By David Lipsky
4.5 stars
So what exactly is this book? Basically, it is the entire transcript of the time that the author David Lipsky spent interviewing author David Foster Wallace as he wrapped up his publicity tour for Infinite Jest, along with an introduction and afterward. Lipsky was writing a piece for Rolling Stone Magazine as Infinite Jest was becoming both a cult and popular success. Lipsky set out to determine how the author was dealing with the sudden fame, which is at that point in time was frankly a little unprecedented in the world of literary fiction. This book was published in 2010, after David Foster Wallace's death by suicide and is being reintroduced because of the recent movie, The End of the Tour, starring Jason Segal.
Now that the background has been laid, I will say that this book does a tremendous job at portraying a truly fascinating yet completely open man at an amazing point in his life. Wallace comes across as insightful, intelligent yet also completely normal and Midwestern. A picture of my copy of this book would show how many pages I have flagged and how many quotes I have underlined. He had so many statements on the process of writing and the act of reading that I really found profound. This book also portrayed a picture of Wallace that goes beyond the myth, gossip and publicity of his short life. I found this book particularly heartbreaking because he really had a different picture for his life than the one that unfolded. I have not read Infinite Jest and in all honesty, I most likely won't but I am a fan of his nonfiction essay collections and a lot of what I like about his essay writing comes through in his interview answers. I will say that David Lipsky's interview questions did get repetitive and I think Wallace's annoyance at attempts to dredge out his substance abuse history and feelings about fame was justifiable. This book is hard to review and may not be for everyone but I became completely immersed in this reading experience and would recommend it to fans of David Foster Wallace's work and for anyone wanting an inside look at an author's thought process. I receive this book from the Blogging for Books program in exchange for an honest review.
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