Infinite Jest in Atlantic Monthly

[Paul Mackin]

On 29 Jan 1996, English, Darrin quotes and asks:


> "Whatever aestetics we espouse, we are all closet traditionalists in our 
> expectations--and these must be shelved.  Wallace rebuts the prime-time 
> formula.  Think Beckett, think Pynchon, this Gaddis.  Think."  (Are we all 
> really closet traditionalists?  Do we have the same expectations from TRP's 
> novels that we have from, I don't know, Gore Vidal?  Or do we expect/demand 
> something untraditional?)

> So...what do you think?

I guess we aren't any-kind-of-traditionalist-at-all if we read Pynchon.

On the other hand, there _are_ limits. We are not all that _ideal_ reader 
with an infinitely severe case of insomnia, who is supposed to be 
required for reading _Finnegans Wake_. (Wish I could remember the exact
quote.) I _do_ need some kind of a story, more or less, to follow along with.
The fact that not all plot angles are resolved or tied together is
secondary. Hope the reviewer is not warning us against anything more
troublesome than that.

At least Pynchon, unlike Joyce, is traditional enough to give the four 
parts of his magnum opus _names_, not just _numbers_. And so also will
Wallace, I sort of hope. Look forward to my first time out with him.

				P.