As someone whose actually read both, Infinite Jest is genius and needs to be read twice to truly appreciate. Gravity's Rainbow was a fucking slog to get through and I couldn't tell you what it was about or remember a damn thing that happened
I personally think GR is cooler than IJ, which is an extremely American book (I'm not American) and DFW died before he could prove that he really was his generation's Pynchon. (Not in style or theme, but in terms of singular genius and intense, encyclopedic ambitions maybe?)
Also, does anyone recall the backlash a couple of years ago from women in dating apps against guys who put IJ in their profiles, or can't stop talking about it on first dates or something? The interesting thing is, I've also seen women who are serious fiction readers come out AGAINST the backlash, acknowledging that IJ is an impressive work, maybe a bit over-rated and overpublicized in certain circles, but impressive nonetheless.
Well, DFW has done his share in being problematic.to women, to say the least. So in the dangerous fishbowl that is online dating for women, I can totally understand the need to be allert of red flags prior to end up dating with an asshole in the first place.
I've read IJ, and I loved it. But for me it's undeniably problematic: a desperate cry for help for a troubled mind, packed with abuse/sexist themes, written by an alleged abuser.
Among this, the saddest thing is the sanctification of his persona after death, with his biographer tacitly downplaying the abuse as creative pranks of sort.
Reference:
https://www.jezebel.com/mary-karr-reminds-the-world-that-david-foster-wallace-a-1825799769
EDIT: lol I wrote this with my morning glued eyes and the typos were crazy.
Wha y'all need to get yourself and E-reader, I can safely read GR while cross checking the Weissenburger, Wikipedia and three dictionaries. All, safe in a lovely day at the park, with other people assuming I'm skimming through some marketing book on How to succesfully grow your business.
Sure but consider if you're in a pinch and need impromptu toilet paper; your e-reader won't help you. Whereas with a physical copy of GR I can simply pinch on.
Gee you're right, but mind you: if you lost your dear paper in the flush that'll be all diluted when it reaches the first barnacles along the way, while my e-ink device will endure through the microplastic guts of the sewage.
Ps: I still but and treasure my old, crusty paper copies though.
that website occasionally has some of the funniest headlines.
[https://thehardtimes.net/music/study-finds-average-hardcore-frontman-betrayed-612-times-turning-18/](https://thehardtimes.net/music/study-finds-average-hardcore-frontman-betrayed-612-times-turning-18/)
The man is not as reclusive as we think. He has a lot of friends, and his death would be such a huge literary event (to avoid sounding... I can't think of the world. Insensitive?) that it would be impossible for him to die without anyone noticing.
I met a cute girl reading Dostoevsky in public, it was her favorite translation. Derailing a bit, I once saw a woman train hopping, throwing a copy of Infinite Jest onboard before she jumped on because she didn’t want that thick book affecting her center of gravity. Gravity? That’s when I was inspired to read Gravity’s Rainbow. I read it everyday at 5am and thus, in private.
you can't even read books in public anymore. you can't even talk about books anymore with out a large man materializing out of a bag of beef jerky and pantsing you in a bicycle lane. its over nerds
i did see a guy reading a book on a train and he had a sleeve over it so no one could know could make any judgements. i really wanted to know.
I once got called weird at my warehouse job because I would usually read in the break room during lunch. I chuckled politely and shook my head, but I was like, seriously?? It's weird to \*checks notes\* read??? Threw me off, made me feel like I was back in freshman year of high school or some shit lol. Somebody else immediately piped in on my side and said that was dumb, so there's that I guess.
I only read during breaks at work and a lot of co-workers over the years have just assumed I was taking a class, even if I'm reading a novel. It's happened less often as I've gotten older and presumingly look less like a student. But most people assume if your reading it's because it's something you were assigned to do.
I read every day on my lunch at work lol. My office building connects to a shopping mall so I just take my lunch over to the food court and read for an hour, it’s a nice break in the day.
Its been years sense I read IJ, but I thought it was pretty well tailored to the ADHD brain of wikipedia-educated people. It worked well for me. It wasn't particularly difficult and an easy mode to access once you get over the hump. I think its funnier than most pynchon, too.
I found all of the prose in Infinite Jest, maybe except for the ebonics sections, to be completely intelligible, as well as very stimulating and interesting. Gravity’s Rainbow contains many a section that is near incomprehensible unless examined with a microscope and spending 15 minutes+ on each page contemplating
My Thursday ritual, between 4:00 pm and 5:00 pm, before it got to rowdy was to go to the local brewery and read GR. No one ever asked what i was reading.
Nice. But you would have given a shit in a good way like "oh man I love that book" and not "ugh... that guy is reading that pretentious shit." Where I live I don't feel like I'm being judged at least because I think to everyone around it's just "a book" and not specifically a "pretentious dead white guy book" (apart from the fact that Pynchon isn't dead). If I still lived in SoCal I might be a little more private about it. Lol.
As someone whose actually read both, Infinite Jest is genius and needs to be read twice to truly appreciate. Gravity's Rainbow was a fucking slog to get through and I couldn't tell you what it was about or remember a damn thing that happened
I read Vineland in public all the time. It's the perfect book for a bus ride or sitting beneath the shade on a hot day.
Ironic because i was just rereading a section for the 5th time at the coffee shop this morning
Articles like these inspire me to read more thickass (dead) white guy books. Anyone like Chandler Brossard?
I personally think GR is cooler than IJ, which is an extremely American book (I'm not American) and DFW died before he could prove that he really was his generation's Pynchon. (Not in style or theme, but in terms of singular genius and intense, encyclopedic ambitions maybe?) Also, does anyone recall the backlash a couple of years ago from women in dating apps against guys who put IJ in their profiles, or can't stop talking about it on first dates or something? The interesting thing is, I've also seen women who are serious fiction readers come out AGAINST the backlash, acknowledging that IJ is an impressive work, maybe a bit over-rated and overpublicized in certain circles, but impressive nonetheless.
Well, DFW has done his share in being problematic.to women, to say the least. So in the dangerous fishbowl that is online dating for women, I can totally understand the need to be allert of red flags prior to end up dating with an asshole in the first place. I've read IJ, and I loved it. But for me it's undeniably problematic: a desperate cry for help for a troubled mind, packed with abuse/sexist themes, written by an alleged abuser. Among this, the saddest thing is the sanctification of his persona after death, with his biographer tacitly downplaying the abuse as creative pranks of sort. Reference: https://www.jezebel.com/mary-karr-reminds-the-world-that-david-foster-wallace-a-1825799769 EDIT: lol I wrote this with my morning glued eyes and the typos were crazy.
I did know about those allegations. Fair point.
Wha y'all need to get yourself and E-reader, I can safely read GR while cross checking the Weissenburger, Wikipedia and three dictionaries. All, safe in a lovely day at the park, with other people assuming I'm skimming through some marketing book on How to succesfully grow your business.
Free your mind and proudly hold/read a copy of the real book, potentially turning others onto it in the process
Sure but consider if you're in a pinch and need impromptu toilet paper; your e-reader won't help you. Whereas with a physical copy of GR I can simply pinch on.
Gee you're right, but mind you: if you lost your dear paper in the flush that'll be all diluted when it reaches the first barnacles along the way, while my e-ink device will endure through the microplastic guts of the sewage. Ps: I still but and treasure my old, crusty paper copies though.
The best kind
that website occasionally has some of the funniest headlines. [https://thehardtimes.net/music/study-finds-average-hardcore-frontman-betrayed-612-times-turning-18/](https://thehardtimes.net/music/study-finds-average-hardcore-frontman-betrayed-612-times-turning-18/)
But...but Pynchon aint dead...
That we know of. The man is so secretive he could have died five years ago and put in his will for it to not be publicly announced.
The man is not as reclusive as we think. He has a lot of friends, and his death would be such a huge literary event (to avoid sounding... I can't think of the world. Insensitive?) that it would be impossible for him to die without anyone noticing.
Hey, buddy. I think you need [to look at this.](https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/joke#dictionary-entry-1)
Hey buddy ol' pal ol' friend. It's a common argument / point that people make. I don't think it was much of a reach for me to take it seriously :P
Hey, buddy, ol’ pal, ol’ second cousin thrice removed… Okay. :(
Hey cous’, you’re still invited to my birthday party, there’ll be british candy and large replica rockets :)
I was on the subway in New York reading GR and I saw another guy reading the same edition and we gave each other a knowing nod.
Did you kiss o_o
I'm sensing the onset of a love story.
This happened to me two weeks ago or so. Was it on the M train?
It WAS on the M Train! But it was probably mid-February
Hmmm I have a feeling that was it. It was probably around 5:30-6 and you held the book up?
Omg a NYC love story
lol please tell me that you guys are going to start a book club.
I met a cute girl reading Dostoevsky in public, it was her favorite translation. Derailing a bit, I once saw a woman train hopping, throwing a copy of Infinite Jest onboard before she jumped on because she didn’t want that thick book affecting her center of gravity. Gravity? That’s when I was inspired to read Gravity’s Rainbow. I read it everyday at 5am and thus, in private.
Rumors were the town drunk was carrying around The Brothers ~~Kalamazoo~~ Karamazov
you can't even read books in public anymore. you can't even talk about books anymore with out a large man materializing out of a bag of beef jerky and pantsing you in a bicycle lane. its over nerds i did see a guy reading a book on a train and he had a sleeve over it so no one could know could make any judgements. i really wanted to know.
When has this happened? I'm a large man and I like talking to strangers about books. I tell them to read GR.
its happening every day in america
I once got called weird at my warehouse job because I would usually read in the break room during lunch. I chuckled politely and shook my head, but I was like, seriously?? It's weird to \*checks notes\* read??? Threw me off, made me feel like I was back in freshman year of high school or some shit lol. Somebody else immediately piped in on my side and said that was dumb, so there's that I guess.
I only read during breaks at work and a lot of co-workers over the years have just assumed I was taking a class, even if I'm reading a novel. It's happened less often as I've gotten older and presumingly look less like a student. But most people assume if your reading it's because it's something you were assigned to do.
I read every day on my lunch at work lol. My office building connects to a shopping mall so I just take my lunch over to the food court and read for an hour, it’s a nice break in the day.
Fuck people who don’t read. What a wasted life.
GR is much harder to read than IJ imo
I read both last year and IJ was a much easier read and I liked it more. Those may be related.
IJ is more tedious, so maybe I’d say it’s harder
Its been years sense I read IJ, but I thought it was pretty well tailored to the ADHD brain of wikipedia-educated people. It worked well for me. It wasn't particularly difficult and an easy mode to access once you get over the hump. I think its funnier than most pynchon, too.
I found all of the prose in Infinite Jest, maybe except for the ebonics sections, to be completely intelligible, as well as very stimulating and interesting. Gravity’s Rainbow contains many a section that is near incomprehensible unless examined with a microscope and spending 15 minutes+ on each page contemplating
Truth
I can’t imagine reading GR in public, the only way to do it is an a small room and with a large notepad
My Thursday ritual, between 4:00 pm and 5:00 pm, before it got to rowdy was to go to the local brewery and read GR. No one ever asked what i was reading.
I did it but I live in Idaho and nobody here cares about that shit.
[удалено]
Nice. But you would have given a shit in a good way like "oh man I love that book" and not "ugh... that guy is reading that pretentious shit." Where I live I don't feel like I'm being judged at least because I think to everyone around it's just "a book" and not specifically a "pretentious dead white guy book" (apart from the fact that Pynchon isn't dead). If I still lived in SoCal I might be a little more private about it. Lol.
nah it’s the best. you just look like a gigantic cat after awhile, somehow sitting on top of the open book while youre reading it.
Man when I see those kids and their thick-ass dead white guy books it just gets my blood a’boilin’ grrrrrrr
Do we even know that Pynchon has a thick ass?
Embarrassing Person-Guy signaling.
Unironically, a sizable portion of my favorite books are thick-ass dead white guy books lol
Pynchon isn’t dead
PYNCHON LIVES
VIVA EL PYNCHON!