Tag: David Foster Wallace

Editors and writers discuss the ways David Foster Wallace’s work influenced them and what it was like to work with him.

“Despite the headlines that came after the election calling this country ‘Trump’s America’—and there were many—I won’t call it that, or see it that way. And regardless of your politics I’ll ask you to join me. This is our America. It’s our America to write in, and our America to write.”

In 1996, David Foster Wallace profiled tennis player Michael Joyce in one of the most celebrated pieces of sports writing ever published. Who has he become since?

If you’ve never heard of this acclaimed author, treasure your last moments of innocence; then, read this primer at Vulture on DFW’s contested legacy.

It’s better for us not to know the kinds of sacrifices the professional-grade athlete has made to get so very good at one particular thing. Oh, we’ll invoke lush clichés about the lonely heroism of Olympic athletes, the pain and analgesia of football, the early rising and hours of practice and restricted diets, the preflight […]

David Foster Wallace saw clear lines between journalists and novelists who write nonfiction, and he wrestled throughout his career with whether a different set of rules applied to the latter category.

Nancy spoke to me as if she were my mother. “Margaret dear—you can’t possibly miss Laura Danker. The big blonde with the big you know whats!” “Oh, I noticed her right off,” I said. “She’s very pretty.” “Pretty!” Nancy snorted. “You be smart and stay away from her. She’s got a bad reputation.” “What do you […]

When Jeffrey Eugenides moved to New York, he was 28 years old and things were not looking good. After graduating from Brown in 1983, he and Rick Moody, a college friend, had driven out to San Francisco with no real plan other than making a go of it as writers, and lived together awhile on […]