Thursday, June 03, 2010

For those who like that kind of thing...

You are reading what I am blogging about someone else's online account of James Wood's lecture on David Foster Wallace.

Faaaar out, man.

This is funny:
Midway through the lecture it becomes apparent that many of the elders have not read Wallace before. You can tell when Wood reads aloud a particularly disturbing passage from BIHM and some of the older ladies crinkle their faces, their better-humored husbands guffawing resonantly. Later, when Wood glosses Wallace’s suicide, he is stopped mid-sentence by an elaborately coiffured lady in the front row, who demands clarification; when Wood explains that Wallace took his own life in 2008, the lady gasps and turns to her dozing husband.

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