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Summary: Disclaimer: I've not read Wallace's fiction...
Review: ...but i really loved this essay collection.Wallace is (IMO) a totally hilarious writer and the essays collected in this book are astute observations and analyses of a number of topics and events written wittily with a voice that is brutally critical yet somehow still compassionate. His accounts of things as varied as a day at a small county fair to his experiences going on a "luxury cruise" are filled with information, abstract analysis, biting wit, and self-examination. I laughed out loud frequently, yet it made me think about society and selfhood a lot as well. Highly recommended for fans of this sort of writing.
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Summary: When he's on he's on, when he's not he's not
Review: I think David Foster Wallace is a brilliant writer, but can't really hit the target all the time. Either he is totally on top of something in describing it, or he writes himself into an intellectual loop that only he appreciates. When i read his stuff, i almost wonder if he is too intelligent for his audience, in that he tries to write about pop culture and similar themes that appeal to the average reader with such strength and knowhow that he seems like he's a genius stuck in a kid's mind and his descriptions of the kid's world can become too complicated for the kid to enjoy. That said, this book is well worth it, if not for the title essay on board a cruise ship which is hilarious then for the essay on amercian writing in the television age. There is a remark about irony in that essay which just blew my top off, it was great. The other notable essay is his "personal" review and account of a state fair, which is also equally funny. As for the others, i wasn't all that interested, in that i found them too wholly theoretical and dull. However, don't let this stop you, his writing is so original and fresh that its worth buying, not only for what it can give, but for what it exposes you to. Well worth it.
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Summary: Wow!
Review: One of the most insightful collections of essays I've read in years, Wallace's A Supposedly Fun Thing explores contemporary life with fresh and vibrant language. Too many try to compare these non-fiction essays with his magnum opus, Infinite Jest; there's a directness, a desire to not beat around the bush, present in A Supposedly Fun Thing. I.J. is a massive metaphor for the issues and concerns discussed in A Supposedly Fun Thing and Brief Interviews with Hideous Men (another fine Wallace book). I'd love to read Wallace's take on the post-Sept. 11th America and the Bush Administration. If you're reading this, Dave, consider this a suggestion for more exceptional essays. Thanks for the great book.
Rating:
Summary: Very good
Review: David Foster Wallace is a gifted writer and always a joy to read. His fiction is groundbreaking, and as this book proves, his nonfiction may even be better. "A supposedly fun thing" is a collection of essays that are ostensibly stabs at journalism, the big joke being that Wallace is no journalist. He comes off as an endearingly neurotic-bordering-on-pathologically-self-concious red headed step child of Hunter S. Thompson. In fact, it could even be stated that this book is a sort of postmodern inversion of "The Great Shark Hunt", where Thompson's diving in head first to live inside the events he reports is replaced by Wallace's endearing midwestern unwillingness to get in the way and fear of making a nuisance and/or humiliating spectacle of himself. Mixed in with all that, though, are startling on point revelations about the state of American Culture, what it means to be an american, the nature of art, and the human condition, which one normally doesn't expect from works about TV, Tennis, State Fairs, or Carribean Pleasure Cruises(in the title essay). While it may not be as great an accomplishment as Infinite Jest (and the comparison to that magnificent book is the only reason this is getting four stars instead of five), "Supposedly Fun Thing" is without a doubt an incredible read and well worth the price of entry.
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Summary: Worth it
Review: This was a thorough and entertaining read. I laughed all the way through.
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Summary: A supposedly good author I'll never read again
Review: Occasionally Wallace manages to craft a story or essay that holds interest throughout. More often, however, he uses language for no other purpose than to show his adeptness at using language. His paragraphs of description upon description demonstrate that he has a way with adjectives, but they fail to actually improve the reader's understanding of the story-- if there is a story buried beneath the description. It is not vivid description that makes a good author, but relevant description. "See what I can do!" his writing seems to scream. It seems to work for him, as reviewers regularly comment on his brilliance.
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Summary: Fantastic
Review: More brief than his novels, just as inviting, conversational, thought-provoking, and funny. The addition of a self-effacing first person is really charming. After having read the novels, which are so cool they're practically untouchable, this book is absolutely sparkling. I'd say David Foster Wallace is even better at nonfiction!
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Summary: 100 Page Essay About a Boat Cruise Is Worth Gold
Review: The title essay, about a hundred pages, is a sort of spy mission where the author, a man who makes it clear that he loathes the philistinism of conspicuous consumerism, poses as a boat cruise passenger and chronicles the depression and uneasiness that results from a luxury boat cruise. Wallace's depression is our joy because he is extremely funny in the way he shows how the Pampering Industry, that is, the boat cruise staff, is in fact a bunch of bullies who force us to "have a good time" as we luxuriate on a cruiser, which Wallace envisions as a sort of huge, warm womb where consciousness is lost and where the tourists experience a sort of death. Funny, profound, disturbing, Wallace hits a home run in an essay that was originally published in Harper's magazine around 1995. I believe this version is slightly different, longer, but curiously, missing some juicy parts that I remember enjoying in the magazine version.
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Summary: Genius, and variety
Review: James Gleick's biography of Richard Feynman, entitled _Genius_, spent a while defending that choice of adjective. The word ``genius" gets tossed around so much these days that it's been stripped of almost all its value. I tried to come up with a suitable subjective definition of genius, and my provisional one is something like the following: a genius is someone whose work changes the future direction that his particular speciality takes; after he's published his work, his speciality will never be the same again. By this definition - and by any others that I can think of - David Foster Wallace is a genius. His genius comes from a few directions. First is his astonishing ability to meld diverse thoughts into a coherent whole. I think this is revealed most clearly in ``E Unibus Plurum," Wallace's essay within _A Supposedly Fun Thing I'll Never Do Again_ about the effect that television - particularly television's habit of swallowing irony - has on fiction. He diverges briefly into thoughts about what this means for our society in general. What happens when we spend our time conversing ironically - that is, commenting sardonically, but not actually fixing anything? But at the same time that he can be incisive and intelligent, he's incredibly funny. The title essay from this collection describes Wallace's trip aboard a luxury cruise liner for Harper's Magazine, and the strange sort of death-transcendence (his term, not mine) that defines cruise lines. It's both funny enough that I had a hard time breathing at certain points, and almost heartbreaking. I guess I don't always think of Wallace's genius until days like today when I'm sick at home and pull his essays off the shelf. I learn a little bit more about his arguments each time; laugh a little bit more; and find myself in the presence of an old friend who's incredibly candidly honest with me: ``[The mirrored staircases are] wickedly great because via the mirrors you can check out female bottoms ... without appearing to be one of those icky types who check out female bottoms on staircases." This is a man who's laying it all out on the line for you: his sense of humor, his erudition, and his very human perversions. He seems like the kind of guy with whom I could have a great conversation over coffee. Imagine this essay collection as a conversation with an incredibly brilliant friend. It will be some of the best few hours you ever spend with a book.
Rating:
Summary: mostly superb
Review: Mr. Wallace isn't just funny (and he can be wickedly funny), he has a superb command of language, isn't afraid to use words, is beautifully observant, and has a great sense of character. All of those gifts have converged in a couple of these essays to make them, or parts of them, utterly memorable. Unfortunately, there are some long dead moments within each essay that make me stop and think, Now here's an example of really bad judgment. What's unfortunate is that Wallace's mistakes tarnish the lustre of his finer moments. Without the extreme bad here, though, we might not also have the extreme good. And in the end it's worth it. There are a few writers who always get grouped together with Wallace in literary commentary, but not a single one of can hold a candle to this guy.
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