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findyourgoldenhour 's review for:
Consider the Lobster And Other Essays
by David Foster Wallace
I consider myself to be pretty well read, and yet I have never read anything by the formidable and much admired David Foster Wallace. I think it's because when I think of DFW, I think of [b: Infinite Jest|6759|Infinite Jest|David Foster Wallace|https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1446876799s/6759.jpg|3271542] and at 1088 pages, it's a tad intimidating. I think it's safe to say I'll probably never pick it up.
But when this essay collection came up on my Kindle Daily Deals email, I snatched it right up. And it was timely, because this collection includes his essay on John McCain, and I bought it the day McCain died. He wrote this piece after riding McCain's campaign bus, the Straight Talk Express during his run for the Republican nomination in the 2000 election. It is worth getting a copy of this book just for this essay. I would say it's worth getting a copy of this book just for the few paragraphs detailing McCain's experience in the North Vietnamese POW camp. Foster Wallace is masterful at putting the reader in McCain's shoes here, at making the hero human. Maybe I felt it so intensely because of the day I happened to read it (I read this essay the day of McCain's public memorial service). It was powerful.
The title essay about the lobster brought back childhood memories of summer camping trips to Maine. His description of how lobster is prepared reminded me of my first foray into vegetarianism: watching my mom boil a live lobster over our campfire was traumatic, to say the least. The piece about his experience of 9/11 in a small Illinois college town was so moving, especially with the hindsight of 17 years. And his essay on the porn industry in the late '90s seems quaint to 2018 sensibilities. His talk about how VCRs being in every home changed how people consume porn made me think, "that's adorable.”
The critiques of DFW are legit: too many footnotes, too many random asides, too longwinded. All true. And yet I can see from this one collection that he has legions of die-hard fans for a reason. He was clearly a gifted writer with a keen eye for observing human behavior. His loss to the literary world is our collective loss for sure.
But when this essay collection came up on my Kindle Daily Deals email, I snatched it right up. And it was timely, because this collection includes his essay on John McCain, and I bought it the day McCain died. He wrote this piece after riding McCain's campaign bus, the Straight Talk Express during his run for the Republican nomination in the 2000 election. It is worth getting a copy of this book just for this essay. I would say it's worth getting a copy of this book just for the few paragraphs detailing McCain's experience in the North Vietnamese POW camp. Foster Wallace is masterful at putting the reader in McCain's shoes here, at making the hero human. Maybe I felt it so intensely because of the day I happened to read it (I read this essay the day of McCain's public memorial service). It was powerful.
The title essay about the lobster brought back childhood memories of summer camping trips to Maine. His description of how lobster is prepared reminded me of my first foray into vegetarianism: watching my mom boil a live lobster over our campfire was traumatic, to say the least. The piece about his experience of 9/11 in a small Illinois college town was so moving, especially with the hindsight of 17 years. And his essay on the porn industry in the late '90s seems quaint to 2018 sensibilities. His talk about how VCRs being in every home changed how people consume porn made me think, "that's adorable.”
The critiques of DFW are legit: too many footnotes, too many random asides, too longwinded. All true. And yet I can see from this one collection that he has legions of die-hard fans for a reason. He was clearly a gifted writer with a keen eye for observing human behavior. His loss to the literary world is our collective loss for sure.