NO JEST

David Foster Wallace was one of those writers I appreciated and respected more than liked. A few years back I struggled to read Infinite Jest and gave up after the first hundred and fifty or so pages. It was impenetrably intellectual and, in my unsophisticated view, unrelentingly indulgent. But then again, maybe that's just a reaction to my own limitations as a reader. It's easy to say someone is being indulgent if you don't fully appreciate and understand their work. I should probably give the book another try some day.

Still, I can't help but think that writing is an act of communication... and if you can't communicate your ideas to me --and I'm a reasonably intelligent fellow-- then is the failure solely mine own? I can't stand Toni Morrison's writing for similar reasons. It's unnecessarily and arrogantly impenetrable. She seems to delight in the idea that people struggle to understand her work.

And so, I think she is a far inferior writer to Wallace. Hers seems to be the obfuscation of pretense. An ego-driven need to muddy the waters with faux poetry and indulgent digressions in order to distract the reader from her contrived and pedestrian narratives. Wallace, on the other hand, seemed to speak in his own argot. While his essays are cogent, intellectual dissections that betray his inner geek (read his critique of the Terminator 2 here), his fiction seems to stray into some uncharted part of his brain where stories and convoluted ponderings fuse. It's reminiscent of Thomas Pynchon, a type of unconscious regurgitation that erupts and undulates with ideas. Unlike Pynchon, however, Wallace seemed less married to narrative thrust or an inner storytelling pattern. Instead, he seemed to be simultaneously deconstructing and constructing his stories as they unfolded --never sure of which was more important. Then again, I've only read the one abandoned novel and waded through The Girl With The Curious Hair (which I quite liked). Maybe I don't know what the hell I'm talking about.

I do know I really enjoyed his collection of essays, Supposedly Fun Things I'll Never Do Again, for it's wide-eyed misanthropy, intellectual mockery and gamely amused embrace of conventional pasttimes. Wallace combatted irony in his writing (while infusing it with, well, irony), indicting those who peddled in irony as never caring enough to actually say anything of import or substance. In his own convoluted manner, he seemed to dare to suggest that there is virtue in sincerity.

And if only for that, I admire him.

Yesterday, Wallace hung himself. I'll never quite understand what drives someone who obviously burns to create to destroy themselves. Don't they have more stories they want to tell? Or did it become a burden to try to tell them?

I felt the same way about Kurt Cobain and Elliot Smith. Didn't they have more songs they wanted to write, to sing. For Kurt, wasn't it worth staying alive just to see his child safely into adulthood? Even if these men's creativity is spurred on by mental dysfunction (manic depression or whatever), you have to wonder what biological imperative required them to flip off the switch.

And so, no irony. I'm a little sad. Sad for Wallace's wife who discovered his body. Sad for Frances Cobain, who never got to know her father. Sad for all the stories and songs that won't be created. Sad for the joy or peace or insight or solace they would have brought to readers and listeners.

God knows we can all use a little of all those things.



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