Ok, here it is. You've heard the hype. You've bought the book. You've started to read it. You've started to read it again. You've lost the book, and then found it and used it as a door stop. Now it's time to dust off that puppy and finally sup upon its contents.



We're going to gang up and tackle this beast of modern fiction. Let's get a list of participants at this point, and decide upon a good pace. I normally read a page per day, but for this I think it best to push a little harder.

Any suggestions on how to go about this are welcome.

I've read about 100 pages, however long the kindle sample is and loved it. Naturally I haven't read any more of it

In. Tried twice, gave up after 150 or so pages.

In! Bought this when I was 19. Read about 100 pages or so. I'm 22 now and I'm no closer to finishing.

Starting from the beginning again, let's do this! Foreword has me suitably excited.

Not in, but will be following the thread (I've read it already). I kind of want to do a full reread even though I finished it only recently, but this is the one book I can randomly pick up, thumb to a random page, and be absolutely riveted for awhile. (I did this just last night with page 500-something and was not disappointed. I laughed my ass off at the first passage I found then was sucked in for the next hour.)

I'm not ashamed to admit I cried a little when I finished IJ, since I felt like it had basically become a part of my life that I was really sad to give up. If you put the work into reading this beast, you will get an absolute metric ****ton out of it.

Haven't read it and have no idea what it's about but there was a big thread on another forum and people recommended you take notes.

I guess you can, especially if you're having trouble engaging yourself with the book, but you don't want reading to feel like a chore. I don't think taking notes is necessary at all to understanding the plot and characters, but YMMV.

+1

Just "force yourself" through the first 200 pages and after that it will suck you in.

Without knowing about the plan for this thread I've been reading this on vacation. I'm a big fan of DFW's short stories and journalism so figured it was time. I'm through about 160 pages and am starting to get sucked in and feel like it's all coming together.

Are we going to dedicate spending day x to day y discussing chapter z, or is this more of a casual drop-in and comment on where you're currently at etc?

On page 53 at the moment, I'm trying to process each chapter in and of itself, though I'm noticing recurring words appearing in different characters' arcs. Like desiccated, references to Toblerone and some others I'm forgetting. Not sure how to interpret this just yet.

Read it three times. Desperately want in. That is all.

Almost made a $1k bet with a friend where I would have had to read the book in a year to win. So glad I didn't, I almost definitely would have lost. Think I made it about 15 pages in before giving up, but I am definitely in to give it another go. Great idea for a thread!

I think maybe to do this we should set dates to finish each "chapter" of the book. 1 page per day seems a little slow, unless we want this to last over 3 years. I have never really participated too much on 2+2, but I'm thrilled to come out of my lurker shell to be a big part of this thread if we're going to get it going. I love this book to pieces, and I am willing to put a decent amount of work into this.

Other random things:

1) Read the endnotes! They are hugely important in the book, and are often vital to the plot. Don't skip them.

2) I'd try to get a physical copy of the book if possible. Maybe I'm wrong, but it's gonna be difficult to jump around to the endnotes with an e-book. There is also a list of years somewhere in the middle of the book that it's useful to be able to jump to at will.

3) If someone in the group knows a lot about Hamlet, that'd be good news too. The book is deeply indebted to Hamlet, and I feel as if I don't know Hamlet well enough to catch the references.

I'm not sure this is true. There are definitely some oblique references to Hamlet (such as the title), but it seems like the book has more in common with The Brothers Karamazov (which I know nothing about) than Hamlet. I'd imagine the former would be more valuable to know well than the latter.

I am in, been just laughing at me from the shelf for a couple of years, time I took it on.

I think the references are more than oblique. Hal writes an essay about a hero of inaction, which is basically what Hamlet is. Hal's father is a ghost who comes back to the human world (like Hamlet's father) and Hal's mother is sleeping around like Gertrude does. Furthermore, they dig up the movie in a graveyard in a scene that is totally reminiscent of the Poor Yorick scene from Hamlet, which is where the title "Infinite Jest" is taken from.

The janitors who peel Stice's face from the window seem to me to be reminiscent of Rosenkrantz and Guidlernstern (sp?), though like I said I haven't read Hamlet in forever and could be wrong.

The fingerprints of The Brothers K are all over IJ as well, as the chapter where Mario touches the guy in the subway is a Grand Inquisitor reference, if I remember the Brothers K correctly. Also, Orin seems perhaps in some way based on Ivan?

Either way, I think both books are important influences on DFW.

Clawnsby,

Good points, but you might want to put that stuff in spoilers

Edit: Never thought about the Hero of Inaction as a reference to Hamlet, but that does make a lot of sense

The one page a day thing was a joke on myself, as I do read slow, but not quite that slow.

From my first attempt at reading this thing, I don't think breaking it up into chapters is going to be the way to go. Unless the formatting on my ebook is screwed up, the table of contents is an infinite jest upon the reader.

Tentatively I was thinking we could do 50 to 100 pages per week, from Saturday to Saturday. I think we already have enough interest to start, so unless there's some objection we could go ahead and read and discuss the foreward and first 50 pages this week, and start the next 50 next Saturday.


Edit: It's nice to have someone well versed in the book on board. Feel free to take up the reins on this thing, because i have no idea what i'm doing.

YEAR OF GLAD

I am seated in an office, surrounded by heads and bodies. My posture is consciously congruent to the shape of my hard chair. This is a cold room in University Administration, wood-walled, Remington-hung, double-windowed against the November heat, insulated from Administrative sounds by the reception area outside, at which Uncle Charles, Mr. deLint and I were lately received.

I am in here.

Should we say read to p. 63 for Saturday as a start? I last reread IJ like 3 months ago so I'm afraid there's a chance I might not totally get into rereading it again now but I'm willing to give it a shot. How many people are in?

Also, I'd pay special attention to p. 10-11. The first time I read it, I honestly just skimmed those two pages. They end up being potentially very important, so don't just skim them.

I moved right i to LBJ vol 3, so I'm not able to participate in this right now. I may try to catch up later, good luck all.

Potentially cool piece of trivia to whet your appetite: Some literary critic (or avid reader or something) pointed out that the first line to Hamlet is:

"Who's there?"

and IJ's first line starts with:

"I am..."

The person (I forget where I read this) posited that IJ is DFW's response to Hamlet. In my opinion, it's probably just a total coincidence, but still kinda neat to think about.

Sounds good to me.

I'm fated to be in on this. Read some of his non-fiction earlier this year and then found IJ on the sidewalk right in front of my place a few months ago. Stalled out 80 pages in but will try to keep pace here.

Highly recommend the two pieces I read at the link below: "Shipping Out" (DWF on a cruise) and "Ticket to the Fair" (DFW at a state fair)

http://harpers.org/archive/2008/09/hbc-90003557