 1950 + 54 = 2004. Therefore, the Year of the Trial-Sized Dove Bar is 2004, and The Year of the Depend Adult Undergarment (which falls five years later) is 2004 + 5 = 2009. Plus or minus a year, depending on the exact date of his birth.
I feel compelled to tout this particular instance of deductive excellence on my part because it is the only one I have successfully completed.28
Meanwhile, in the forums, readers blithely mention connections that I totally, completely missed. “X said Y and Z said Y, therefore X is Z.” That kind of stuff. It makes me want to turn back to page 3 and just start over, and this time transcribe the novel into a notebook line-by-line, to ensure that I don’t miss a thing.
It also makes me feel like George Michael. No, the other George Michael.
(Just mentally replace the phrase “math problem” with “contemporary post-modern masterpiece”.)29
I love a good mystery as much as the next guy, but finding clues in Infinite Jest sometimes feels like trying to find a pattern in the digits of pi, or solving various quests in an adventure video game (“You seek the Crown of Midas? Alas, it was broken in seven pieces, each of which was placed in a different world. Run around for the next 35 hours and collect them all, why don’t you?”).30
How say you? Do you like the treasure hunt aspect of the novel, or do you occasionally find yourself wishing Wallace would quit with the coy and give us the straight dope? What connections have you unearthed thus far?
Misc:
Thunder Stolen: My original topic for today’s post was going to be the Wardine and yrstruly sections, but on Friday that particular discussion broke out like a brawl in a soccer bar. It’s even spilled over to yesterday’s Roundup thread and, frankly, I am now kind of relieved that I wasn’t the one to first throw a folding chair.
Self-PUNK’D: I finished the 14-page endnote 110 (yeah, I’m a bit ahead of schedule–shhhh!). It’s so long that I had to take a break in the middle of it. When I returned and saw my bookmark one centimeter from the end of the novel rather than the beginning, I had a momentary, electric thrill. It was like finding a $20 bill on the ground, and then remembering that you are in your own bedroom.
Art Imitates Life: My friend J. was going to participate in Infinite Summer, but then she decided that she had too many other books that she wanted to read . “Funny thing, though,” she told me over the weekend. “The first book I read was The Emperor’s Children, which had a character who was trying to read Infinite Jest to impress people on the Internet.”
Oh quit with the coy … that’s every second day.
2004 plus three years is… 2007, right?
Dumb. DUMB!!
(and corrected – thx.)
<3
Broken endnote? I think the one you have as 23 should go to 30. Unless you don’t want us to read endnote 30, want us to read endnote 23 again, and then want us to click on that 23 to end up back in the post from last week about the bricklayer story.
Wait, maybe that is what you want. There is hidden meaning here. I shall seek to put the pieces together.
1. If I hadn’t known that you hadn’t read the book prior to launching Infinite Summer I might have thought that you chose this year to do it for its YDAU convergence. A nice coincidence, though, even if it wasn’t engineered.
2. This is a re-read for me, and the whole thing feels like a treasure trove of missed clues and connections. I don’t know that it’s worth trying to catch them all the first time through; save some fun for your next pass rather than getting paralyzed.
This has been very true in my experience also: first vs.second time through.
And another agreement on second-time reading. For those of us unaccustomed to careful reading, the first time through can be really tough. Without the “what’s going to happen next?” mindset, it’s much easier to relax and appreciate everything else, which actually includes appreciating why things happen and the relationships between the events. Reading IJ for plot is like drinking expensive wine because you’re thirsty.
and isn’t it all the more creepy that DFW eliminated his own map for keeps before a few months before the YDAU?
What creeps me out is the fact that y’all can only be bothered to finish this work of genius, which I’ve read pre-mortem, ’cause DFW de-mapped himself. How ’bout y’all buy Thriller, now? Keep congratulating yourselves. Hey! Shakespeare’s dead!
Holy shit… Michael Jackson’s dead?
Wow. That was a truly lame comment, Matt.
Also, Matt, are you suggesting that DFW wouldn’t want something like Infinite Summer to happen after his death? That he would be creeped out? What better tribute or honor to an author could there be than to have hundreds (thousands?) of strangers get together online to read and discuss the author’s work? Don’t authors want to see their works live on? Isn’t that what is going on at this site every day?
Sure, it would have been great if DFW had lived to see this happen. But he died young, and shocked a lot of us who had figured we would read IJ or his other stuff someday, into action. DFW’s passing is sad, but I’m not sure what you’re suggesting. Those who hadn’t read his stuff before should not bother?
More to the point, it seems like your main fear is that new readers, who hadn’t read IJ “pre-mortem” are now opening up to DFW, and this threatens your sense of territoriality or prior possession or whatever regarding DFW/IJ. To that, I can only say, get over it.
Jeez. Do you want a cookie?
Way to overgeneralize. I read it back in 2002 and have been meaning to reread it for a while. This was a good enough excuse as any.
I love the treasure hunt aspect, in a way it is like a DVD version of literature. In fact I think IJ obviously predicts not only the blossoming internet but the DVD approach to art. In this way the novel reminds me of a Fincher film on DVD; not only do you have probably a masterpiece, but you have an even more entertaining deconstruction of the masterpiece. Although it is also a bit like Terry Gilliam’s BRAZIL, where the fact that the author has thrown in the sum total of his mortal knowledge is both thrilling and exhausting.
Not related to thread, but if they can make a watchable WATCHMEN film, I think a masterful IJ miniseries can be made. Where are you HBO? Get David Simon and Charlie Kaufman on the phone and get it made.
I don’t know why people (including Stephen Burn, who wrote the excellent Reader’s Guide) are often reluctant to just accept YY2007MRCVMETIUFI/ITPSFH,O,OM(s) as 2007 and deduce everything else from that. The Dowling and Bell Companion actually gets the calendar wrong!
When I first reached page 223 and saw that one of the products had a year in its name, I figured it was Wallace’s way of letting me know he was done messing with my head. (Chronology-wise only, of course.)
Personally, when I first encountered “YY2007MRCVMETIUFI/ITPSFH,O,OM(s)”, my assumption was that Subsidized Years must begin in 2008 or later, on the theory that no one would be allowed to use Gregorian dates after subsidization began.
As for why a tech company would be touting a product with “2007″ in it’s title after 2007–well, anyone with “Office 2007″ (or “Windows 98″, heaven forfend) can answer that one.
I don’t think President Gentle/the U.S./the O.N.A.N. could force other countries to use Subsidized Time year-names. The maker of the upgrade is probably Japanese, right?
Has anyone noticed that DFW’s math wasn’t exactly flawless w/r/t this whole ST thing, though? Because, okay, so on page 223, we have the outline of Subsidized Time, right? But so when Hal meets with the professional conservationalist on April Fools Day in The Year of the Tucks Medicated Pad, he’s 12, going on 13. How, then, is he only 17 in the Year of the Depend Adult Undergarment, which is six years later? He should be 18 at the very youngest in that case, turning 19 in June that year.
Snarky Amber: Oh yeah, that was real frustrating. I noticed that right away (cough, looks at shoe).
(Tries to think of some other anomaly and draws blank because I have no idea when anything happens and the order of years of this or that. So my way of handling this is to decide that every clue is a non-clue and that everything that is supposed to be true turns out to be false. And it was all a dream!)
Treasure Hunt: Not even doing it. When I do notice some connection or something I enjoy the woven-together aspect of things. But the hunt for secret clues is not my bag.
But M, I love the idea of self-punking and the character reading Infinite Jest to impress people on the internet.
Is Infinite Jest supposed to be really hard to read? I admit that charting things to the Nth detail would be hard but this is not a hard book to just…read. Well, not in the lazy way I’m doing it.
In that scene Hal is only 10. The exchange (on pg 27) is:
“You’re how old, Hal, fourteen?”
“I’ll be eleven in June.”
So it ends up adding up correctly. I had to go back and actually reread it I was so frustrated with a possible timeslip.
I assure you, I don’t have a reading comprehension problem, Chris. My copy says “I’ll be thirteen in June.” However, as indicated below, it sounds like later editions were corrected. That makes sense – my copy is a first edition.
I think this was discussed on the board – in some versions of the book, Hal is 13 in that scene, but in later versions, DFW updated it and Hal is 11 instead – perhaps because he initially made an error.
I actually believe there are other, perhaps irreconcilable, contradictions with the timeline. I’ve started a discussion thread on the matter here: http://infinitesummer.org/forums/viewtopic.php?f=13&t=297
I know! That was my post that you redirected.
It’s worth noting that just below the line you point out, Todeswalzer, Hal makes another mistake (which O. corrects), and once again it’s a mistake where Hal says something that is incredibly precise. (Hal’s reply to O.? “How embarassing. When the skills go, they go.”)
There are undoubtedly other weird things going on with the narrative’s chronology but for this case, DFW is hitting us over the head with it.
I like the treasure hunt aspect, mainly because it’s optional. The book is fantastic as just a straight-through exploration, but it encourages repeated readings, which is part and parcel with its’ two-faced nature.
Yes, DFW’s math wasn’t flawless. I think he admitted it himself in some interview or another.
Re-reading I’m on page 105-ish [I've been paging through IJ ... on my iPod ... hehe] and there’s this talk between Marathe and Steeply that’s just extremepy illuminating.
Man, I’ve re-read IJ like four times and all I want to do is read it again. It really is the video in book form.
I don’t go in for the treasure hunt much, however, I was struck by the information on page 249, which takes place on 5 November, YDAU, where Hal mentions that it’s been “four years 216 days” since his father killed himself. This puts Jim’s death at 3 April, Year of the Purdue Wonderchicken. (I think. Be gentle if I’m wrong — I really suck at math.) Is DFW contradicting himself or am I misunderstanding/miscalculating?
He seems to have contradicted himself similarly in other places as well. He said Yushityu was three years after JOI’s death and DAU was four years after, but in the chronology, there’s a year in between. It wouldn’t make sense without that extra year, because Hal couldn’t be 17 in DAU without it, he’d have to be 16. I’m finding tons of other year-related discrepancies, but I’m thinking either it was intentional, to mislead the reader, or just a byproduct of too much information.
On my first read thru, I was having too much fun plowing onward to go nuts on the treasure hunt (basically, used page 223 to get the rough sense and left it at that)…I think it is important to not let the possibility that you are missing something paralyze you (analysis paralysis?)…one reason a lot of people may burn out on this book is because they set their personal bar too high(“I MUST PROVE MY CLOSE-READING PROWESS! I MUST NOT LET SMARTYPANTS DFW DEFEAT ME!”), which can make the reading a chore. For me, it’s gotta be tied to pleasure in reading at whatever level: I think the treasure hunt stuff is a brilliant move on DFW’s part to add pleasure to possible re-readings: I get a pleasure out of obsessively close reading of passages now that there is no way I would have enjoyed in that way on the first reading.
Oh, and it’ll be fun to talk about that footnote 110 when it leaves the spoiler zone, and also to talk more about the timeline a few more chunks of pages down the road.
Also, on p95, we are informed that November 3rd in YDAU is a Tuesday. This happens in 1998, 2009, and 2015. 2009 being the most likely, given other factors.
And, also, Subsidized Time is referred to in a number of places as ‘Lunar’ (though I can’t find a reference offhand), which allows some freedom in years not matching up exactly.
This is going to sound uncharitable, or perhaps not in the spirit of things, but does anyone feel like the whole “subsidized time” thing is sort of unfunny and lame, and entirely unbelievable, to boot? Am I alone in finding the “Year of the Whisper-Quiet Maytag Dishmaster” and the “Year of the Yushityu 2007 Mimetic-Resolution-Cartridge-View-Motherboard-Easy-To-Install-Upgrade For Infernatron/InterLace TP Systems For Home, Office, Or Mobile” just not that funny? Really, DFW coming up with the “Year of the Perdue Wonderchicken” doesn’t strike me as great writing — even as parodic science fiction it would be lame.
To me, part of the problem is IJ’s sort of half-ass effort to be a science fiction novel, while not at all really being a science fiction novel.
The aspects of the book that are “science fictional” (O.N.A.N., the Great Convexity/Concavity, etc.) are, to my mind, just tacked on pointless frivolities: the core of the book has to do with tennis academies, academics, drug addiction, etc.: there is absolutely no need these themes and characters have to be tossed into some half-heartedly realized future — and there’s no purpose I can see that’s served by the half-assed science fictional aspects.
My suggestion is that DFW’s strength was not futurism, not in the hard science vein of Kim Stanley Robinson, the near-future version of William Gibson, or the goofier and more psychological version of Philip K. Dick, or the satiric sci-fi of Vonnegut. DFW obviously had enough going on with the digressions, the fixation on minutia, the endnotes, etc. It’s unclear why DFW felt the need, on top of all of that, to shove the stories in IJ, which read like stories from the 1990′s, ten or fifteen years into the future, to no real effect. Perhaps to be different? Perhaps to escape charges that he was simply aping the style of 90′s contemporaries like Nicholson Baker (see MEZZANINE)? I.e., “It’s totally different! — mine is set in the FUTURE.”
I obviously don’t know, but DFW’s attempts to glom on science fictional doodads to a very unfuturistic set of stories seems forced and unsuccessful to me. Perhaps I am alone in this sentiment.
I think it’s the “(sic)” at the end of The Year of the Yushityu… that makes it funny/-ier.
The only response I’ve heard DFW give on the subsidized year concept was on the Leonard Lopate interview when he (Lopate) tried to get him to concede that it was (basically) a wacky joke and DFW totally seriously said “It’s not meant to be funny, it’s meant to be entirely plausible. Given the level of courage congress has about raising taxes, it seemsto be a fairly painless and plausible way of reducing the deficit.”
I just think some stuff would sit better if you didn’t consider it an unfunny joke.
Wow. . . you mean your stomach doesn’t turn when you hear names like STAPLES Center, NOKIA Theater, Edison Field? (oooh, L.A. specific, sorry, endnote please?) Maybe you’re too young to remember when event centers and sports fields all had names that actually meant something, rather than serving as colossal advertising space.
I think ST is one of the most clever and brutally hilarious commentaries on American consumerism/commercialism I’ve read in a while. And yeah, I still chuckle at it when I’m not thinking to myself, “Geez, I hope I’m gone before this becomes a reality!”
Just in the last two months or so, I have read articles about the possibility of buying naming rights to New York City subway stations and university courses. The idea of subsidized time is rapidly becoming less “funny because it’s absurd” and more “funny because it’s true.”
I think it’s inaccurate to characterize Infinite Jest as a science fiction novel, for a couple of reasons. First, the technology in the novel isn’t significantly different from what was available at the time of writing (1996); and second, the technology is largely incidental to the themes and plot-lines. What I mean by that is this: In science fiction proper, the “fiction” part directly emerges out of the technological aspect — think of H.G. Wells’ War of the Worlds or The Invisible Man. Those stories can’t exist at all without the “science” part.
That isn’t the case here. Our current society is already overrun with consumerism, addiction, depression, etc. The point of the near-future setting, from what I can gather, isn’t “just to be different” but to open a broader space for parody, satire, and sarcasm to reveal just how absurd our current society really is.
I guess it’s a matter of personal taste whether you find that approach to be appealing. I myself think “Subsidized Time” is both far-fetched and not — and hilarious for precisely that reason.
Todeswalzer: I think we are in partial agreement. I agree with you that it’s inaccurate to call IJ a science fiction novel: IJ’s just not sci-fi, for the reasons we’ve both noted.
And as you note, the world in 1996 was “already overrun with consumerism, addiction, depression, etc.” I guess where we differ is that your take on the near-future setting is that it “open[s] a broader space for parody, satire, and sarcasm to reveal just how absurd our current society really is.” (But, that of course, is what classic sci-fi does [e.g., Dick, Vonnegut].) I, on the other hand, don’t think there was any need to force the world of tennis academies and rehabilitation centers into a near future to accomplish the goals you mention.
My problem is that DFW seems to be messing with Mr. In-Between. That is, IJ feels like it can’t decide whether it really is a sci-fi work with important things to say about technology, possible futures (that speak to the state of the present), etc., or if it’s a more conventional work about deeply personal states of need, addiction, etc.
And that, to me, is a deep flaw here, and part of what lends IJ a generally half-baked, unfinished, first-draft flavor. It also suggests to me that DFW didn’t feel that the crucial parts of the book addressing addiction, depression, breakdown, etc., could stand on their own, and that they needed an elaborate set of gaudy, ornamental trappings and accessories. Those trappings don’t really do much work (in my view) and seem like self-indulgent silliness.
But as you say, different strokes….
As an addendum, I would note that the take on IJ offered above may help to explain why, for example, the videophone section, as interesting as it may have been, felt a little jarring and tacked-on.
it can’t be a novel about addiction, achievement, and deeply personal states of need as experienced in our particular society (the US as it adapts to rapidly evolving technologies that are inherently isolating)? I don’t see why it has to be one or the other. Even if I didn’t like it, the last thing I’d call IJ is half-baked.
“[I]t can’t be a novel about addiction, achievement, and deeply personal states of need as experienced in our particular society (the US as it adapts to rapidly evolving technologies that are inherently isolating)? I don’t see why it has to be one or the other.”
I don’t think you mean to be, but I believe you are making my point. What Todeswalzer and I were discussing were the merits of placing IJ in the near future. He sees certain benefits to that approach; I find it to be unsuccessful and distracting.
Your comment suggests that you don’t see the need to place the novel in the near future either — unless I’m somehow misreading “in our particular society . . . .”
ah, i guess i should amend my comment. i think the near-future is the best possible setting for the book. i agree with todes and think it opens up a lot of possibilities for satire, social critique, etc. if he’d set the thing in 2200 i am guessing it’d end up reading less like a statement about our current society than about humanity in general.
i don’t think it has to decide what kind of book it is. the stuff you read as ornamental trappings and accessories to the heart of the novel = the stuff i think helps me better understand the societal and cultural forces that have both (a) exacerbated all this loneliness, addiction, depression, etc and (b) emerged as a reflection of the same. i hope that makes sense.
Ursula LeGuin once said something along the lines that she wrote science fiction because it allowed her to do whatever she wanted in her novels.
Likewise, I think DFW put IJ into the near future so he wouldn’t be constrained by current reality, not because he was trying to write scifi.
It’s so strange to see the words “half baked” and “half assed” used with regard to a book that is nothing if not deliberate.
I have to be honest – I’m not exactly sure what you’re criticizing. I think you’re saying that IJ should stick closely to the themes at its core – addiction, depression, etc – and not use “gaudy, ornamental trappings” to distract from them.
But I think you’re missing the point: the “ornamental trappings” aren’t ornamental. They’re vital to the core of the novel. What you see as a distraction is actually a reinforcement of and, in some cases, a more compelling example of what he’s talking about.
Honestly, I think the need to reduce and essentially classify what you’re reading is going to inhibit your enjoyment of the book – or anything you read.
Stephanie: I have actually been keeping a list and will post exactly what I am referring to as half-baked and half-assed — hopefully tomorrow.
Also, we have a fundamental disagreement: it may already be totally obvious, but I just don’t think the book is that great. I don’t think it’s that well written, I think it’s unnecessarily messy and sloppy, I think it’s full of abbreviations and shorthand leftover from first drafts written by hand, I think it creates a random set of jumps in time that DFW himself loses track of and which serve no narrative or thematic purpose other than to be “different,” and I have not yet laughed out loud once. It’s a subjective thing, for sure, but I just don’t think DFW is that funny. And I’m not blown away by his ability to use unnecessarily fancy words when simpler words would do, or his compulsion to pedantically copy out the full names of pharmaceutical compounds, or random diseases from a medical textbook. None of this strikes me as particularly inventive or visionary.
That’s just my lonely point of view. But I continue my death march through the book.
I want to see this list of half-asseries. I’m taking my opinion about language use to the forums because I’ve digressed so far from this post’s topic.
I don’t seem to be able to respond to your last comment directly, so I’m responding here. I guess I just think it’s strange that, since you dislike the book so much, you’re continuing to read all 1088 pages and also engaging in this online community. I’m not saying that I don’t appreciate and even encourage differing or critical opinions – it makes the discussion more interesting, and it helps me to formulate and strengthen my reasons for liking the book. But your comments seem to have an air of… I don’t know, something between condescension and just plain negativity about them.
My suggestion: either post comments with a slightly more open mind and begin in a sincere discussion about what you perceive to be weaknesses, rather than having your mind set already and just sort of complaining, or, quite frankly, abandon the “death march” through the book and read something you enjoy.
Stephanie: It’s kind of hilarious that you take my personal opinion on the book to be condescending. I’m not, for example, doling out advice on how to read the book or what attitude to have. I’d note that in your last two comments you’ve suggested that I’m “missing the point,” that “the need to reduce and essentially classify what [I'm] reading is going to inhibit [my] enjoyment of the book – or anything [I] read,” and that I should post with a “slightly more open mind and begin in a sincere discussion about what [I] perceive to be weaknesses,” (i.e., stop with my insincere discussions of the book’s weaknesses).
Thanks! And I appreciate all your helpful advice on how I should read and post! I didn’t realize that expressing my own personal opinion on the book in the comments, in what I thought was a sincere way, and perhaps slightly more substantive than lobbing in my opinion on whether the Dove Bar is ice cream, chocolate, or soap, or what year the Year of Glad is, would offend you or others.
Look, I’m really sorry that (so far) I don’t share your opinion of the book. I don’t think that makes me in any way condescending. You don’t have to convince me to like it, and I don’t have to convince you to dislike it. You don’t even have to read my comments if they annoy you so much. Vive la différence.
I’ll stop posting after this, but before I go – coming into a community of people who are obviously fans of the book and calling it “half-assed,” “sloppy,” and “self-indulgent silliness,” and sarcastically mocking his intent (“It’s totally different! — mine is set in the FUTURE” and “I’m not blown away by his ability to use unnecessarily fancy words”) does all come across condescending toward both the author and the fans.
I’m happy to talk about the flaws and weaknesses of the book, and I totally get why people might not like it. Something about your tone and language (as I described above) just struck me as unnecessary.
Stephanie: My last post on this as well. (In reply to your comment of 7/15 at 9:07 a.m. below.) You say that I am “coming into a community of people who are obviously fans of the book ….” Really? I mean, it’s great if people have already read IJ and totally love it and want to read it again here (and there are obviously a few), but I thought this was a book discussion group, not a fan site, and that a lot of the people here were (like me) reading the book for the first time, and registering their first impressions — good or bad — of the book. I didn’t realize that established fealty to DFW was a prerequisite to participation in this reading group.
Whose “mind [is] set already [?]” Mine, or yours?
Just FYI: I’m reading Infinite Jest for the first time.
I’ll stop posting after this …
My last post on this as well …
Please note that these are binding verbal contracts.
Matt: I think they would be written contracts (though there’s likely a lack of consideration to make the promises enforceable). That is to say, they are gratuitous promises made without consideration (anything received in return by the promisor or given up by the promisee(s)).
Ditto Todeswalzer – I think “speculative” fiction is closer to the right term than “science” fiction, but it’s not really either. The near-future is similar to our world but not quite the same, and here I’ll quote from wikipedia instead of trying to say it myself:
“The Uncanny (Ger. Das Unheimliche — literally, “un-home-ly”) is a Freudian concept of an instance where something can be familiar, yet foreign at the same time, resulting in a feeling of it being uncomfortably strange.
Because the uncanny is familiar, yet strange, it often creates cognitive dissonance within the experiencing subject due to the paradoxical nature of being attracted to, yet repulsed by an object at the same time.”
Come to think of it, there’s a whole lot of simultaneous attraction/repulsion in this book. As far as the subsidized time goes I think that the disorienting effect it creates is more important than the joke. What better way to understand these characters than to feel like them?
Interesting point.
As a minor digression, note that the etymology of “unheimlich” is interesting, and was discussed at length by Freud. The German adjective “heimlich” means “secret”, or “furtive”. (The German word “hauslich” means “homely” [as in domestic, familial, etc.].)
Thus, as Freud notes, the German adjective “unheimlich“, which means “uncanny”, “weird”, or “eerie”, in an odd way suggests that the uncanny is that which “is secretly familiar . . . which has undergone repression and then returned from it . . . .” See here.
Okay, so digressions are contagious.
This is familiar… Gravity’s Rainbow?
I’ve read this somewhere too, but I haven’t read Gravity’s Rainbow… An article in the Believer maybe?
Upon further thought, I believe it’s in this article, though it’s not all available online:
http://www.believermag.com/issues/200803/?read=article_shepard
Are we talking about the “unheimlich” vs. “heimlich” thing, or something else? Because the discussion comes straight out of Freud’s essay, which I’ve linked to above. You just need to scroll down. I don’t think I recall a discussion of heimlich/unheimlich in GRAVITY’S RAINBOW.
I think it’s worth it just for the brilliance that is “Year of Glad” .
I think this and the invented political controversies/movements are by far the weakest parts of the book.
It reminded me of White Noise–the idea of brand names permeating our consciousness. It’s sort of a clever and kind of funny idea but it doesn’t go anywhere.
Octopus, I do generally agree with you that the science-fiction-y aspects of the novel are–to my mind–overbroad and largely unsuccessful.
I was weaned on science fiction, and I never once considered IJ sci-fi until I read this comment. It’s an interesting take and definitely gives me a new perspective on the near-future setting, but as a hard-core, sci-fi genre geek, I just totally disagree with calling IJ sci-fi. Like Todeswalzer says, there isn’t enough focus on the actual science to make it sci-fi.
Of course, maybe the Eschaton math and technical film-jargon matters a lot more than I think it does, in which case it’s going straight over my head.
I’m just reading the book straight through since it’s my first time, but I’m sure I’ll revisit it later for clues, etc. It won’t be the first time I’ve had a “dumb, dumb George Michael” moment!
I mostly enjoy the puzzle aspect, but occasionally get tired of it, since I can’t remember characters who’ve been mentioned before, even though I’m taking notes.
Consider this about the sections of the professional conversationalist and Jame and his father, since I marked up my book with the connections today:
prof. conv is p 27, and JOI’s film, “It was a great marvel that he was in the father without knowing him” (992) was released in YTSDB.
James and his dad in the garage is p 157, and JOI’s film of the same subject is “As of Yore” on p 991.
Perhaps the two segments in the book were screenplays, not supposed to be exact events on those dates, esp the April Fools YTSDB?
I think his humor is wacky, so some of it’s going to hit, some miss. I have no problem with the subsidized years, and find some of them quite funny–I read them, like the characters who are listed at 200kg, as humorous exaggerations and authorial license.
What I find to be a more intriguing treasure hunt is the ambiguity over why Joelle is wearing a veil. Recall that Joelle appeared several times in the filmography under the alias “Madame Psychosis” and each time played some horribly deformed character. So how did the PGOAT end up landing the lead role in Safe Boating is No Accident?
Totally! I actually don’t have a problem with Subsidized Time or 200kg football players because that IS the direction we’re heading in and it, along with the videophone issues all seem to relate back to the things our society concerns itself with.
But, w/r/t Madame Psychosis, I can’t tell if she is A) hideously grotesque and is called P.G.O.A.T. in a “you’re beautiful on the inside so don’t worry about a thing” way or B) Literally the P.G.O.A.T. and is so overwhelmed by that that she wears a veil and tries her best to not be the idolized madonna of everyone around her.
While A seems more likely, B is very possible given theories as to the “Entertainment” and whether that’s Infinite Jest (V). Immobilizingly beautiful.
In either case though, we’re given an indication that Joelle was molested by her father – In the theater, he puts his hand in her lap. I’m not sure what more I can draw on this.
Beyond that, I’m pretty sure Hal knows that MP and Joelle are the same person, but it seems as though Mario has no idea, given his religious zeal in listening to her broadcast and wondering about her.
I’m pretty sure Joelle shows the nice black man on the subway station, late at night, her non-membership card in the UHDP (or whatever it’s called). In line with all the other self-fulfilling addictions (re: the woman so afraid of being blind and paralyzed that she refuses to move or open her eyes), I think MP is so afraid of her own beauty (especially after Jim basically killed himself from looking at her so often) that she wears the veil.
Then again, I’m only on page 239, so I may be totally wrong.
on p. 223 in the Joelle section, is says, “Orin–punter extraordinaire, dodger of flung acid extraordinaire–
which leads me to believe that Joelle’s face is scarred by acid.
Personally I’m operating under the assumption that the page 157 section is “As of Yore”, so you can’t really determine dates from it. And that inconsistency about Hal’s age is huge evidence for that conversationalist section being “It Was a Great Marvel…”.
I strongly advise using two bookmarks. It saved me much hassel about finding the right footnote.
I found the technology bits of SF in Infinite Jest were a bit off, but its use of being slightly in the future to create amusing situations/satire worked well with me. Which is exactly the same thing Vonnegut does with SF in his books. As an interesting note, having just read The Broom of the System, alot of the comedy/future elements are very similar in said book.
Subsidized time actually struck me as amusing because it’s both completely absurd and completely possible.
Further, ever since I read Chimera by John Barth I can’t help thinking of Madame P. as so heavily inspired by a character in said book that I view her basically as said character (and yes, I’m 99.9% sure DFW read the book). Don’t really want to spoil anything so that’s all I’m saying.
DFW spends a fair amount of time discussing Barth in the Bookworm interview. Chimera is one of the works he cites. A link to the interview transcript is http://web.archive.org/web/20040606041906/www.andbutso.com/~mark/bookworm96/
If you want to listen to DFW on Bookworm re IJ and other books, you can access the podcasts on http://www.kcrw.com/etc/david-foster-wallace
With respect to other posts supra, as far as DFW being sloppy with the text, losing control of the timeline, and so much more in IJ, DFW says the following in a comment starting at 9:38 into the Bookworm interview:
…I worked harder on this than anything I’ve ever done in my life and there’s nothing in there by accident and there have already been some readers and reviewers that see it as kind of a mess, and as kind of random, and I just have to sort of shrug my shoulders.
[...] David Foster Wallace’s future seems most clearly and emphatically not our own time (whatever year the Year of the Depend Adult Undergarment may be)–moments where, in an outburst of crassness, you might exclaim, “Boy was DFW wrong [...]
defectiveyeti is much more fun to read than than this site. So it goes. Whoops, who said that??
Nice reference to Vonnegut. I read DFW and think of Vonnegut and Heller. He’s got a very similar tone.
I’ve been reading these posts thinking about Farenheit 451 and his reference to the earpiece telephones (“seashells” I believe? Someone correct me what he called them . . . but Bluetooth anyone?). He also talked about folks installing TVs on every wall in their home? That’s not Sci Fi, that’s insight/foresight, esp since that was written a half a century ago.
DFW, et al, are simply commenting on the future of American society. Farenheit 451 to me was not science fiction, but rather a clever commentary on where we are heading. 1984 spoke of cameras everywhere and that war is peace. Hmm. Sound familiar anyone?
RE: science fiction?
Michael Chabon, who I’m sure is a careful reader, loved this book. In “Maps & Legends”, he essentially whinges (Love that word) for 200 pages about our need to dump books into buckets … claiming that once you put the little rocket ship on the spine of the book in the library or bookstore, no one will read it … sometimes out of embarrassment, sometimes because they assume the category is full of cruft. Chabon said the only reason The Road wasn’t science fiction was because it won the Pulitzer. This is sci-fi the same way zombie films are … using a debatably plausible premise to pass commentary on society today, as we know it.
I consider this book a warning (and DFW’s terminal unhappiness with this world the “!!!!!” at the end of the warning). In that sense, this book HAS to be set in the near future, where you can extrapolate enough to see that the water you’re sitting is indeed getting closer to a boil, but not so far in the future that the outcome is inevitable.
I also think the book is one big ink-blot test. Everyone is unhappy with some aspect of the book, but the number of camps of unhappiness exceeds the number of pages in the tome. The fact that this is so many different books to so many different people just makes me love it that much more.
[...] as they talk about things being different in the new millennium. Although Matthew Baldwin’s argument here is very convincing which would make Subsidization begin in [...]
[...] mid-90s, and set in the future. In fact, The Year of the Depend Adult Undergarment may actually be this year. But of course, the world has changed rather dramatically since the mid-90s, w/r/t the [...]