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glowbird's review against another edition
3.0
I'd been meaning to check out David Foster Wallace for a while. This book of essays was a great introduction to his voice. The general interest essays were great but I'm not a writer or a tennis fan, so I skipped over 50% of the material. Keep in mind, many of these essays are serious pieces of literary criticism originally written for an audience of peers; they may not appeal to the casual reader.
Overall this book did its job. I'm now interested in the author and his writing style and may try some of his famous fiction next time the mood for a big, important book strikes.
Overall this book did its job. I'm now interested in the author and his writing style and may try some of his famous fiction next time the mood for a big, important book strikes.
remlezar's review against another edition
3.0
This one is tough to review. On the one hand, I love David Foster Wallace's non-fiction, and it was great to experience some of his essays for the first time. On the other hand, it's obvious why many of these weren't put into his previously released, much higher quality collections, Consider the Lobster, and A Supposedly Fun Thing I'll Never Do Again.
There are a few essays here about tennis, a sport I generally don't care much about, but DFW always manages to make interesting to me. There are some book reviews, some of which are great, and some of which are so insanely niche it was hard for me to get into, especially with zero knowledge of the book in question. One essay was the introduction to a collection of essays he edited, and one (fantastic) essay was basically a bunch of tips on proper English language usage.
All in all, it's a bit of a mess, but some gems made it worth getting through. However, the pessimistic part of me feels like this is a nasty little money grab book designed to rob the grave of DFW as much as humanly possible.
Example: Wallace was obsessed with words, so, at the beginning of each chapter the editor of this collection decided to list completely random definitions from Wallace's favorite dictionary edition. There are a few possibilities for why they would do this, and none of them strike me as good moves. 1) They thought, "This is totally a Wallace type thing to do, listing definitions. He would love this." This is dumb in the same way that people trying to emulate the style of Dr. Suess is dumb. It feels forced and phony. Besides, I don't think he would ever do this. It's not engaging to the reader at all, and it's just stupid. 2) They wanted to pad the total page count of the book to make it seem like more of a substantial collection than it really is. Or, 3) some combination of these two reasons.
If I had been reading the hard copy of this book, I would roll my eyes and skip past these pages. But I was listening to the audiobook, which meant that for approximately four and a half minutes at the beginning of EVERY SINGLE ESSAY I was stuck listening to someone literally read the dictionary. It's bad enough that someone thought it was a good idea to include the definitions in the print version, but it's downright idiotic to include them in the audiobook version.
Basically, if you're a DFW fan, it's worth checking this out from a library and reading the essays that sound interesting to you. But if you've never read any of his non-fiction collections, there is no reason to start with this one.
There are a few essays here about tennis, a sport I generally don't care much about, but DFW always manages to make interesting to me. There are some book reviews, some of which are great, and some of which are so insanely niche it was hard for me to get into, especially with zero knowledge of the book in question. One essay was the introduction to a collection of essays he edited, and one (fantastic) essay was basically a bunch of tips on proper English language usage.
All in all, it's a bit of a mess, but some gems made it worth getting through. However, the pessimistic part of me feels like this is a nasty little money grab book designed to rob the grave of DFW as much as humanly possible.
Example: Wallace was obsessed with words, so, at the beginning of each chapter the editor of this collection decided to list completely random definitions from Wallace's favorite dictionary edition. There are a few possibilities for why they would do this, and none of them strike me as good moves. 1) They thought, "This is totally a Wallace type thing to do, listing definitions. He would love this." This is dumb in the same way that people trying to emulate the style of Dr. Suess is dumb. It feels forced and phony. Besides, I don't think he would ever do this. It's not engaging to the reader at all, and it's just stupid. 2) They wanted to pad the total page count of the book to make it seem like more of a substantial collection than it really is. Or, 3) some combination of these two reasons.
If I had been reading the hard copy of this book, I would roll my eyes and skip past these pages. But I was listening to the audiobook, which meant that for approximately four and a half minutes at the beginning of EVERY SINGLE ESSAY I was stuck listening to someone literally read the dictionary. It's bad enough that someone thought it was a good idea to include the definitions in the print version, but it's downright idiotic to include them in the audiobook version.
Basically, if you're a DFW fan, it's worth checking this out from a library and reading the essays that sound interesting to you. But if you've never read any of his non-fiction collections, there is no reason to start with this one.
rocketiza's review against another edition
3.0
I have yet to find another writer that can so fantastically communicate such complex thoughts and emotions. I did quite a bit of skipping around in this collection though, as it wasn't as balanced in topics as his other works. Really enjoyed the ones where you could just tell he was having fun writing them, and as always the more self reflexive essays.
big_goose's review against another edition
3.0
This collection is pretty mixed, but what's good is really good. I especially enjoyed the review of the anthology "The Best of the American Prose Poem" - I don't usually actually laugh out loud while I'm reading, but this time I did.
gjmaupin's review against another edition
5.0
Not even his finest collection, but DFW's non-fic smacks me with whatever German word means "the glow of one's language used with near-perfection".
livinlargemike's review
"In sum, to really try to be informed and literate today is to feel stupid nearly all the time, and to need help."
This collection is a bit of a wash, but the best essays are essential reading. Of those essentials consist "The Nature of the Fun," "Borges on the Couch [which better pinpoints the mythology of Borges' stories and why they are revolutionary than anything else I've encountered]," "Deciderization 2007—A Special Report," and "Just Asking," of which the last's questions only seem more dire here in 2017. "Twenty-Four Word Notes" is a succinct usage guide to keep in your back pocket, as engaging as a usage guide can be. The others are mostly forgettable, or have better counterparts in his other collections (primarily w/r/t the tennis commentaries).
This collection is a bit of a wash, but the best essays are essential reading. Of those essentials consist "The Nature of the Fun," "Borges on the Couch [which better pinpoints the mythology of Borges' stories and why they are revolutionary than anything else I've encountered]," "Deciderization 2007—A Special Report," and "Just Asking," of which the last's questions only seem more dire here in 2017. "Twenty-Four Word Notes" is a succinct usage guide to keep in your back pocket, as engaging as a usage guide can be. The others are mostly forgettable, or have better counterparts in his other collections (primarily w/r/t the tennis commentaries).
markeefe's review against another edition
3.5
As might be expected from a posthumous essay collection, this is a bit uneven. The title piece on Roger Federer is amazing, and several other pieces are quite good. But a couple of long pieces from the '80s and '90s were passed over for inclusion in prior collections, and it's apparent why. The one on Conspicuously Young writers rambles, is a kind of stiff, and its discussion of TV's influence on his generation is better fleshed out in "E Unibus Plurum." And his Tennis Magazine piece on commerce at the U.S. Open, while it features some great writing (especially on the sport itself, the experience of watching, and on his experience of watching the fans), it gets bogged down in both hyper-observational specificity and in amassing support for its thesis. There are some fun and/or thoughtful, shorter pieces, especially in the book's latter half, like his round-up of five great post-1960 novels, his 24 thoughts on word usage, his philosophies around Terminator 2 (which is a middle distance essay, really), etc. This collection is worth reading, but selectively. If you haven't read A Supposedly Fun Thing and Consider the Lobster yet, hit those first.
morganbird's review against another edition
3.0
Probably 3.5. Just skipped several pieces of literary criticism that clearly weren't going to interest me. Feels like they were really scraping the bottom of the barrel to get one last collection out posthumously.