Infinite Death

[Slaky]

My favorite part in history is the musings on the failure of the video phone to catch on.

For a time I was also obsessed with the Wheelchair Assassins.

The idea of the masks and dioramas was outstanding and probably not far removed from what would actually hai.

As someone who has to talk to his wife on skype for the time being, I can promise you it's true. We almost never use the video function. Just the voice.

[Fork]

Fine.  I'll pick up the book.  Can we go back to talking about death and zombies in here now?

Tell her no, no, no, no, nah nah nah nah no, no, no, no, nah nah nah nah no, no, no, no.

There have got to be at least 40 other threads you can ruin instead of this one.

40, 41, whatever it takes.

[Slaky]

Not that you need any motivation to finish but when you find out what happens to Orin, please let me know.

[RV]

Not that you need any motivation to finish but when you find out what happens to Orin, please let me know.

Haven't reached that point yet, but I'm around page 600 and this is my definitely my favorite book ever. Wallace's ability to describe the sights, sounds, and smells of a particular scene is just stunningly good. I know the word 'genius' gets tossed around too much, but it's definitely appropriate for this guy. Found a couple interesting interviews:

http://web.archive.org/web/20040606041906/www.andbutso.com/~mark/bookworm96/

http://www.charlierose.com/view/interview/5639

[Slaky]

Not that you need any motivation to finish but when you find out what happens to Orin, please let me know.

Haven't reached that point yet, but I'm around page 600 and this is my definitely my favorite book ever. Wallace's ability to describe the sights, sounds, and smells of a particular scene is just stunningly good. I know the word 'genius' gets tossed around too much, but it's definitely appropriate for this guy. Found a couple interesting interviews:

http://web.archive.org/web/20040606041906/www.andbutso.com/~mark/bookworm96/

http://www.charlierose.com/view/interview/5639

The Orin stuff is almost in a throwaway scene near the end. You won't get there for a while but you'll clench up a little. And then you'll post your thoughts here. I'm looking forward to them.

[R-V]

http://gawker.com/5049526/david-foster-wallace-dead-of-suicide-at-46

Foster Wallace, longtime darling of grad students and civilian PoMo lit fans, was often very funny in print (see his famous essay skewering the cruise ship experience, "A Supposedly Fun Thing I'll Never Do Again"), but as his 2005 speech at Kenyon College implied, he was not unfamiliar with the heft of existence:

[L]earning how to think really means learning how to exercise some control over how and what you think. It means being conscious and aware enough to choose what you pay attention to and to choose how you construct meaning from experience. Because if you cannot exercise this kind of choice in adult life, you will be totally hosed. Think of the old cliché about quote the mind being an excellent servant but a terrible master.

This, like many clichés, so lame and unexciting on the surface, actually expresses a great and terrible truth. It is not the least bit coincidental that adults who commit suicide with firearms almost always shoot themselves in: the head. They shoot the terrible master. And the truth is that most of these suicides are actually dead long before they pull the trigger.

Very Sad.

I'm curious as to why he hung himself when he knew his wife would find him that way. That seems cruel. Unless she knew it was coming.

According to this, it sounds like his whole family saw it coming. Sad stuff.

http://www.rollingstone.com/news/story/23638511/the_lost_years__last_days_of_david_foster_wallace

More from the Rolling Stone archives:

http://www.rollingstone.com/news/story/23638939/getting_to_know_david_foster_wallace

And this sounds interesting:

http://www.theawl.com/2010/03/booked-up-although-of-course-you-end-up-becoming-yourself-a-road-trip-with-david-foster-wallace-by-david-lipsky

[Slaky]

http://gawker.com/5049526/david-foster-wallace-dead-of-suicide-at-46

Foster Wallace, longtime darling of grad students and civilian PoMo lit fans, was often very funny in print (see his famous essay skewering the cruise ship experience, "A Supposedly Fun Thing I'll Never Do Again"), but as his 2005 speech at Kenyon College implied, he was not unfamiliar with the heft of existence:

[L]earning how to think really means learning how to exercise some control over how and what you think. It means being conscious and aware enough to choose what you pay attention to and to choose how you construct meaning from experience. Because if you cannot exercise this kind of choice in adult life, you will be totally hosed. Think of the old cliché about quote the mind being an excellent servant but a terrible master.

This, like many clichés, so lame and unexciting on the surface, actually expresses a great and terrible truth. It is not the least bit coincidental that adults who commit suicide with firearms almost always shoot themselves in: the head. They shoot the terrible master. And the truth is that most of these suicides are actually dead long before they pull the trigger.

Very Sad.

I'm curious as to why he hung himself when he knew his wife would find him that way. That seems cruel. Unless she knew it was coming.

According to this, it sounds like his whole family saw it coming. Sad stuff.

http://www.rollingstone.com/news/story/23638511/the_lost_years__last_days_of_david_foster_wallace

More from the Rolling Stone archives:

http://www.rollingstone.com/news/story/23638939/getting_to_know_david_foster_wallace

And this sounds interesting:

http://www.theawl.com/2010/03/booked-up-although-of-course-you-end-up-becoming-yourself-a-road-trip-with-david-foster-wallace-by-david-lipsky

You are the sickness yourself.... You realize all this...when you look at the black hole and it's wearing your face. That's when the Bad Thing just absolutely eats you up, or rather when you just eat yourself up. When you kill yourself. All this business about people committing suicide when they're "severely depressed;" we say, "Holy cow, we must do something to stop them from killing themselves!" That's wrong. Because all these people have, you see, by this time already killed themselves, where it really counts.... When they "commit suicide," they're just being orderly.