Writer David Foster Wallace found dead

[RedSock]

Source: LA Times

David Foster Wallace, the novelist, essayist and humorist best known for his 1997 tome "Infinite Jest," was found dead last night at his home in Claremont, according to the Claremont Police Department. He was 46.

Jackie Morales, a records clerk at the Claremont Police Department, said Wallace's wife called police at 9:30 p.m. Friday saying she had returned home to find her husband had hanged himself.

Read more: http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-wallace14-2008sep14,0,7461856.story

---

Stunned. One of my favourite writers. IJ is my fave book of all time.

Plus he was only one year older than I am.

Damn.

[Redstone]

1. And eight years younger than me. Damn, as you said.

Redstone

[LiberalHeart]

2. From wiki

In the November 2007 issue of The Atlantic, which commemorated the magazine's 150th anniversary, an invited series of authors, artists, politicians and others were asked to prepare 300 words or so on "the future of the American idea". Wallace asked whether some things were still worth dying for, and presented a "thought experiment" in which "we decided that a certain baseline vulnerability to terrorism is part of the price of the American idea." He goes on to say that we might have to accept that every now and then "a democratic republic cannot 100% protect itself without subverting the very principles that made it worth protecting." By comparison, he continues, we accept the 40,000 highway deaths each year as the price we pay for the convenience of the motor car. Finally, he asks, in the context of Guantanamo Bay, the Patriot Act, and warrantless wiretapping, "Have we become so selfish and scared that we don't even want to consider whether some things trump safety?"

[firedupdem]

3. Wow. I hear of suicide way too much now. n/t

[Ian David]

13. Suicides always increase under conservative governments. n/t

[firedupdem]

4. dupe n/t

[Arctic Dave]

5. NOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!

DFW is my favorite modern writer. FFFFFUUUUUUUUCCCKKKKK!!!!

My condolences to his wife and family.

:cry: :( :cry:

[Hissyspit]

6. He is one year older than me, too. I will check out "Infinite Jest."

[girl gone mad]

16. His first book, Broom of the System..

was also very good and may be a quicker read.

[Tuesday Afternoon]

7. sheesh -- sad. May he rest in peace. eom

[villager]

8. Well goddamnit to hell.

It's always the wrong people knocking themselves off.

[RedSock]

9. first saw the rumor here

http://www.edrants.com/david-foster-wallace-dead/

and hoped like hell it was a hoax/mistake.

...

Anyone who does not know his stuff should probably first check out "A Suppoesedly Funny Thing I'll Never Do Again" -- a collection of essays.

Do not miss his account of his time on a cruise ship (originally in Harper's)!

[Hugin]

15. Tragic.

:(

[Andre II]

17. Yeah

I'll second that.
Great book.
Great writer.
It's tragic.
Condolecence to his family.

[Edgewater_Joe]

10. Suicide, Too.

It makes you wonder, considering INFINITE JEST happened when he was very young, whether he thought life wasn't worth living because he'd never "top" that. As a writer I know too many people who would think just that.

And he's my age, too.

Sad, but (perhaps ironically) he leaves INFINITE JEST and some terrific essay collections. That, I hope, is something for his family.

It will help me.

Excuse me while I raise a drink to his memory ...

[timtom]

11. OMG!!!

I just bought "Infinite Jest" from Amazon 3 weeks ago.

[semillama]

12. My condolences to his family.

He was one of my favorite modern writers.

[debbierlus]

14. Oh, damn. That is horrible.

All my positivie thoughts and energy to his family.

[KewlKat]

18. The Wall Street Journal

has a recent (May 31, 2008) interview of him.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB121218708445533979.html?mod=2_1167_1

Here are a couple questions he responded to:

WSJ: Have you changed your mind about any of the points that you made in the book?

Mr. Wallace: In the best political tradition, I reject the premise of your question. The essay quite specifically concerns a couple weeks in February, 2000, and the situation of both McCain national politics in those couple weeks. It is heavily context-dependent. And that context now seems a long, long, long time ago. McCain himself has obviously changed; his flipperoos and weaselings on Roe v. Wade, campaign finance, the toxicity of lobbyists, Iraq timetables, etc. are just some of what make him a less interesting, more depressing political figure now—for me, at least. It's all understandable, of course—he's the GOP nominee now, not an insurgent maverick. Understandable, but depressing. As part of the essay talks about, there's an enormous difference between running an insurgent Hail-Mary-type longshot campaign and being a viable candidate (it was right around New Hampshire in 2000 that McCain began to change from the former to the latter), and there are some deep, really rather troubling questions about whether serious honor and candor and principle remain possible for someone who wants to really maybe win. I wouldn't take back anything that got said in that essay, but I'd want a reader to keep the time and context very much in mind on every page.

WSJ: You write that John McCain, in 2000, had become "the great populist hope of American politics." What parallels do you see between McCain in 2000 and Barack Obama in 2008?

Mr. Wallace: There are some similarities—the ability to attract new voters, Independents; the ability to raise serious money in a grassroots way via the Web. But there are also lots of differences, many too obvious to need pointing out. Obama is an orator, for one thing—a rhetorician of the old school. To me, that seems more classically populist than McCain, who's not a good speechmaker and whose great strengths are Q&As and small-group press confabs. But there's a bigger . The truth—as I see it—is that the previous seven years and four months of the Bush Administration have been such an unmitigated horror show of rapacity, hubris, incompetence, mendacity, corruption, cynicism and contempt for the electorate that it's very difficult to imagine how a self-identified Republican could try to position himself as a populist.

[alcibiades_mystery]

19. Writer David Foster Wallace found dead

Source: LA Times

David Foster Wallace, the novelist, essayist and humorist best known for his 1996 tome "Infinite Jest," was found dead last night at his home in Claremont, according to the Claremont Police Department. He was 46.

Jackie Morales, a records clerk at the Claremont Police Department, said Wallace's wife called police at 9:30 p.m. Friday saying she had returned home to find her husband had hanged himself.



Read more: http://www.latimes.com/news/obituaries/la-me-wallace14-2008sep14,0,246155.story

---

Anyone who hasn't read Infinite Jest should.

Guy obviously wrote himself just a step ahead of the demons. I guess they caught up. Can't believe he was only 46

[Ken Burch]

20. Jesus. I hope somebody is there for his wife at this time.

Sounds like we just lost another bipolar genius.

[gateley]

21. I'm so sorry.

I'm not familiar with him or his work, but it breaks my heart that people can feel so hopeless and helpless that death is seen as preferable and a solution. :(

[LuckyLib]

22. He was an amazing humorist. Wrote "A Supposedly Fun Thing I'll Never Do Again"

with a chapter on cruises that is the definitive jaundiced eye at the culture of cruise holidays. So sad.

[progressoid]

26. That's the only thing of his I've read.

So sorry to hear about this.

[InternalDialogue]

23. Oh, that man had a clever and active mind.

I'm sorry to hear of his suicide.

I remember the first time I read about him, in an interview piece from the early 1990s. I hadn't read "Broom of the System" at the time, but I really identified with Wallace because he was about my age and was just starting a writing career. I remember the photo of him from the magazine, Wallace sitting in a comfortable library/office setting, with a red bandanna wrapped around his forehead. He said he loved to sit in his chair, put in a dip of Copenhagen, and start writing.

His work was dense but satisfying, and he never lost the knack for writing like a young man. I never got the feeling I was reading a middle-aged man's words, though he grew from a 20-something to a 40-something over the years. In a way, it's the same way I remember Kerouac's work or Fitzgerald's. He had a great mastery of the language.

I will miss him.

[DeepBlueC]

24. Oh nooooo.

Suicide...according to Gawker

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

[HughBeaumont]

25. I still haven't read "Infinite Jest" yet.

I guess I'll have to now.

R.I.P.

[girl gone mad]

27. I'm heartsick..

he was one of my favorite writers.

[RandomKoolzip]

28. Oh Shit. Shit shit shit shit....

:cry:

"Infinite Jest" changed my life. I still consider it the best work of fiction produced in the last 50 years.


Goddamnit....

RIP, DFW.

[EmilyAnne]

29. This is just terrible. I can't believe it.

[Heidi]

30. Unbelievable.

Safe passage, David Foster Wallace. :cry:

[tishaLA]

31. I really admired his writing

and he wrote the two best articles about tennis ever--one in Esquire and another in the NY Times.

[Heidi]

32. Charlie Rose interview with David Foster Wallace (1997)

DFW portion begins at 23:16
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zPWh9yQbU4E

[redqueen]

33. Oh my God...

:cry: :cry: :cry:

[Codeine]

34. He was a genius.

Infinite Jest is an amazing work. His talent will be missed.

[Haole Girl]

35. So many writers kill themselves

It's so sad.

:cry:

[Liberal_in_LA]

46. Spalding Gray... still haven't gotten over that one

[nashville_brook]

36. omg -- one of my all time favorite writers too -- holy shit.

[SmokingJacket]

37. I quit eating lobster because of him.

His essay "Consider the Lobster" offered a convincing argument for the suffering of lobsters when you toss them in the pot. Used to be my favorite food -- haven't eaten one since.

I loved his essays. He meant every single word he wrote. :cry:

[Mabus]

38. People should read his "McCain's Promises"

It's a great book. I've lent it out to several friends and it helped wake them up to what a manipulator McCain is.

Wallace reworked his Rolling Stone article and published it earlier this year under the title McCain's Promises: Aboard the Straight Talk Express With John McCain and a Whole Bunch of Actual Reporters, Thinking About Hope. Wallace talks about the coziness of the political media and the McCain campaign and how it isn't healthy for our country.

[RedSock]

39. mccainb ook

Actually, it is more like what he originally turned in. When asked to provide (for example) 10,000 words, DFW would submit more like 30,000. He did the same thing with his classic Harper's essays on the cruise and fair.

Also, what is in Consider the Lobster is exactly what is in the new book. No new material.

[Mabus]

40. It just strikes me that it was a very important work for him

It was published at least four times, three of them in print. As noted, he originally wrote it for The Rolling Stone for publication 2000. He then published it in Consider the Lobster. Then, or contemporaneous with Lobster, it was published online. Finally, he had it republished earlier this year.

[crossroads]

41. So Sorry To Hear This! nt

[Dreamer Tatum]

42. Can you imagine the suicide note?

Wonder how many footnotes it had.

[Codeine]

43. Bad. Bad. Bad.

But so deliciously good at the same time. :evilgrin:

[Dreamer Tatum]

44. That is my written paean to him

As he is my favorite essayist by far.

[girl gone mad]

45. Tennis anyone?

That's mine.

:(

[darkstar]

48. Eschaton

[pitohui]

47. very tragic, he was much too young

i have never read a better book than infinite jest about addiction/compulsion, i did not know anything of his personal life and am sorry to hear that he suffered from many of the issues that he wrote about such as clinical depression

i hope he knew how much he meant to us

[renate]

49. it's so sad to read this, now knowing the path he was going to take:

As I'm sure you guys know by now, it is extremely difficult to stay alert and attentive, instead of getting hypnotized by the constant monologue inside your own head (may be happening right now). Twenty years after my own graduation, I have come gradually to understand that the liberal arts cliché about teaching you how to think is actually shorthand for a much deeper, more serious idea: learning 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.

http://www.marginalia.org/dfw_kenyon_commencement.html

[LuckyLib]

51. The Kenyon commencement address is wonderful. Thanks for the link.

More than a few students learned something there. Parents as well.

[Rosie1223]

50. I went to high school with Dave

His off-beat humor and observations on life were great. I loved his books and essays. My condolences to his wife and family.

[Arugula Latte]

52. Such talent ... now gone.

:(

[On the Road]

53. Shocking and Saddening

If you read DFW's commencement address to Kenyon, controlling your thought process and experience was extremely important to him. Doesn't look like that worked for him.

Infinite Jest was strange and astounding, although it does take about 150 pages to really get going.

If you finish the book and re-read the first chapter, there are events that suddenly make sense that were meaningless the first time around. I always wondered if that recursive element had anything to do with the title, meaning that if you kept rereading the book infinitely you would continue to get these new insights.

Looking at the Wikipedia article, all the forgotten people and themes come up:


the Eschaton War Games,
the nuclear wasteland of New England populated by giant mutant hamsters (my daughter loved those),
the Quebecois terrorists, wheelchair bound from playing "Le Joue de la Prochain Train" ,
the shrouded and possibly disfigured beauty Joelle van Dyne, AKA the PGOAT and Madam Psychosis
Subsidized time, in which numbers were replaced by corporate sponsorship: Year of the Whopper,
Year of the Trial-Size Dove Bar, Year of the Depend Adult Undergarment, etc.
the footnotes within footnotes, some of them containing incorrect mathematical functions
and more, too many to name

It is too bad he was this unhappy. I wish he had been able to take enough pleasure in life to make it worthwhile.

[hunter]

54. Controlling one's thought process...

...it is a futile and unnatural quest. Our minds are instruments of a greater consciousness, and it is not always a rational consciousness. This state of humanity is an inevitable consequence of our storytelling. These stories rule over us and all we can do is choose the stories we remember, and the stories we live by, and the stories we tell. We cannot control them, and if we seek this control they will break us. Faith of any kind is a brittle thing, and when it breaks the shards cut like glass. It is better to seek resilience rather than faith, and to seek growth rather than perseverance.


Oh the sisters of mercy, they are not departed or gone.
They were waiting for me when I thought that I just can't go on.
And they brought me their comfort and later they brought me this song.
Oh I hope you run into them, you who've been traveling so long.

Yes you who must leave everything that you cannot control.
It begins with your family, but soon it comes around to your soul.
Well I've been where you're hanging, I think I can see how you're pinned:
When you're not feeling holy, your loneliness says that you've sinned.

Well they lay down beside me, I made my confession to them.
They touched both my eyes and I touched the dew on their hem.
If your life is a leaf that the seasons tear off and condemn
they will bind you with love that is graceful and green as a stem.

When I left they were sleeping, I hope you run into them soon.
Don't turn on the lights, you can read their address by the moon.
And you won't make me jealous if I hear that they sweetened your night:
We weren't lovers like that and besides it would still be all right,
We weren't lovers like that and besides it would still be all right

-- Leonard Cohen