Essays and Arguments
Ratings39
Average rating4.2
A collection of stories from David Foster Wallace is occasion to celebrate. These stories -- which have been prominently serialized in Harper's, Esquire, the Paris Review, and elsewhere -- explore intensely immediate states of mind, with the attention to voice and the extraordinary creative daring that have won Wallace his reputation as one of the most talented fiction writer of his generation.Among the stories are "The Depressed Person", a dazzling portrayal of a woman's mental state; "Adult World", which reveals a woman's agonized consideration of her confusing sexual relationship with her husband; and "Brief Interviews with Hideous Men", a dark, hilarious series of portraits of men whose fear of women renders them grotesque.
Reviews with the most likes.
Essays that I could relate to - the state fair, the cruise - were fantastic. Others that I felt less of a connection to - tennis, TV, David Lynch - contained great writing and a lot of interesting ideas, but also felt like they went on too long. I think I'm ready for his fiction now.
“08/15/0840h. A Macy's-float-sized inflatable Ronald, seated and eerily Buddha-like, presides over the north side of the Club Mickey D's tent. A family is having their picture taken in front of the inflatable Ronald, arranging their little kids in a careful pose. Notebook entry: ‘Why?'”
Brilliant collection of 7 essays ranging from erudite meditations on irony and television to in-depth tennis talk to the absurdity of a midwestern State Fair to the works of David Lynch to the Luxury Cruise Experience™
God he was truly just an incredible writer
Another fun and interesting collection of essays (which makes me think that maybe I like essays, even though I'm most often not in the mood for one). Favorites: "E Unibus Pluram" (of course), "Getting Away from Being Pretty Much Away from It All", and "A Supposedly Fun Thing I'll Never Do Again".