A review by alexegol
Although of Course You End Up Becoming Yourself: A Road Trip with David Foster Wallace by David Lipsky

5.0

I'll try to write more on this later, but I loved the dynamic between the two Davids. Lipsky wants what Wallace has (fame, recognition, acclaim, etc.), while Wallace doesn't want what he has(though I'm not sure if I entirely believe that). All the while, it's Lipsky who's the pretentious one, spewing literary allusions in response to Wallace whenever he can. Wallace even asks him how he knows all this stuff, and the best parts of the book were when Wallace would call out Lipsky's prententiousness (I can pull up the quote later), compared to when Lipsky would try, and fail, to call out Wallace for trying too hard to be a "regular guy". He's not wrong; Wallace is pretentious in his own right (i.e., wearing a bandana to keep his thoughts from exploding? Come on...), but he's much more self-aware.

And I don't mean this as a judgment on either of these people. It was fascinating. It's so bizarre that over the course of a completely transcripted, days-long conversation, you can learn almost everything about a person, from their merits to their flaws (the flaws are just more interesting). I highly recommend reading this, and to do it after Infinite Jest. I don't think I would have been as interested if I didn't commit so much time and brainpower to getting through that book.