David Foster Wallace on Life and Work

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB122178211966454607.html#printMode ^ | David Foster Wallace

[ventanax5]

Adapted from a commencement speech given by David Foster Wallace to the 2005 graduating class at Kenyon College. Mr. Wallace, 46, died last Friday, after apparently committing suicide.

There are these two young fish swimming along, and they happen to meet an older fish swimming the other way, who nods at them and says, "Morning, boys, how's the water?" And the two young fish swim on for a bit, and then eventually one of them looks over at the other and goes, "What the hell is water?" If at this moment, you're worried that I plan to present myself here as the wise old fish explaining what water is to you younger fish, please don't be. I am not the wise old fish. The immediate point of the fish story is that the most obvious, ubiquitous, important realities are often the ones that are the hardest to see and talk about. Stated as an English sentence, of course, this is just a banal platitude -- but the fact is that, in the day-to-day trenches of adult existence, banal platitudes can have life-or-death importance. That may sound like hyperbole, or abstract nonsense.

[fkabuckeyesrule]

Why did he commit suicide.

[palindrone]

Not meaning to toot my own horn here, but I was in attendance when he gave that speech, and many of the transcriptions you find online were, as DFW might say, de moi. It was really a phenomenal and, I think, essentially conservative speech.

I still haven’t read his Rolling Stone article on McCain (from 2000), recently reworked and re-released as a paperback. Even though Wallace listed a little to port, I still thought he was an amazing talent.

[Jagman]

who cares. Read the address. He's just a typical self-obsessed liberal with few beliefs beyond the great IAM.

[PhilosopherStones]

Thanks for posting that. I’m a huge DFW fan (and in fact, started re-reading Infinite Jest last week just before he died).

[chrisser]

"It is unimaginably hard to do this, to stay conscious and alive, day in and day out."

Harder still if you kill yourself.

[Rudder]

Never heard of him. This post doesn’t explain who he was or what he did or why he is allegedly famous. Good job.

[Wilhelm Tell]

It was a good article, as far as it goes. I do think that one of the most “I am the center of the universe” things one can do is commit suicide. Obviously, the man had issues but then again, we all do, if we are honest with ourselves. Usually when I meditate about life I just shrug in despair and say, “God help us.” That is, when I am not whining “Why me?” about this or that problem.

[Sir_Ed]

Wow, I really liked his speech.

He kept talking about resisting the urge to shoot oneself, yet he hung himself.

It sounds like he was unable to take his own advice and choose to see the truth about situations that bring despair.

Ed