So David Foster Wallace died this weekend, a suicide. I am grieving, which sounds ridiculous since I had no actual personal relationship with him, but it's true. I started reading his essays in college - the fantastic A Supposedly Fun Think I'll Never Do Again is so delicious and witty and sardonic that I've been rereading it for years. His description of solipsism as "not exactly the cheery crackling hearth of psycho-philosohpical orientations" (I'm probably paraphrasing a bit) makes me laugh. His essay on David Lynch gave me new and powerful insight into films I'd seen and loved and been mystified by. I have never again been to a state or county fair without thinking of his hysterical description of the evangelical Christian booth at the Indiana State Fair. I was just musing this weekend over his description of a boxing match he saw during that visit.
His short stories are disturbing and strange and beautifully titled. The novel Infinite Jest took me months to finish (and I am first and foremost a dedicated reader) but has remained in my consciousness for years.
His later writing, including Consider the Lobster is just as sharp and penetrating - his essay on John McCain is brilliant and he depicts McCain's courage as vividly as his scary neocon politics. A short story in the New Yorker made me cry a year or two back. He wrote an essay on dictionaries and language use that so perfectly described the feeling of wanting one's guests to go home but being unable to put it into the right words that it made my skin crawl. His description of how language was used and analyzed in his childhood made me want to be the kind of parent who inspires love of words in her kids.
He didn't ever seem like a healthy person, or a happy person, or a person you'd want taking care of your cat. But he seemed like he'd be great to get a drink or twelve with, he seemed brilliant and vicious and funny and genuinely dedicated to his students. I have enjoyed his writing for years, and I am sorry he is dead. I wish we had another fifty years of his writing to look forward to. I never knew him at all, but I will miss him greatly.
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You wrote:
"I have never again been to a state or county fair without thinking of his hysterical description of the evangelical Christian booth at the Indiana State Fair."
Please pardon me for just butting onto your blog, but my Google search for a short story by DFW turned up your blog.
I just saw an interview with Sam Mendes on The Charlie Rose Show. Mendes said he understood more about America in the 80-page short story about the county fair than he ever had before from any other text.
I've scanned the tables of contents of several of Wallace's books and can't find a title of a story that seems to deal with a county fair. Could you tell me which book and which story you are referring to in your blog? I would love to buy that book.
Thank you,
Jennifer Mitts
jennifermitts@gmail.com
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