In A Supposedly Fun Thing, he misuses 'vomitorium'.
In Infinite Jest, he misuses 'defenestration'.
Also, I'm 90% sure he's only pretending to have been deeply influenced by Wittgenstein w/r/t Broom.
What gives.
His dad was (is?) a Wittgenstein scholar so I'm sure he has a pretty good understanding of his work and themes.
>>7856681
Fuck me, *had.
>>7856681
Or how to seem like he did...
>>7856681
I've never heard of his father. For all I know he could be some autist obsessed with the Tractatus.
>>7856685
Good point.
>>7856640
He is a pseud, that is what gives.
>>7856681
My father was a gastroenterologist and you don't see me shove cameras up people's asses
>>7856724
Now there's a though :')
>>7856731
*thought
Think of the niche porn you could sell...............ok you've convinced me anon, I'll do it.
>>7856732
I do have some of those on video (the machine records a few seconds for the insurance as proof of work accomplished)
I can see how someone could be turned on by this, it's the goo-iest thing possible
>>7856640
>Also, I'm 90% sure he's only pretending to have been deeply influenced by Wittgenstein w/r/t Broom.
He's written an essay on Markson's "Wittgenstein's Mistress" where he also talks about Wittgenstein a lot (obviously) – you could check it out and decide for yourself whether he's understood him or not.
(In fact he does refer to having asked his dad about a lot of the topics.)
>>7856724
Not your cousin, arch nemesis of TV prose hating DFW?
>>7856767
I have read that essay, that's where his bullshittyness really came out. There are limp passing references to LW in Broom but Wallboy goes full douche in that essay.
>>7856687
Tractatus is pretty awesome.
who cares
in supposedly fun thing he betrays a comical misunderstanding of technical terms in his summary of how the ship's engine works.
he makes a lot of mistakes. whether you forgive him or not depends on how far into the pity column you want to move him, given that his shtick was "effortless intellectual superiority." when it turns out he's just as dumb as everyone else, you have to make a choice. hopefully you didn't like him because of it, but if you did you didn't get him anyway.
>>7856767
This one I think? http://www.scribd.com/doc/124867666/David-Foster-Wallace-The-Empty-Plenum-David-Markson-s-Wittgenstein-s-Mistress
So I've decided to read Infinite Jest in ebook format. Everyone keeps saying it's very hard, and I'm kind of scared to read to be honest. What you people say how should I read it? Should I use a reading guide?
>inb4 he fell for the meme.
>>7856834
>betrays
He openly says so. Everything he says is constructed to get a certain reaction from the reader. For someone so cautious, you'd think he wouldn't use the meme'd definition of vomitorium. I mean 'effortless intellectual superiority'? He purposely uses obnoxious vocabulary throughout the essay while 'and but so'-ing & aw shucksing.
The essay is very funny, I just expected a little more from someone who is ostentatiously a SNOOT.
>>7856869
>hard
It's an easy read. Wallace writes very clearly, he is, despite his vocab slip-ups, a master of grammar.
>ebook
You're asking for trouble. Just buy it.
>guide
It's the easiest fucking book. Ulysses needs a guide.
>>7856869
If your ebook reader has good endnote functionality, definitely read the ebook. Flipping back and forth was irritating when I read it the first time. The second time I read it on my Kindle and it was a lot easier.
The book isn't hard. The only books that are hard to read are boring books. This book isn't boring. You don't know what's going on for the first 400 pages, but just live with the uncertainty and know that all will be made clear.
Haven't read IJ, but how can someone misuse a word with such a concrete definition as 'defenestration'?
>>7856724
yea only ur dick BURN
>>7857014
>>7857113
In fact defenestration appears extremely early in the book so it's likely that OP read like 30 pages then went online to shit-post because he was predisposed to the idea that he shouldn't like it because someone on /lit/ doesn't like it.
In all reality it's an entertaining and overall pretty good book. The critique tends to be either 'it's the best thing ever made' or 'it's so shit, I hate everything about it', I think it's definitely worth reading.
>>7857113
>>7857142
You meme-ing idiots, see pic related.
Defenestration appears once in the book on p896.
Obviously The Darkness didn't pass through the window... He was peeled off it. It's possible that it's Hal misusing the word, since he is narrating at that point and having his breakdown. But you read the book and noticed all this already and were only pretending to be retarded.
Which is it though? Hal or Wallace? Wallace screws up 'vomitorium', so why not 'defenestration'? He's using his own voice in A Supposedly Fun Thing.
And you got to appreciate a shitposter who will lie to protect the longest book he's ever read's reputation.
>>7857291
I thought it was earlier, I read the book in 1996.
Whatever, it's still a good book
>>7857300
You were old enough to read it in '96 and are still supporting your arguments with 'whatever'?inb4 the longer version of 'whatever'—I'm just not going to get into it, not worth my time m8
>>7857312
I'm not trying to "correct" your opinion, you can believe that.
I just don't want somebody to miss out on it because they saw your tirade about a particular usage.
>>7857297
You aren't very bright are you
Defenestration = passing through the window
Fenestration = anything related to windows
De-fenestration = being removed from a window (or, like Stice, having your face removed frok it)
It's a very simple wordplay, esp. considering that Hal can recite the dictionary.
>>7857338
Defenestration: the action of throwing someone or something out of a window.
What's the wordplay?
Fenestration: having windows.
I guess I took your bait. Damn it.
>>7857323
I have no opinion. He misused them. He's all about prescriptivism, so you'd think he'd use the words correctly.
I haven't read all this DFW because I dislike his writing...
>>7857364
Vomitorium is a common misunderstanding/myth, I forgive him for that.
dfw was a such a lame piece of shit, he could fool the plebs but not the patrish, dude was such a try hard
>>7857369
Is somebody jealous?
I sense a non-reader
>>7857297
the sad part is wallace was trying to seem "literary" by swagger jacking defenestration from pynchon, who used it (the idea not the word) early and often, as usually dfw confirmed for plenbtier cargo cult writer
>>7857338
>wordplay
>>7857375
>jealous of someone so miserable they killed themselfs
oooh, kay
>non-reader
read a dick, faggot
>>7857378
>swagger jacking
kek
HOLY FUCK IM LOVING THIS SHITPOSTING!
LOVING IT! L O V I N G I T ! HOLY FUCK! HOLEEEEE FUCK! HAHAHAHAH! HAH HAH! DAVID FOSTER WALLACE
DAVID! DAVID! I LOVE YOU DAVID! HAHAHAHAHHAHA SHITPOSTING IS SO FUN DAD? WAS MY DAD A GOOD SHITPOSTER? DOES THAT MAKE MEEE A GOOD SHITPOSTER? AH AHA!
SHIT
POSTING
SHIT POSTING!
>>7857384
>themselfs
>read a dick, faggot
He's commonly noted as the best modern author (mostly by people who haven't heard of Gass or Pynchon)
Nevertheless, quality author, worth being jealous of.
SAGE ALL THREADS MAKING DFW A MEME
SAGE GOES IN ALL FIELDS
>>7856875
You have to remember that he was pumped full of antidepressants and underwent at least a couple of rounds of the even more brain-liquefying electroconvulsive therapy. That and he was undeniably pseudish and just flat out wrong about a number of things. So a few boners in his writing are par for the course.
Besides, his schtick wasn't really affecting erudition so much as having a predilection for class clown antics and another part of himself that wanted to write something meaningful and therefore hated the class clown he couldn't stop being.
You shouldn't read Wallace the way you'd read Joyce. Going through his oeuvre is more akin to watching a slow motion trainwreck happening over the course of two decades; a voyeuristic and gleefully callous endeavor.
>words meanings are anchored in stone
look at all the rules Shakespeare broke
>>7857378
I heard Tommy Pinecone literally jumped out of a window to avoid some journalists in Mexico. So he lived defenestration.
>>7857416
>he was undeniably pseudish
that's why he was so fucking depressed, he knew we could tell, even if the soccer moms couldn't
>>7856640
But "a place in which, according to popular misconception, the ancient Romans are supposed to have vomited during feasts to make room for more food."
Is still part of the definition for vomitorium
How does he misuse defenestration?
>>7857364
>what's the wordplay
You don't get the meaning of ''de'' in de-fenestration?
you are THIS stupid?
or... oh, it's b8. okay then.
>>7857404
You sound like you just started reading
He's okay. Definitely nothing to be jealous of unless you're 16
the vomitorium is a misconception not a misuse.The internet kind of but an end to it.
What the main thing is is that you understood what he meant (it was used for a joke anyway)
>>7857456
He's more pitiable than envy-inspiring but everything that was wrong with him and his writing was what made it entertaining.
>>7857453
Nobody wrote "de-fenestration" except you. Wallace wrote "defenestration"
>>7857456
Definite no-life jelly-fag confirmed.
>nothing to be jealous of
>other people's opinions don't matter for I am the supreme patrician! None possess taste as high-brow as mine
>>7857594
So what? It's obvious unless you have 60 IQ.
It's comedy. I wouldn't begrudge a stand-up comic using a popular misconception about Roman history in service of a joke. If anything this makes me like Wallace more. Makes him more human.
I know it's already been pointed out in this thread, but just in case anyone is still unsure: Wallace did not use defenestration incorrectly.
It was a pun.
Stice's forehead was, at the time, "fenestrated," as in, it "had" a window. If a house had a lot of windows, you'd call it "well fenestrated."
Stice's forehead was removed from the window, thus it (his forehead) lost the window it "had."
He was "de-" (prefix for remove) "fenestrated" (verb for having windows).
Just because he didn't include a hyphen doesn't mean shit.
If you're saying Wallace was wrong because you're trolling, then alright, maybe you need a new hobby.
But if you sincerely think his use of defenestration was wrong, then you're a tool who should stop reading and get into trolling instead.
When I was reading 'Supposedly' last month, I typed 'vomitorium' into Goolge to see what it really meant and instantly discovered that it was a sort of misnomer. Now, Wallace was either 1) being goofy or 2) genuinely misinformed.
Either way, it's not like he could Google the word like I did way back in the mid-'90s when he wrote 'Supposedly.'
>>7857416
That last sentence is hilarious.
>>7857742
Wallace was a total dick about usage and a legendary grammar Nazi.
>>7857416
>i know literally nothing about either antidepressants or contemporary electroconvulsive therapy
>>7857805
You keep repeating the defenestration thing, but it still means to toss out a window. In fact, 'defenestration' went in in a later draft of the novel, so maybe it wasn't even his mistake. He originally wrote 'detachment'. I love the emotions this has stirred up in you.
Defenestration obviously isn't a pun and there is something terribly sad and banal about that.
>>7858563
Or the timeline of Wallace's treatment...
>>7857401
*sticks head out car window*
DAAAAAAAAVVVVVVIIIIDDDDDD
FOOOOOOSSSSSSSTEEEEEEEEERRRRR WAAALLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLAACCCEEEEE
>>7858574
I think its wordplay. It's taken from a french word and it literally means "to unwindow", and tho we use it to mean thrown from a window, Stice was definitely "unwindowed" in the book.
>>7858974
....look it up. That's not true. Like at all. And keep in mind he's an ultra prescriptivist. A nauseous (and apparently meretricious) prescriptivist.
And so was Hal. So they don't get the benefit of the doubt when it comes to usage. They lock themselves into the dictionary definitions.
>>7857364
what font is that
>>7860128
I know the english definition is more narrow and ridgid, I meant if you break down the word into its components(and its latin, not french, thx for making me look it up) you get "un" and "window". Hal is shown many times to have memorized entire dictionaries but in terms of his actual speech I remember him being more flamboyantly verbose and using large words in inappropriately colloquial context.
>>7857385
One of my Latin teachers in high school taught us about the word and its root, and since then I've always wanted to use it, but it just seemed so edgy and now it's clearly a point of criticism and of course the jacking of swag.
>>7856724
Not yet, at least.
>>7856685
this
>>7860140
Silian Rail
I honestly don't believe that someone as smart as Wallace would make these mistakes. I think sometimes he made deliberate mistakes just to bring his writing down to earth so that people could relate better to him. Wallace knew more about grammar and usage than anyone alive, and he was also a genius at creating certain impressions, so... you do the math.
>>7861377
Sumptuous bait matey.
>>7860597
Thinks about it tho
>>7858579
loud keks
>>7858563
>contemporary
>20+ years ago
lolk
>>7858574
>you
I've explained it first, and the guy you quoted isn't me.
>>7864690
You may be able to fool me but the rest of /lit/ knows better, motherclitrubber.
