Not P but DFW: Richterish-looking sound wave

[Mark Kohut]

The usual word is Richteresque, I learn.    [like Kafkaesque, Daliesque,
Pynchonesque]    But Richterish is used...

from Google:  However, there is a slight "clash of definitions" here
because Richter’s style is actually the opposite of a shaky seismogram.

And look at some of Richter's paintings, a whole lot---most?---are not like
sound waves AT ALL....so where would Richterish-looking sound waves even
 come from?...one usually doesn't usesome part of an artist's work to
generalize even loosely about...

"individual bits"?    Who talks about a whole Gestalt artwork that way?

Google definition: The only time you’d hear about "bits" in this context is
if you are talking about *digital seismographs*.

Nobody knows anything about Richter but the scale that is part of the
phrase. Almost no one knows about the artist then, no matter that he was
'hot'  then and Wallace would NOT use it like that in a magazine for smart
general readers...I argue.....and an editor would not let him IF he would
follow the editor.....(and they do for the best magazines although not
necessarily for books...)


Visualizing Sound Waves

When you look at your screen while editing, you aren't just seeing "noise";
you're seeing a mathematical representation of air pressure over time.
1. The Waveform (Time Domain)

This is the standard view you see in almost every editor. It shows the
*amplitude* (loudness) on the vertical axis and *time*on the horizontal
axis.

   -

   *Sine Waves:* The simplest form of sound—a smooth, repetitive
   oscillation. It sounds like a pure, clear whistle or a tuning fork.

   -

   *Square/Sawtooth Waves:* Common in synthesizers; these look "jagged" or
   blocky and sound buzzy or harsh because they contain more harmonics.
   -

   *Complex Waves:* This is what human speech or music looks like—a messy,
   organic-looking forest of peaks and valleys.

2. The Spectrogram (Frequency Domain)

Some high-end software (like iZotope RX) allows you to see a
*spectrogram*. Instead
of just seeing how loud a sound is, you see which *frequencies* are present.


   -







On Mon, Feb 16, 2026 at 12:03 PM Mike Jing <gravitys.rainbow.cn at gmail.com>
wrote:

> Upon further reflection, I'm all but convinced that Gerhard Richter is
> indeed the intended reference here. What's being talked about here is a
> picture or waveform of a soundwave, showing its amplitude vs. time,
> displayed on a computer screen by audio editing software. Although it looks
> very similar to a seismogram, I find it odd to describe it as
> "Richterish-looking", because although a seismogram is closely related to
> the Richter scale and thus to its namesake and co-creator Charles Richter
> the seismologist, it's not quite the same as the relation between an artist
> and his work. For one, the seismograph/gram was not actually invented by
> him, nor does it hear his name. This is where I think the use of
> the name-derived adjective breaks down. It's far more likely the
> "Richterish" here actually refers to an artist, in this case a painter, due
> to the visual nature of the comparison. In fact, a google search of
> "Richterish" yields several results that refer to Gerhard Richter the
> painter.
>
> Furthermore, Gerhardt Richter had a good deal of play in the early 2000s,
> and many in art circles raved about his work. A writer like Wallace was
> likely exposed to his work. And this particular essay was published in the *Atlantic
> Monthly*, whose readership may very well be more knowledgeable in such
> matters than the general public. So it's not out of the realm of
> possibility. Actually, I think it's quite probable, for the reasons given
> above.
>
> What do you think?
>
>
> On Sat, Feb 14, 2026 at 2:07 PM Mike Jing <gravitys.rainbow.cn at gmail.com>
> wrote:
>
>> That's what I went with originally, and I was going to reject the
>> suggestion out of hand due to the simple fact that I've never heard of the
>> artist or his work. Then I looked him up and it turns out he is sort of an
>> important figure in contemporary art, so I thought I'd better ask in case
>> it was my own personal ignorance.
>>
>> Thanks for replying, Mark.
>>
>>
>> On Fri, Feb 13, 2026 at 2:54 AM Mark Kohut <mark.kohut at gmail.com> wrote:
>>
>>> It refers to the Richter scale....jagged sometimes earthquake-like
>>> size....
>>>
>>> On Thu, Feb 12, 2026 at 1:18 PM Mike Jing <gravitys.rainbow.cn at gmail.com>
>>> wrote:
>>>
>>>> The following excerpt is from David Foster Wallace's *Host*:
>>>>
>>>> NexGen (a Clear Channel product) displays a Richterish-looking sound
>>>> wave,
>>>> of which all different sizes of individual bits can be highlighted and
>>>> erased in order to tighten the pacing and compress the sound bite.
>>>>
>>>> It was suggested by a proofreader that the Richter here refers to
>>>> Gerhard
>>>> Richter, a German painter, and the picture of the sound wave displayed
>>>> by
>>>> the NexGen software looks like some of his abstract paintings. I've
>>>> never
>>>> heard of the artist before but it does sound plausible, and the word
>>>> "Richterish" is similar to "Picassoesque". Does anyone care to confirm
>>>> or
>>>> refute this?
>>>> --
>>>> Pynchon-L: https://waste.org/mailman/listinfo/pynchon-l
>>>>
>>>