Infinite Jest - Review
Over the past several months, I've listened to Infinite Jest on tape. This book, David Foster Wallace, is almost indescribable, but here is my review...
Bullet points:
1) It is long, really, really unnecessarily long (over 1,000 pages).
2) The writing style is very creative, overly informal (which I like), original (he uses words that are made-up, but seem just right), and it has a beautiful flow.
3) There are 3 main plots, and dozens smaller plots that are either completely unrelated to each other, or forced together. It might be better as three different novels and 50 short stories.
4) There is no ending. It might has well ended in the middle of a sentence. Nothing was resolved, there was no climax, and critical plot aspects were completely ignored.
I liked the book, but would not recommend it to anyone (unless they were studying literature). There was a stream of consciousness to the entire book, which helped sections flow into each other; however, they often flew off into completely irrelevant topics (and never returned the original subject). The book was also constantly switching between plots and was not in chronological order. There were some interesting aspects about knowing the future for some characters than exploring their past, but it was completely unnecessary. The entire book was an experiment in taking literacy techniques too far. Some succeeded (re-imagining the basics of geography and the near future, creative linguistics, deep-diving into the psychology of addicts, beautiful philosophy, etc.), while many others failed (length of book, constantly deviating from the plot, end-notes, character development, etc). Overall, it was an interesting experiment that can shed light on "the possible", but by itself was just "too much" and "not enough". The non-ending was particularly frustrating as I'd invested so much time into the plot, just to have nothing resolved. Perhaps the author was trying to make a point about something, but I prefer an actual ending (even a bad ending would have been better).
Overall grade: C
Bullet points:
1) It is long, really, really unnecessarily long (over 1,000 pages).
2) The writing style is very creative, overly informal (which I like), original (he uses words that are made-up, but seem just right), and it has a beautiful flow.
3) There are 3 main plots, and dozens smaller plots that are either completely unrelated to each other, or forced together. It might be better as three different novels and 50 short stories.
4) There is no ending. It might has well ended in the middle of a sentence. Nothing was resolved, there was no climax, and critical plot aspects were completely ignored.
I liked the book, but would not recommend it to anyone (unless they were studying literature). There was a stream of consciousness to the entire book, which helped sections flow into each other; however, they often flew off into completely irrelevant topics (and never returned the original subject). The book was also constantly switching between plots and was not in chronological order. There were some interesting aspects about knowing the future for some characters than exploring their past, but it was completely unnecessary. The entire book was an experiment in taking literacy techniques too far. Some succeeded (re-imagining the basics of geography and the near future, creative linguistics, deep-diving into the psychology of addicts, beautiful philosophy, etc.), while many others failed (length of book, constantly deviating from the plot, end-notes, character development, etc). Overall, it was an interesting experiment that can shed light on "the possible", but by itself was just "too much" and "not enough". The non-ending was particularly frustrating as I'd invested so much time into the plot, just to have nothing resolved. Perhaps the author was trying to make a point about something, but I prefer an actual ending (even a bad ending would have been better).
Overall grade: C
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