Sam Devenport

Though there are a variety of evident similarities between the style and certainly the content of the different story fragments, I did not find them nearly as notable as the differences. From short to short David Foster Wallace seems to vary his approach towards narration: in some fragments he writes with an officious tone, paying due respect to the conventions of the English language, while in others he speaks colloquially, casually, his sentences rolling with a certain fluidity that brazenly ignore grammar and punctuation. In these instances it almost seems like Wallace is avoiding the writer’s issue of making choices, that is making choices regarding what details to include in his story (to me it seems he is either making choices in an indiscriminate fashion or not making choices at all—he writes unobstructed, unopposed, describing absolutely everything whether fit or unfit. I suspect that there may be a correlation between his style of writing and the character he is addressing. Notice how, for instance, when talking about the plight of a certain unnamed addict, or rather periodic addict, from page seventeen through twenty-seven, Wallace writes with a quickened pace, leaving little room for parenthetical breaks, detailing every minor aspect of the moments waiting for his dealer’s phone call, tracing his calculated logic, his every emotion. This style of writing feels almost like a worded depiction of the man’s anxiousness as he eagerly awaits his delivery.) This makes for a difficult state of affairs—I felt the rhythm of my reading often interrupted as I adapted to Wallace’s styles. Further discouraging are all the multi-syllabic names of various drugs he chooses to include in his story (again this dampened the flow of my reading). I also feel that there are certain incongruities throughout the stories, things alluded to but then left unexplained. This is excusable but all together wearying after awhile. Admittedly my reading has been biased-- I concluded stubbornly after about the fifth page that I hated the book. That said, it’s possible that the incongruities that I perceived were more a fabrication of my own unwillingness to read the text carefully and thoroughly (the first eighty pages was a tormenting endeavor to say the least even after deciding that I would approach the book as if it was leisure reading). Yes, I am seeing a comprehensive picture being drawn, that is I am able to recognize the basic story, but I don’t yet understand why the story is being told, and this is one of many questions that have remain unanswered.