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Summary: "Read Infinite Jest it's pretty f**king, funny"
Review: This was the e-mail'd recommendation I received from a friend (do I need to put those stars in there - I really didn't know). And after reading IJ, I agree with him. Don't read it if you never bought the line "half the fun of traveling is getting there" - or whatever that saying is. I guess that's why people don't like it. I loved the book, but I've been reading these reviews and can understand why people don't like it. The book that is. It's definitely not for everyone, but it's not because it's such an intellectual challenge. Although if your vocabulary is somewhat limited or reading Michael Crichton novels taxes your brain - it might make the reading a bit more tedious (ie, boring for you, the reader). I would suggest that if you read 100 pages and are still waiting to get into it or hoping for some epiphany by the end of the thing. Put it away ... for good. But try it you might love it. Finding humor in pop culture and things such as bongs raises the possiblity of enjoyment I would think. Also you may like it if you laughed in the movie "Get Shorty" when Travolta corrects Farina's use of "e.g." - when he meant to say "i.e". I.e, like when you submit a review to this site they ask for "Your Location (ie, Moscow, Russia)" sic - when they meant to put "Your Location (eg, Moscow, Russia). At the same time understanding that by noticing something like this you are a bit anal retentive, but think it is worth discussing anyway.
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Summary: I've just had three weeks of my life sucked away
Review: I would derive sincere pleasure in hunting down this Wallace character, wrapping him up in a burlap sack, and beating him senseless with a two by four. His pedantic, painfully forced, prose makes text-books seem fun. I should have known - whenever the word "post-modern" (a term that no one, not even its users, can define) is used to describe something, my eyebrow raises. I guess in the case of Infinite Jest post-modern means pretentious, awkward, and heartless. Save yourself. . .put the book down and slowly walk away.
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Summary: Don't Believe the Hype
Review: If an infinite number of monkeys at an infinite number of typewriters struck randomly on the keys for an infinite length of time, they would end up with the "novel" Infinite Jest. Like Inifinite Jest, the monkeys would occasionally write something brilliant or hilarious, but mostly they would just write nonsense. Wallace's book does have enough humor and insight to carry a determined reader through, however, I was left at the end thinking that noone has written so very much to say so very little. For those of us readers who have not found Infinite Jest to be a work of "genius", it is not that we all have a short attention span or that we just don't "get it". Many of us do get it, we just don't find it brilliant. Most of the insights are not new or that profound, in fact I was stunned for such a supposedly "insightful" book how little true understanding of human nature was evident in the dialog or character construction. For readers considering this book, if you enjoy long, occasional witty essays or writing for the sake of form rather than content, you may love this book. But if you are looking for fiction, with viable characters, and a worthwhile story to tell, search elsewhere.
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Summary: This is one nude regent!
Review: Perfect marketing: I fell for the "challenge" Infinite Jest was presented as; also, I happened to have read Wallace's essays in Harper's and loved those.
IJ shows that what's great in small doses is terrible in large ones, and IJ revealed exactly what someone mentioned earlier: "Too many words, too little story."
People seem so brow-beaten by the vocabulary and pharmaceutical jargon that they are left too cowed to step back and deem the book a monumental stylistic exercise with no character development or emotional depth.
Read his collection of essays, have a good laugh, and stay way from IJ.
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Summary: I wanted the book to go on forever
Review: I had not heard of this book prior to purchasing it. I was unaware of the hype or the reviews. It called out to me from the shelves of my local book store, so I bought it. Now I am hooked. I have read the book cover to cover twice. I have had to hold myself back from starting it again. In fact I may need the assistance of a 12 step program to stop reading this book. Much like the "entertainment" it describes, "Infinite Jest" is addictive. The voice and story of each of the main characters is unique and engaging. Do not be put off by the size of this book. I have since found out that the authors original draft included 500 additional pages. I want those pages. Don't expect the book to answer all of the questions it asks. You will find some of the answers if you look hard enough. Be prepared to be drawn into a intricate world that seems as real as our own.
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Summary: Trust me on this one
Review: I am a writer, and I have a problem with books that are bigger than me. Now all of these reviews are comparing Wallace to Pynchon and Gaddis . . . .Blah blah blah.
I don't read that crap. I read Barker, and Conroy, and King, and Mamet, and Lustbader.
But let me tell you something. In INFINITE JEST, David Foster Wallace has done things with words that I've only known Jimmy Hendrix to do with a guitar.
Don't give up, no matter what . . . You'll feel smarter just for having finished it.
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Summary: A crossword puzzle in the form of a brilliant novel
Review: Reading this book was for me like solving a crossword puzzle. At first, it was a little difficult to understand, but once I got further on into the novel, pieces started falling into place. It wasn't until I got to the end, and started over again (as is required by all good crossword puzzles) that it all clicked together. But what a puzzle. The man is brilliant, as is the book. It has so many different levels and says so much about our society, where it's going, our failure to communicate with one another, our need for entertainment, the process of writing. . . I could go on, but I'll stop. My one word of advice for anyone considering reading this novel is don't give up until page 200, and by then you'll be hooked. You won't be able to stop thinking about the book but you won't want to. You must read very carefully, because some seemingly "throw away" lines are important to figuring out what happens. But it all does begin to make sense, and it is just so much fun, and so funny.
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Summary: Infinite Jest is weighty literature only in that it is heavy
Review: Infinite Jest includes every odd-ball situation and character imaginable and quite a few which I would have thought unimaginable. It is weighty literature only in that it is too heavy to carry around with you. However, if you have a good resting place for your elbows, the laughs and screw-ball irony will reward the effort involved in spending at least two-hundred pages wondering what the heck is going on. I do hope that the author was drinking when he wrote this. That this book might be the product of a totally lucid mind is a deeply distrubing notion
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Summary: Cudgel thy Brains in this Lexicographic Quagmire
Review: Infinite Jest is a work of genius; age the only criterion excepting it from 'Classic'status. Wallace has created a world so bizarre, yet it mirrors life in modern America. A hyperbolical view of society that allows us to laugh - uproariously - in the face of an oncoming wave of entropy, even as it envelops us.The english language has some 5,000,000 words, and Wallace made an admirable attempt at using all of them - in one book. Laden with wonderfully complex metaphor, this book was painfully funny. Infinite Jest is going to be read and pondered for decades
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Summary: It's worth the effort.
Review: I finished Infinite Jest a little over a year ago, and thought at the time: "This might be my favorite book ever." (Or rather, I thought that about three hours after I finished it--as a few other readers have commented, the physical book ends several hundred "pages" before the story ends, so it took a little while for all the disparate parts that needed to come together to click inside my head.) Then I thought "nah--you're just thinking that way because you just finished it--wait a while and then decide if you're overreacting."
Well, it's been long enough, and I wasn't wrong--it's my favorite book ever, all right. Infinite Jest is rich and resonant and, oh yeah, howlingly funny--I was reduced to helpless hysterics more than a few times. It's not a perfect book at all (though the cuts others have suggested seem strange--c'mon, cutting the Eschaton game? No way!); it's just a great one. It takes patience, thought, and a little bit of deduction to make it yield up its secrets. But they're in there, and the book will stay with you.
And as for the length, well, somebody once said that Robinson Crusoe and Don Quixote were the two books no one ever wished were shorter--maybe now there's a third. I'd have happily read another 500 pages.
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