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Home News by Category General Updates Reddit's jeremy1122 and DFW

Reddit's jeremy1122 and DFW

Amusing/frustrating angle in a recent piece over at The Daily Dot by Miles Klee, Bookish troll does nothing but post about David Foster Wallace for a year, about redditor, jeremy1122, who apparently posted only about David Foster Wallace on Reddit for a year:

[...]
In the 19 years since it was published, David Foster Wallace's Infinite Jest has gained the sort of cult status that a struggling novelist would kill for. And perhaps because it describes the bottomless black hole of instant, addicting entertainment in late-capitalist America (hello, Netflix bingers), it has enjoyed something like constant low-level virality in that time.

But because it's so long and dense and hipsterish, and was written by a man whose personal struggles have been grossly romanticized all the more following his 2008 suicide, Infinite Jest has also become a headache for people serious about literature. There's no easier way to make a bookseller roll her eyes than by thumping a copy down at the register and expecting her to be impressed—she knows you'll never get through it.

Those intrepid souls who do digest the entire opus, meanwhile, have a tendency to become obnoxious evangelizers for the text. Should someone ask if you've read it, make no mistake: They want you to say "no" so that they can extol its Byzantine style, satirical mastery, and profound insight. They want to be the one who persuades you that Wallace was a genius.

Which brings us to jeremy1122. The redditor—who did not respond to request for comment—first popped up in r/books one year ago to offer "An introduction to Infinite Jest." A trifle presumptuous, you might think: There are plenty of intros to this popular but intimidating book online.
[...]

Continue reading, Bookish troll does nothing but post about David Foster Wallace for a year.
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