Infinite Summer

So far, it seems that there are tons of literary references - Kafka, Joyce, Shakespeare, etc - but I'm sure that most of these are going over my head. People have brought them up here and there, but I thought it might be nice to have them collected in one spot. Anyone want to add?

Also, I've been noticing subtle similarities to other works. The section where JOI and his father are in the garage reminded me of Jamaica Kincaid's story "Girl" - mainly because you get such a sense of JOI's character and voice (or lack of) without ever hearing him speak, once. In "Girl," the eponymous character only speaks twice, but those two lines provide a clearer picture of her than if she had produced a monologue. (I later found out that "Girl" was on DFW's syllabus, when he taught one of his courses.)

I also think of Barthelme a lot, particularly in the party scene around pgs. 232 - 233. There's a Barthelme short story (I can't recall the title but it's in 40 Stories) that consists of a similar collage of conversations. I'd imagine DFW was a fan?

Great Gatsby is in there. There's more that I've noticed but I didn't note them down. I guess that changes tonight.

In note 90, in his critique of AA, Geoffrey Day quotes T.S. Eliot's poem "The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock":

Day/Wallace: "Oh do not ask what is it. Do not ask whether it's not insane. Simply open wide for the spoon" (1002).

Eliot: "Oh, do not ask, 'What is it?'/Let us go and make our visit."
AND "I have measured out my life with coffee spoons."

Don Gately suggests that Day is experiencing "Analysis/Paralysis" (1002), and Prufrock may suffer from a similar condition: he's so caught up in analyzing his surroundings and doubting himself that he's unable to act. Plenty of people think that Eliot was trying to comment on the condition of the modern man (well, person). As was DFW.

Oh, and Eliot's poem also alludes to Hamlet.

"Simply open wide for the spoon"...

kinda combines the Eliot reference with the "frozen moment when everyone sees what is on the end of every fork" that Burroughs "Naked Lunch" title refers to, which seems appropriate to probably the best examination of addiction in a novel since Burroughs...it strikes me a lot that DFW's talent for brilliant extended comic riffs like the one on telephony is similar to the "routines" that Burroughs was also a master off.

I also catch glimpses of Barthleme in DFW's writing. Mainly sentence structure, or playing with and against conventions of sentence/ paragraph/ even word structure. DFW at times seems very influenced by Barthleme's playful nature and his graphic sense (e.g. the "w/r/t"s, etc.).

I am also wondering if there is a nod to Robert Coover. Especially the party conversation bits. I may be wrong here, but my memory of things like "Gerald's Party," are similar to some of DFW's sections.....