Infinite Jest in Book Riot's Read Harder Challenge

Jan 04, 2011 David Abrams rated it really liked it

It's been well over a decade since I read "Infinite Jest." Rummaging through the dusty attic of my hard drive, I came across this review I wrote in 2000. It's probably high time for a re-read and re-assessment of IJ, but as I mention in the review, I really don't have the time or the energy right now. In retrospect, IJ has probably taken on a life of its own in my memory--one where I think more highly of it now than I did when I turned the last page 10 years ago. Here's the review:

There’s a lot It's been well over a decade since I read "Infinite Jest." Rummaging through the dusty attic of my hard drive, I came across this review I wrote in 2000. It's probably high time for a re-read and re-assessment of IJ, but as I mention in the review, I really don't have the time or the energy right now. In retrospect, IJ has probably taken on a life of its own in my memory--one where I think more highly of it now than I did when I turned the last page 10 years ago. Here's the review:

There’s a lot in David Foster Wallace’s head. Whether it’s the algebraic formula comparing a military arsenal to the number of combatants or the chemical formula of hallucinogens, Wallace comes across as one smart guy. Every page of his mammoth novel "Infinite Jest" contains enough cerebral spillage to fuel three or four high school classrooms for a year.

I first took notice of Wallace when I read an essay on cruise lines he wrote for The New Yorker (it’s now the title piece in his collection "A Supposedly Fun Thing I’ll Never Do Again"). I was bowled over by this obviously huge comic talent. It was the Marx Brothers meet Royal Caribbean.

When I picked up "Infinite Jest" at the bookstore, I expected more of the same. What I got was a large piece of literature that defies any attempt to categorize it or even explain its meaning. With his zest for satire and long-winded jokes, Wallace takes an obvious bow to the likes of Vonnegut, Pynchon and, yes, Groucho Marx.

It’s as hard to summarize the novel as it is to hang it on a peg. The novel sprawls with characters, places, ideas and footnotes. Yes, a novel with footnotes. Some of the best humor can be found here, tucked away at the back of the book.

"Infinite Jest" takes place in the indefinite future, a time when years are subsidized by major corporations so that we get The Year of the Tucks Medicated Pad and The Year of the Depend Adult Undergarment. It’s set at the Enfield Tennis Academy, a Boston-area institution founded by James O. Incandenza, whose offspring, athletic and academic prodigies, still reside there. Then there’s Ennet House, a residence for recovering drug addicts and alcoholics just down the hill whose residents suffer from infinite torpor. James O., a former tennis prodigy, physicist specializing in optics and avant-garde film maker, has by the time the story opens killed himself by sticking his head in a microwave oven. In a footnoted filmography, Wallace gives us an idea of what kind of filmmaker he was: "Baby Pictures of Famous Dictators," "Dial C for Concupiscence" and "Pre-Nuptial Agreement of Heaven and Hell" are just a few of the titles Incandenza filmed. And, of course, "Infinite Jest," the movie he was working on when he microwaved himself to death. Only problem is, no one’s seen it because it’s so mesmerizing that anyone viewing it is rendered helpless and insensible to everything except the desire to keep watching it. No one survives "Infinite Jest," the movie. The same could also be said for the novel.

"Infinite Jest" opens with a burst of comedy that immediately got me in the mood for a 1,079-page laugh-fest. Yes, I said 1,079 pages! As it turns out, I had a good chuckle while reading about 179 of those pages, but then energy (either mine or Wallace’s) started to fizzle and sputter. The subsidized years joke can only go so far.

By the time I reached the final footnote on the final page, I was just barely hanging on to Wallace’s coattails. I was grateful to make it all the way to the end of the book, but I was left asking myself things like, "What’s it all about, Alfie?" and "Where’s the payoff?" and "Huh?"

I can’t deny there’s genius at work here. Heck, anyone who can use footnotes in a novel for comic effect deserves a round of applause. But if I’m going to invest this much of my attention in a work that turns out to be the Godzilla of novels, then I want a little more satisfaction than I get here.

I suppose "Infinite Jest" begs for a second reading—something for which I don’t think I have the strength or time…unless I take that Marx Brothers cruise.
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Sep 18, 2009 Jess rated it it was amazing

Shelves: fiction, hamlet, family

I read Infinite Jest, as part of Infinite Summer --- a phenomenal way to combat the aloneness of reading and the loneliness of this novel in particular. There’s a lot out there about how DFW’s suicide saddened people who weren’t necessarily his fans (me included), a lot out there about how IJ is really about the importance of sincerity and the juvenile quest for happiness. But if I were still in grad school and/or independently wealthy, I would make a long, hopefully complicated argument that th ...more

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Aug 09, 2015 Roman Colombo rated it really liked it

I'm finally done. And I can't really say how I feel about it because I don't think the audiobook did the work much justice. First, they don' read the endnotes, so you miss all of that, and the story is very nonlinear, so a straight readthrough without the ability to flip back easily doesn't work. But I did enjoy what I could gather from it, and will definitely try a print version sometime down the road. ...more

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Jan 02, 2020 Lianne marked it as did-not-finish

Shelves: kindle

January 2020: have had this on my kindle for approximately a million years and have ever only read the first chapter. In the spirit of new year's resolutions and decluttering, I am calling this and saying that I am not interested in reading it. ...more

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