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Consider the Lobster: And Other Essays

by David Foster Wallace

4.17 · rating details · 7,803 ratings · 1,021 reviews

Do lobsters feel pain? Did Franz Kafka have a funny bone? What is John Updike's deal, anyway? And what happens when adult video starlets meet their fans in person? David Foster Wallace answers these questions and more in essays that are also enthralling narrative adventures. Whether covering the three-ring circus of a vicious presidential race, plunging into the wars betwe...more

Paperback, 344 pages

Published July 2nd 2007 by Back Bay Books (first published December 1st 2005)

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Jan 31, 2008

David rated it

· review of another edition

Shelves: read-in-2007

Full disclosure: I have a major intellectual crush on David Foster Wallace. Yes, yes, I know all about his weaknesses - the digressions, the rampant footnote abuse, the flaunting of his amazing erudition, the mess that is 'Infinite Jest'. I know all this, and I don't care. Because when he is in top form, there's nobody else I would rather read. The man is hilarious; I think he's a mensch, and I don't believe he parades his erudition just to prove how smart he is. I think he can't help himself - ...more

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Dec 10, 2009

Bells rated it

· review of another edition

Do you know that feeling of falling in love so hard and so fast that your head spins? That feeling that your sweetie is AMAZING, PERFECT, and you have no idea how you ever lived without them? The sun rises and sets with each breath they take??
No?
Sorry about your luck.

The first DFW book I read was A Supposedly Fun Thing I'll Never Do Again and I was instantly smitten. Totally in love.
And then I read this.

That AMAZING, PERFECT love? I feel like I have...more

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Dec 21, 2009

Kelly rated it

· review of another edition

Recommends it for: people who like to read The New Yorker and can also appreciate immature middle school humor

Recommended to Kelly by: every intelligent male I know

Shelves: po-mo, wits-and-fools, 21st-century

I'm going to admit to a very large book lover's solecism here: I pre-judged David Foster Wallace by his cover, without reading a word the man had written. And no, I do not mean the starkly depicted, rather adorable lobster we've got on this edition of the book, I mean his figurative cultural cover- the movement he is classified as belonging to, several people I know who like him, the worship surrounding Infinte Jest and what is said about it, etc.

All of those pre-judgements were nega...more

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Dec 01, 2009

Dave Russell rated it

· review of another edition

Shelves: essays, nonfiction

There's a small theme running through some of these essays(1): People trying to bridge the gap between two different camps. In "Authority and American Usage" DFW praises Garner for bridging the gap between the Prescriptionist and the Descriptionist usage experts. In "Joseph Frank's Dostoevsky" Frank impresses DFW by weaving together two rival approaches to literary criticism. "Up, Simba" is an encomium to John McCain's ability to appeal to Young Voters (presumab...moreThere's a small theme running through some of these essays(1): People trying to bridge the gap between two different camps. In "Authority and American Usage" DFW praises Garner for bridging the gap between the Prescriptionist and the Descriptionist usage experts. In "Joseph Frank's Dostoevsky" Frank impresses DFW by weaving together two rival approaches to literary criticism. "Up, Simba" is an encomium to John McCain's ability to appeal to Young Voters (presumably of all political stripes(2).)

Herein lies the major weakness of the book. This desire to reconcile two different camps, to me, comes across as a little wishy-washy. Compare "Up, Simba" with Hunter S. Thompson's Fear and Loathing on the Campaign Trail '72, one of my favorite books about a political campaign. Thompson really impressed me with his uninhibited, unvarnished attack on mealy-mouthed candidates who try to appeal to the center at the expense of "the hippie and freak vote," a bloc of voters which Thompson clearly embraces. The book is full of passion and vitality, which I felt a little lacking in DFW's(3) book.

Of course, I realize that there is more than one discussion group here on GR dedicated to DFW and he is not without his very devout defenders, so let me just say while I did not enjoy this book as much as others, I recognize he has his merits and respect those who got more out of this book than I did(4).

(1) I question calling them essays. Most of them are journalism pieces, and in fact DFW excels most in reportage. He has an amzing talent for finding and describing the telling detail. It's the more analytical "essay*" parts of the pieces that let me down.

* Essay in the sense that Montaigne used the word--a "trial" of one's own opinion.

(2) Partisanship, at least, is not emphasized when he discusses YV.

(3) Armchair Psychoanalyzing On My Part: Considering how DFW ended his life, I couldn't help thinking that perhaps this lack was in part a symptom of depression. It's also entirely possible that the fact that my knowledge of DFW's suicide, in some way, colored my reading of this book.

(4) In "Authority and American Usage" DFW espouses what he calls "the Democratic Spirit," which he defines as a rigorous defense of one's own opinion combined with a humble respect for another person's views. While an admirable outlook in the real world, in a book of essays this too struck me as a bit of a hedge and a lack of desire to man the bastions and put up a fight. Depressed people often seek to avoid conflict.

(less)

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Oct 09, 2008

Valerie rated it

· review of another edition

Shelves: non-fiction

I just finished reading Consider the Lobster by David Foster Wallace. What I'm left with is an absolute amazement at the immense amounts of knowledge related in the essays. It's like DFW had - or did enough research - to fill a set of encyclopedias on each topic, and then whittled it down to the presented short-storyish length.

In "Big Red Son", an essay about the Annual AVN Awards (that's Adult Video News, by the way) I learned more about the adult entertainment industry t...moreI just finished reading Consider the Lobster by David Foster Wallace. What I'm left with is an absolute amazement at the immense amounts of knowledge related in the essays. It's like DFW had - or did enough research - to fill a set of encyclopedias on each topic, and then whittled it down to the presented short-storyish length.

In "Big Red Son", an essay about the Annual AVN Awards (that's Adult Video News, by the way) I learned more about the adult entertainment industry than I ever thought possible. In addition to covering the event, DFW covered so many other aspects of the industry that it's almost overwhelming, and almost every page of the essay is accompanied by copious footnotes. Anything you've ever wanted to know but were afraid to ask? PM me.

He brought the same level of detail to an article about John McCain that was originally written for Rolling Stone Magazine, but is presented in the book in its unabridged form. Following him on the 2000 campaign trail (before he was knocked out of the race by Bush) I was presented with so much interesting information on John McCain that I have to admit that I have more respect for him now. I'm not voting for him, but I can respect him, and that's mainly because DFW objectively presented him to me in a way that I haven't really seen in other media coverage. Don't get me wrong - he doesn't let him off the hook for anything - but his exhaustive coverage and his further analysis of his own coverage made for some really interesting reading in light of the current presidential campaigns.

"Consider the Lobster" is simply hilarious when you think about the fact that he wrote it for Gourmet Magazine, and pretty much calls readers' attention to the plight of the lobster as it's cooked alive. He was sent to cover a lobster festival in Maine, and I hope that the editor of the article knew what he was getting himself into when he hired DFW to cover it, or he might have been pretty surprised when the copy arrived. I'm sure it's not the angle most writers would've explored for a magazine whose readers enjoy eating gourmet foods. Like lobsters. And who probably don't want to think about them screaming in the pot.*

I could go on and on about the essays, but what struck me most was his exhaustive knowledge of their subjects. This was a man who left no stone unturned. I'm amazed by how his mind must have worked to capture, compile and translate everything he learned and experienced into his work.

His death - what a loss to the literary world. And the world, period.

*That's a myth by the way - it's just steam escaping from the space between the lobster's flesh and it's shell. (Just one of the million things I learned from reading this book.)(less)

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Feb 24, 2008

Rob rated it

· review of another edition

Recommends it for: DFW fans; modern Americans

Recommended to Rob by: Sue; Adam

Shelves: 2008

I would suggest, dear reader, that when considering Consider the Lobster, that you consider it in the same light as David Foster Wallace's collection A Supposedly Fun Thing I'll Never Do Again. Use that book as your frame of reference for style and content and you can place this collection firmly into the category of "typical" DFW. That being said, if you thoroughly enjoyed A Supposedly Fun Thing... then you'll likely thoroughly enjoy this one as well; by that same coin, if you're on...more

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Jan 11, 2009

Lena rated it

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Shelves: essays

I didn't know much about David Foster Wallace when I cracked open this collection of his essays, so the first piece on the Adult Video News Awards caught me rather by surprise. Within just a few paragraphs, however, the sheer and utter brilliance of this fascinating and yet also erudite and intellectual examination of the porn industry left me with little doubt that DFW's reputation as one of the smartest and funniest writers of my lifetime is well-deserved.

Prior to this book, if yo...more

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Nov 13, 2007

Adam rated it

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Recommends it for: Everyone and their mother

Another essay collection by the man I would consider America's foremost essayist. As great a novelist as he is, and he's certainly no slouch with the short story, his non-fiction is beyond compare.

I think that this work differs from his previous stuff in that it plays up the author's own dorkiness a lot less than the other ones, although it doesn't even come close to losing it entirely. Rather, it gets augmented by some level of taking himself seriously that lends a little more cred...more

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Mar 11, 2008

Guy rated it

Every word a treasure. From the very literally-titled title essay to the humor of starstruck fans at porn-video awards shows in Vegas to the very human look at a conservative radio talk-show host.

Most interesting and perhaps most pertinent: Wallace spent time following John McCain on the campaign trail in the 2000 Republican primaries. The picture of McCain is, to say the least, intriguing now, as is the reminder that - to a very large extent - what we see of any candidate is no mo...more

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May 27, 2010

Moira rated it

· review of another edition

Shelves: 2010-50-new-books-challenge, favourites, comfort-rereads

(Ceci n'est pas une review, but I'm getting tired of just rating and adding status updates)

Thought maybe this was worth 4.7666666666666665 stars, but what the hell, there isn't going to be any more, so....'Up, Simba' wrestles in my affections with the cruise ship essay, it's that good. The usage essay is also phenomenal. Big Red Son, Tracy Austin, lobsters, Dostoevsky, Kafka, 9/11, gutting Updike, all amazing....the _one_ thing I don't like is the Host essay, which seems a little lon...more

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Mar 16, 2011

Snotchocheez rated it

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I must confess that I am not one of the cult of DFW followers that wallow in his genius ramblings; I honestly appreciated, though did not love, his (universally acknowledged) masterpiece: "Infinite Jest"; despite its raw humor, it rambled and meandered WAY too much for me to get a feel for his true storytelling talent. It seemed almost as if he was using his (arguably infinite, or at least infinitely superior to my) intelligence to slap the reader insensate. (Part of this feeling was no dou...moreI must confess that I am not one of the cult of DFW followers that wallow in his genius ramblings; I honestly appreciated, though did not love, his (universally acknowledged) masterpiece: "Infinite Jest"; despite its raw humor, it rambled and meandered WAY too much for me to get a feel for his true storytelling talent. It seemed almost as if he was using his (arguably infinite, or at least infinitely superior to my) intelligence to slap the reader insensate. (Part of this feeling was no doubt due to my not heeding Dave Eggers' caveat at the beginning of IJ: It's a book that requires 100% of your concentration and attention to fully appreciate it...and I tried plowing through it with a 2-year-old vying for my attention...but still...) I couldn't shake the feeling that he was mocking the unsophisticated reader with his lofty, circuitous (and unfathomable) wit.

After reading this collection of essays by DFW, consider me a newly converted devotee. "Consider the Lobster...", a collection of essays mostly reprinted (in unexpurgated form) from magazine articles from 1996-2004, is (like IJ) a daunting work to plow through, but it (unlike IJ) takes a modicum of effort to decipher the message(s) propounded, and realize just what a flipping genius DFW was.

The collection is a motley assortment that runs the gamut from coverage of the AVN Adult Film Awards (the porn Oscars, if you will), to a detailed diatribe on Standard Written English, hidden within a review of a dictionary. (Sounds dull? Trust me, it's not.) There's a book review of darling tennis player of the 80s Tracy Austin's abysmally written autobiography (totally hilarious, but not in a mocking kind of way); a view behind the scenes of John McCain's 2000 Presidential bid against GW Bush for the GOP nomination (the worst of the collection, but still quite good); an essay on the titular crustacean and the annual Maine Lobster Festival (as featured in Gourmet Magazine in 2004...an article which I can't help but imagine that, if indeed published, singlehandedly led to the death of Gourmet Magazine in 2009...it's that brutal...not to mention f***ing hilarious). My favorite of the bunch, though, is the last one in the book, and it is a doozy. Entitled "Host", it focuses its attention on (conservative) talk radio, specifically in Los Angeles (my former home town) at KFI (the second-most popular talk radio station in the US)...DFW, subtly, gently yet decisively CASTIGATES the entire industry in what is arguably the best essay/opinion piece I've ever read. It's a stunner.

There's even a "where was I when..." article of his experiences immediately following 9/11 while living in Bloomington, Indiana...an article that (for me, anyway) served to humanize DFW, and brought tears to my eyes. This is rather macabre, but at this point in reading I leafed through what I'd read and looked for signs presaging his bout with depression, and ensuing suicide. Much like IJ, "Consider the Lobster" (despite its lofty narrative) is imbued with an underlying, palpable sadness that provides (this reader, anyway) an humanistic poignancy that will resonate a very long time. In a word: brilliant.(less)

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May 15, 2011

MJ Nicholls rated it

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Shelves: non-fiction, canadamericans

Outstanding. The closest one can get to triple penetration in essay form.

Each one is a stunner, from the grotesquerie of the Adult Video Awards in ‘Big Red Son,’ the magniloquent ass-handing of John Updike, the sublime pedantry of the modern classic ‘Authority and American Usage,’ the obsessive campaign chronicling of ‘Up, Simba,’ to the staggeringly researched meta-bubbling John Ziegler profile ‘Host.’

All the essays succeed at tying razor-sharp exegeses of American cultu...more

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May 16, 2010

Moira added it · review of another edition

Not sure how I feel about the 'footnotes voice' - it seems about as desperate an idea as the little boxes in 'The Host' which wound up annoying me. It was interesting to read in one of the posthumous profiles that he didn't want the footnoting to be like hypertext, because that seems like the most logical way to represent them online with endless scrolling pages. It's nice to hear him, though.

Audiobooks have GOT TO stop the whack tradition of having noodling non-melodic music behind ...more

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Aug 18, 2009

Simon Cleveland rated it

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Shelves: contemporary-literature

Do you have any idea how many lobsters die each year in order to satisfy our culinary cravings? I've no idea, but after reading the essay `Consider the Lobster,' I have to say - too many.

Mr. Wallace approaches the issue from the stand point of our claw-y friends. Put yourself in the lobster's position - here you are, backtracking through the bottom of New England's coastline and suddenly you find yourself in the 100+ lbs pressure cooker of the annual Main Lobster Festival. You squir...more

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Dec 21, 2007

Harlan Lewis rated it

· review of another edition

Recommends it for: those desperately craving to look smarter than everyone else

An excerpt from the NY Times review of another David Foster Wallace book, Oblivion, is close enough to my own feelings to be worth pasting:

"One reason it's tempting to follow the smart set -- that anxious clan of stylishly camouflaged, overeducated social maladapts that functions in the literary world a lot like those old guys sucking White Owl cigars do in metropolitan Off Track Betting parlors -- and flatly declare David Foster Wallace a genius and the greatest you...moreAn excerpt from the NY Times review of another David Foster Wallace book, Oblivion, is close enough to my own feelings to be worth pasting:

"One reason it's tempting to follow the smart set -- that anxious clan of stylishly camouflaged, overeducated social maladapts that functions in the literary world a lot like those old guys sucking White Owl cigars do in metropolitan Off Track Betting parlors -- and flatly declare David Foster Wallace a genius and the greatest young fiction writer of his time, is that doing so is much, much easier than actually reading his sentences (compared to most of which this one is a haiku)."

I'm not sure if Wallace is really trying to write entertainment, much less humor, despite what the jacket says. At what point does an essay about the absurdities of liberal versus conservative dictionaries stop being funny? Wallace presumes far to much when he passes the half-century page with scarcely a pause for breath. What if, while pretending to write humor, he's oh-so-slyly exposing the absurdities of not just dictionaries, but the standards and rules governing all human interaction, and by extension our lives, the universe, everything? Opening with an essay on a porn awards ceremony in Las Vegas pants shock-value desperation - and even with that setup he manages to just not be very interesting. Porn as an analog for widespread hypocrisy vs the admitted and overtly crass stopped being insightful before I knew what porn was, and Wallace doesn't bring anything particularly modern to the analysis beyond lycra suits and adjustable breasts.

Wallace allegedly possesses the ability to master subjects and fields of study others devote themselves wholly to, and he's capable of writing about them in a way that the rest of us can understand, so who the hell are we to complain if the sum simply isn't worth reading?

The constant frustrations are unfortunate because parts of Consider the Lobster are really, genuinely, honestly GOOD. For as much as I yawned and skimmed, particular passages approach brilliance. There's a disarming mix of cynicism and approachable human desire for authenticity in an essay about McCain's 2000 campaign that's rarely touched without sinking to radio-emo simplicity, although on further consideration if that's the level my standards have sunk to then this review is more damning than I intended. Really, parts of the book are good.

Unfortunately, finding those singular bits on a first run isn't worth the effort, and I don't have any desire to go leafing through again to find them. Even the McCain essay, the best in the book, is an off-putting mash of overwrought considerations of inane minutiae and rather questionably superficial claims, "the 60s were, by most accounts, a generally cleaner and happier time than now," claims so poorly supported and so ridiculously detached from sense that they run counter to the whole popular appeal of Wallace as a modern, approachable genius.

This review has gone overlong, a symptom of my frustration. If you don't mind digging, dig.(less)

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Jun 16, 2007

Brendan rated it

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The essay “Joseph Frank’s Dostoevsky” appears near the end of David Foster Wallace’s collection, Consider the Lobster. In it, Wallace is writing about someone (Joseph Frank) writing about someone (Fyodor Dostoevsky) writing about Important Questions. He (Wallace) also writes about himself (and his literary peers) not writing about Important Questions, ramming his point home by interspersing throughout the essay said IQs, uncommented-upon and tucked safely inside asterisks, in uneasy juxtapositio...more

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Sep 13, 2010

logankstewart rated it

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Recommended to logankstewart by: Adam Graham

Shelves: contemporary, nonfic, borrowed, 2010-read

"But if I decide to decide there’s a different, less selfish, less lonely point to my life, won’t the reason for this decision be my desire to be less lonely, meaning to suffer less overall pain? Can the decision to be less selfish ever be anything other than a selfish decision?"

Consider the Lobster, and Other Essays is a non-fiction book by the late, acclaimed journalist and novelist David Foster Wallace. I first heard of DFW on a recent NPR interview, and, like ma...more

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Aug 25, 2008

Nate rated it

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Shelves: non-fiction

Opening essay "Big Red Son", an account of the Adult Video News Awards -- yes, the "porn Oscars" -- is one of the funniest pieces of writing I have read in ages. And informative! DFW's style seems well suited to the subject here, with footnotes serving as expansions into long verbatim anecdotes delivered to the author by the article's colorful supporting cast, and his prose is well up to the challenge of rendering the circus as lucidly as seems possible.

This wa...more

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Jun 02, 2008

Amanda rated it

Recommended to Amanda by: Colette Alexander, Saba Afshar

Shelves: non-fiction

This was my first DFWallace and I will read more. He is a really smart dude. I'm kind of grossed out by lobsters right now but I think their deliciousness will override the fact that they are sea-bugs. Things in addition to lobsters for the reader to consider: a review of John Updike describing a novel that reads like John Updike is badly imitating himself; a really, really long and really, really interesting review of a dictionary; thoughts on Dostoevsky; attending a porn awards show; Kafka i...more

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Dec 11, 2007

Colette rated it

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Recommends it for: smart people

So, I have a crush on David Foster Wallace. It's long-standing, and quite inappropriate given that he's *so much* smarter than me. Maybe I should only give 'Lobster' 4 stars, because I couldn't get through the 'American Usage' essay without skimming and then going back and skimming some more. I guess I'm not enough of a SNOOT.

Still, everything DFW does is amazing. I'm constantly amazed at his intellectual genius (and knowledge of so many subjects). I think what I really value...more

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Sep 25, 2007

Justine rated it

· review of another edition

Recommends it for: the brave, the willing, the critical

Shelves: favorites

DFW may have just won a place as one of my favorite writers. His intelligence, sharp observance, and keen wit jump off the pages. At times a little dense and circuitous, the payoff for reading his work is HUGE. There are so many dogears in this book (good quotes) that it doesn't lie flat.

DFW's style is what I would call "masturbatorily educated." He drops references (both popular and erudite) everywhere and expects his reader to get it. But beyond style, the true bri...more

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Nov 11, 2007

Dean Wheeler rated it

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Recommends it for: Anyone

DFW's challenging fiction, while super-smart, often requires back-tracking and exhaustive concentration.

His searing essay collections, though, are an easier read. Consider the Lobster, much like his earlier collection, A Supposedly Fun Thing I'll Never Do Again, is sharp but effortlessly absorbable.

Lobster takes us behind the scenes at an awards ceremony for porn stars, on a sea-to-plate journey with the crustacean of our desires, and deep into the psyche of a former girl...more

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Aug 05, 2007

Zedder rated it

In a stroke of genius, I assigned the title essay of this as a reading on identity theory for my philosophy of mind class this summer. They loved it, and it gave me a really concrete example of multiple realizability to keep coming back to later in the course.

Here's how Wallace's cab drive puts identity theory: "Lobsters don't feel pain because they don't have the same part of the brain that allows humans to feel pain."

Overall, I feel like this volume isn't as ...more

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Jul 25, 2007

Christina rated it

· review of another edition

I cannot recommend this enough. If DFW's prose has turned you off in the past, try this out. It's still riddled with his trademark way-overdone-footnotes, but is wonderfully written. Makes all sorts of topics accessible and stimulating. I, of course, being who I am, loooved Big Red Son. The McCain bit was a superb slice into the American political machine (in a human way, not an I-have-a-bias-and-I'm-out-to-prove-something way); surprisingly, the radio host piece was too. Possibly my favorite es...more

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Jan 17, 2009

Carolynz rated it

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Shelves: essays, dfw

His last book of essays. Midway contains one of the most authentic reads on experiencing 911 that I've came across. The title essay, Consider the Lobster is classic Wallace.

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Apr 21, 2011

Puzziker rated it

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"Immaginate che l'apocalisse abbia preso le sembianze di un cocktail-party". Oppure che la raccolta in questione, una volta aperta, si riveli essa stessa un'apocalisse.
A me capita con tutto quel che leggo di DFW: del centro di gravità, in fondo, comincio a fregarmene. Mi annodo nelle spirali sempre più strette delle sue analisi frattali.
Soffro, a volte, ma sento che sto andando a fondo, all'interno. E' un microscopio elettronico manovrato con perizia e spietatezza.
Massimalista, isteri...more

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Nov 30, 2008

Andy rated it

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Shelves: nonfiction, humor, essay-collections

This book is a collection of essays by the late David Foster Wallace. You could describe these essays as humorist in nature and I wouldn't argue too much with you, but he is less in the joke-making business than he is a "pure" writer who laces his prose with a wonderful wit that manages to be earnest and wry and insightful all at once.

In my opinion the shorter essays in this book tend to be better. When Wallace focuses his writing to a point, he is peerless; his literacy, ...more

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Jan 20, 2012

Walter rated it

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I simply cannot believe how smart this guy is. Whatever he writes about, he immerses himself in that subject from head to toe, and seems to master it totally. I can't imagine that he knew much about the lobster industry, or talk show hosts, or John McCain, before he took on those assignments. But I'm pretty well convinced that whatever he says is going to be the final word on it, no matter the issue. I did not expect anyone to go over my head so utterly in the realm of grammar and usage. (O...more

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Jan 16, 2012

Kira rated it

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I have my moments of frustration with David Foster Wallace—his writing can be extremely dense and he sometimes shows little regard for the knowledge level (or interest level) of his audience—but to be honest there was just no way this book wasn’t getting four paper cuts. As an author, he will make you laugh, make you think, maybe make you cry, challenge you intellectually, question you ethically, and just generally manage to make you interested in whatever he’s writing about, and more often than...more

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Jan 07, 2012

Joseph rated it

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Well. I started reading this as an attempt to correct a long-lasting antipathy toward DFW's work that was based on extra-aesthetic judgements, and at the behest of a couple of my friends. For the most part, it worked pretty well. The book is funny and often astonishing, well-written in general -- but also a little bit twee and sometimes condescends to its reader in a way that annoys me. The best essays are probably "The View from Mrs Johnson's" (about experiencing 9/11 in the small tow...more

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About David Foster Wallace

David Foster Wallace worked surprising turns on nearly everything: novels, journalism, vacation. His life was an information hunt, collecting hows and whys. "I received 500,000 discrete bits of information today," he once said, "of which maybe 25 are important. My job is to make some sense of it." He wanted to write "stuff about what it feels like to live. Instead of being...more

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Quotes from Consider the Lobster a...

“...in real life I always seem to have a hard time winding up a conversation or asking somebody to leave, and sometimes the moment becomes so delicate and fraught with social complexity that I'll get overwhelmed trying to sort out all the different possible ways of saying it and all the different implications of each option and will just sort of blank out and do it totally straight -- 'I want to terminate the conversation and not have you be in my apartment anymore' -- which evidently makes me look either as if I'm very rude and abrupt or as if I'm semi-autistic and have no sense of how to wind up a conversation gracefully...I've actually lost friends this way.” — 73 people liked it

“Am I a good person? Deep down, do I even really want to be a good person, or do I only want to seem like a good person so that people (including myself) will approve of me? Is there a difference? How do I ever actually know whether I'm bullshitting myself, morally speaking?” — 31 people liked it

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title link	preview: Consider the Lobster: And Other Essays
avg rating	preview: Consider the Lobster: And Other Essays Goodreads rating: 4.17 (7803 ratings)
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BBCode	[url=http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/690051.Consider_the_Lobster?utm_medium=api&utm_source=blog_book][img]http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1177263014m/690051.jpg[/img][/url] [url=http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/690051.Consider_the_Lobster?utm_medium=api&utm_source=blog_book]Consider the Lobster: And Other Essays by David Foster Wallace[/url]

Consider the Lobster: And Other Essays

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