Wallace, David Foster (1962-2008), was an American author famous for his imaginative storytelling techniques. He gained fame for his highly personal books that feature the energetic and complex use of language as well as an exuberant and offbeat sense of humor. His admirers praised Wallace as a refreshing force in American literature. But he was also criticized for self-indulgent cleverness and a lack of discipline.
Wallace’s first book was the fantasy The Broom of the System (1987). The story centers on Lenore Beadsman and her search for her 92-year-old grandmother, also named Lenore Beadsman, who disappeared from a nursing home. During her search, the younger Lenore meets a bizarre group of characters as the author’s use of various forms of writing and styles of speech explores how words and symbols define a person.
The short-story collection Girl with Curious Hair (1989) blurs fact and fiction to test the relation of imagination to reality and analyzes a celebrity culture centered on television. Wallace’s second novel, Infinite Jest (1996), is set in the near future when Canada, the United States, and Mexico have been unified into a superstate. Its multiple storylines touch on topics including addiction, tennis, entertainment and advertising, film, and family relationships. The long novel gained praise from critics and readers for its variety, inventiveness, and humor. A Supposedly Fun Thing I’ll Never Do Again: Essays and Arguments (1997) is a collection of Wallace’s nonfiction that includes autobiographical pieces and the author’s observations on American culture. Consider the Lobster and Other Essays (2005) discusses a variety of subjects, including pornography and sports autobiographies. The collection displays the author’s love of language by such means as inserting long footnotes within the main text and injecting unconventional typographical features on the page.
Wallace playfully examined the theory and history of the mathematical concept of infinity in Everything and More: A Compact History of Infinity (2003). Another short-story collection, Oblivion (2004), mixes philosophy, social criticism, and the author’s distinctive sense of humor.
Wallace was born on Feb. 21, 1962, in Ithaca, New York. He graduated with a B.A. degree from Amherst College in 1985 and received an M.F.A. degree from the University of Arizona in 1987. Wallace was an English professor at Illinois State University from 1992 to 2002, when he became a professor of creative writing at Pomona College. Wallace suffered from depression for many years. He took his own life on Sept. 12, 2008. This Is Water, a commencement address he delivered at Kenyon College in 2005, was published in 2009, after his death. The Pale King, an unfinished novel, came out in 2011, and Both Flesh and Not, a collection of essays, in 2012. Something to Do with Paying Attention (2022) is a novella originally published as part of The Pale King.
