Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #83001 in Books
• Published on: 1997-06-05
• Original language: English
• Binding: Paperback
• 1088 pages

Synopsis
"Infinite Jest" is a movie so entertaining and addictive, anyone who watches it loses all desire to do anything else. Individuals, organizations and governments vie to obtain the master copy, and recovering addicts get caught up in increasingly desperate attempts to control it.

Customer Reviews

A wonderful, wonderful book.
Not everybody will "get" this book - and not everybody will want to. But for those who do, it's an incredibly rewarding experience that stays with you long into the night. It's not short (don't give up until you've got at least 150 pages behind you) dense and at times a little hard to follow. But it's beautifully - and I really mean beautifully - written.
Infinite Jest firmly falls into the "post-modern" category and you can see the influence of Pynchon quite clearly. But whereas Pynchon can be - in my opionion - a bit chilly and cerebral, there's something incredibly warm and humane about this book. It's predominantly set in two neighbouring institutions: an academy for young tennis players and a half-way house for recovering addicts. You meet a wide range of characters who are all unusual in one way or another - and some very unusual indeed. Floating above this is a plot about a film which turns everybody who sees it into a slavering idiot.
Infinite Jest has been my bedside for mroe than five years now. When I feel gloomy I pick it up and dip in, either in a totally random way, or to particular passages that I like. It always makes me smile; it always cheers me up. It always makes me think about life and myself in different ways. It always reminds me that we are all screwed up in one way or another. And I fall asleep a happier, less troubled person. That's not bad for a work of fiction, is it?
For my money, this is one of the best novels in the English language ever written. I really hope this review persuades you to give it a go.

Really not worth the effort
I remember the hype when this book was first released, seeing an article in a Sunday supplement and deciding that I just had to read this book. When the paperback was released I bought it, started reading, and gave up after maybe two hundred pages, donating the book to my local charity shop.

Fast-forward a few years, and I saw it on offer in my book club for £2. I bought it and tried again. This time I managed about three hundred pages before I became bogged down. I returned the book to my shelf, planning to try it again one day.

Summer 2006. I took "Infinite Jest" on holiday. Over five days I read the whole thing from cover to cover, including all of the footnotes, and do you know what? It wasn't worth it. The story meanders round, not really going anywhere, and the plot line mentioned on the back of the book (the search for a film which puts those who watch it into a catatonic trance) crops up maybe two or three times.

I was really upset that I didn't enjoy this book. Wallace should be congratulated for writing something so long and detailed as this, but I really wish it had actually had a point and a purpose, and been enjoyable.

Oh, and the copy I took on holiday? My local charity shop now has two copies of "Infinite Jest" on its shelves.

Like wading through champagne jelly
Cor! I would like to tell you that this book is all the things that these other reviewers say it is - amazing, brilliant, flabergasting etc. Well, it is. However, after pushing through David Foster Wallace's interminable digressions and massively complex clauses, sub clauses, sub sub clauses etc, the brilliance could be said to have been dulled somewhat. Nevertheless, It's still a top-notch piece of boundary-pushing fiction, a brain-pulsingly engaging read, and a mad piece of food for thought. It would've got five stars if I could have persuaded any of my friends to read it too. Those slackers!

Read it. It'll do your brain good.