Talk:Infinite Jest/Archive 1

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Archive 1

Literary Criticism

Unresolved

/Literary Criticism

I have moved this discussion to a subpage, due to it's taking over this one. Please move discussion there (above link). Revent (talk) 16:34, 24 April 2013 (UTC)

Himself - insane?

Unresolved

Revent (talk) 17:48, 24 April 2013 (UTC)

The text reports:

"It is suggested that he can create and view the Entertainment without becoming entranced because at the time of its creation he is already insane."

Could someone exactly tell me where, in the book? I've just finished reading it, but I can't remember this - thanks.

I too just finished rereading the book, and I'm pretty sure that line does not appear anywhere in it (for one thing, it doesn't sound like DFW; for another, nothing is suggested by way of saying "It is suggested." There are no narrators in IJ who would suggest something that way.) It may be from a discussion elsewhere, or a review--something along those lines. Wangoed 15:09, 7 June 2007 (UTC)

I don't recall this line either. To be safe, I searched an electronic version of the book and couldn't find any of several of those phrase parts anywhere. Orangeseattle (talk) 04:29, 13 March 2008 (UTC)

Wayne

Unresolved

Revent (talk) 17:48, 24 April 2013 (UTC)

is in fact not not directly quoted in the text. His lone actual quotable utterance can be found on page 115 ("Plateaux. With an X.") Further vocalizations are summarized by various narrators but the question of them (the vocalizations, as in their existence) is never in doubt. Wangoed 21:29, 5 June 2007 (UTC)

End Zone - inspiration

Unresolved

Revent (talk) 17:49, 24 April 2013 (UTC)

Mention should probably be made of DFW's "borrowing" of certain elements from DeLillo's End Zone and other works, see http://waste.org/mail/?list=wallace-l&month=0102&msg=11100&keywords=end%20zone%20delillo Tchernobog (talk) 23:54, 27 November 2007 (UTC)

Pat Montesian

Unresolved

Revent (talk) 17:50, 24 April 2013 (UTC)

The following text appears in the main article as part of the description of the character Pat Montesian: "It is implied that Mars owns the only non-lethal form of the Entertainment, and that their daughter is hopelessly addicted to it. Pat is especially fond of Don Gately, perhaps because of his recovery from addiction and his survival of being 'Entertained'." To the best of my knowledge, this entire statement is pure speculation, not supported in any way by the novel. I cannot find any passages in the novel that could possibly be interpreted as evidence that Pat M.'s husband "owns the only non-lethal form of the Entertainment" - nor is there any evidence that a "non-lethal form of the Entertainment" exists at all - and Don Gately definitely does not view the Entertainment at any point in the story. I feel this statement should be deleted from the main article, unless someone can offer evidence of its validity. JulesDassin (talk) 06:57, 29 February 2008 (UTC)

Agreed! Icarus of old (talk) 21:30, 25 March 2008 (UTC)
I think they thought that because Marathe notices the two smile-face tapes in Pat's office while Mars and Pat have a fight on the phone about their daughter. But later Pat makes it clear the samizdat comes from ETA's donation. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 66.65.60.243 (talk) 05:27, 23 October 2008 (UTC)

Reasons for Hal's "Final Condition"

Unresolved

Revent (talk) 17:55, 24 April 2013 (UTC)

I just changed the entry on Hal Incandenza. The reason for Hal's strange behavior in the first chapter and during the last few sections of the book in which he appears are not at all unclear. Go back and read all the Hal sections from 851 through 967 or so. Hal begins to act strangely during the scene where he discovers "The Darkness" has gotten his forehead stuck to the window. When Hal goes to get the custodians to help with the situation, Kenkle asks Hal "why the hilarity?" Hal is completely unaware that he is in any way demonstrating anything resembling hilarity, that is to say, he is grinning uncontrollably and is not even aware that he is doing so. This is a classic and and unmistakable sign of the onset of the effects of a powerful hallucinogen, as anyone with any experience with hallucinogens will tell you. Each Hal section from here on to the end contains distinct narrative clues indicating that Hal is in fact on some sort of hallucinogen. And then there is the one tiny section on page 916 where Pemulis discovers that "at least eight panels of the drop-ceiling have somehow fallen out of their aluminum struts and on the floor... including the relevant panel. No old sneaker is in evidence..." We know from earlier that this is where Pemulis stashes his drugs, including the newly gotten-hold-of DMZ. If Pemulis doped Hal's toothbrush (and where did anyone get that idea?), why bother to even have this section in the book, a section which clearly indicates that someone filched the DMZ, and that someone is most likely Hal himself? It could be possible, I guess, that someone other than Pemulis doped Hal, but why? Who would have the motivation to do so? It just isn't textually supported. In fact, none of the suggestions previously made have any textual support - not the "latent mold" theory (though interesting), not the "inadvertent-viewing-of-the-Entertainment" theory, not the "subjected-to-a-technical-interview" theory. Everything you need to know is in the text. Xsgenefuzz (talk) 09:27, 6 July 2009 (UTC)

Also, consider this- p. 27 ' "Dr. Zegarelli says that's one reason for all the caries, is that I have low salivary output." "Those dry sticky salivaless sounds which can be death of a good conversation." ' Hal is prone to anxiety/panic attacks, as is indicated in p.8 and later in the book. The excessive anxiety, in addition to/potentiating prevailing theories on Hal's dissociative breakdown, may have been a critical factor in his misinterpreted speech. Hal's speech during his interviews described '"Like some sort of animal with something in its mouth."' p. 14 etc. Alljokingaside (talk) 17:07, 15 May 2010 (UTC)

So, apparently at least one person didn't like my change to the entry on Hal Incandenza, regarding the reason for his eventual insanity. But they (the anonymous editor who rejected my edit) seemed to indicate that their reason for 'reverting' my edit lay in the fact that the info I added was unsourced. HUH? I was replacing a bunch of *completely* unsourced wild speculation with well-founded speculation that has a great deal of textual support. I outlined this textual support, including relevant page numbers, above under the section "Reasons for Hal's 'Final Condition'". I'll add actual citations to the main entry if that's what's wanted, but I didn't do this because it would merely be a citation to IJ itself and not an outside source. If the complaint is that my speculation is "unsourced", then all of the speculation regarding the cause of Hal's insanity should go. Xsgenefuzz (talk) 00:00, 8 July 2009 (UTC)

See Primary Sources. What you consider "textual support" is irrelevant unless you can find reliable non-primary sources (especially for this book, since with the overwhelming ambiguity of most of the plot you can find textual support for many contradictory viewpoints). Also, FTR on this issue, it is far from clear that the cause of Hal's condition is (solely) being dosed with the DMZ. With all due respect, it takes a simplistic reading of the text to come to so strong a conclusion.

And yes, I also agree that most of this article is speculative, but that doesn't mean you should replace some speculation with a different sort of speculation. This entire article needs a lot of work, but it needs to be sourced work. Hell, see this for agreement. 206.213.209.31 (talk) 14:47, 8 July 2009 (UTC)

In two days

Unresolved

Revent (talk) 17:58, 24 April 2013 (UTC)

I plan on removing the word dystopia from the intro text. Its really not true. Unless we have some sort of objection.

I put it there, and yes it is. It's an ironic dystopia - like the Entertainment itself, it's arguably what we've always really wanted, despite the negative side-effects. It's also a parody. Slac speak up! 02:14, 16 October 2005 (UTC)
It is most certainly NOT a dystopia. Jesus christ. You want "ironic dystopia"? Then read The Elementary Particles, the ironic dystopia there is nested in several other layers of irony. Honestly, sometimes I think it would be better if people had never taken a single English class in their lives, because all the verbiage and classification seems to turn one's literary soul into a midget. Wigglestrue (talk) 19:36, 8 October 2008 (UTC)

This is the same anon poster from before, sorry for taking awhile. However, it remain to be convinced. There is a strong lack of social engineering and despite the best intentions of rodney tine the portrayal of most of america, esp. boston suggests that there is a pretty similar lifestyle to ours. things like the videophones are not used by main characters, the drugs except dmz are commonly synthesized today. Reflecting from a time period very near to the YDAU in reality, there isn't much futurism to IJ. Dystopia also is loaded towards political intentions, which my god wallace has none.

I agree with Anonymous. The book is not intended to describe a dystopia, and it's not a parody. He intended it to be sad. Check out Westward the course... to see the reason he included the bit about the Entertainment; check out interviews with Wallace at the bottom of the page to hear his opinions on irony. Not an encyclopedia-type inclusion, but most of this book can be considered character development; I think Wallace wrote in the near future to emphasize American Utilitarianism.--Cyclone05 02:58, 5 February 2007 (UTC)

Don Gately

Unresolved

Revent (talk) 17:59, 24 April 2013 (UTC)

I just changed the terminology for "Don Gately" from the negative "antagonist" to the more neutral "character" for a few reasons:

  1. 1 - the novel has a decentralized structure that shifts between narratives that limited to various characters minds at various points, making it difficult to single out a unity of action that any character could be described as working "against".
  1. 2 - Gately is extremely sympathetic, and some readers may even go as far as considering him a heroic figure, at least in particular episodes.
  1. 3 - There are points in the text (for example, Hal's "Year of Glad" episode, and Don's supernatural experience/dream in the hospital room) where allusions are made to an event beyond the immediate horizon of action where Hal (described as the protagonist in this article) where Hal and Don perhaps have joined forces in an attempt to foil the AFR's spontaneous dissemination of the samizdat en masse to an unsuspecting populace.

If I was the sole author of this article I would not hesitate to use an entirely positive term for describing Gately (using vocabulary within the confines of point #1 and the structure of action in the novel), but out of respect for the democratic nature of wiki, I elected to edit to a neutral term —Preceding unsigned comment added by 69.156.2.209 (talk) 04:31, 30 August 2008 (UTC)

Can someone explain how he would have been considered an antagonist in the first place? The only characters he would be an antagonist of are hardly the protagonists. I would be pretty comfortable with him being referred to as a protagonist.71.193.106.181 (talk) 01:01, 4 September 2008 (UTC)


The AFR and a minor note on Hal

Unresolved

Revent (talk) 18:04, 24 April 2013 (UTC)

Previously, this page said that the Assasins des Fauteuils Rollents created the samdizat, and also made several other claims that are totally unsupported by any textual evidence. I've edited that section accordingly. Please direct any questions to me.

Also, though it is implied in the other descriptions, nobody bothered to mention that Hal is the youngest of the Incandenza children. So I threw that in too. - Cakedamber 16:27, 22 Mar 2005 (UTC)

My understanding was that the samdizat--we're talking about The Entertainment here, right??--was of uncertain origins, like the Book of Mormon--it's been awhile since I read it, so maybe I'm forgetting here. I like to think of it as a sort of Holy Grail, an entertainment so good you could plotz over and over again. I also vacillate between hating him & worshipping the ground Remy Marathe walks on--should he not just let the bitch die, and do I really care one way or another? I don't know. Somebody should make the story of the AFR into a really sweet spy movie. AllenGinsberg 06:01, 1 May 2005 (UTC)

It's samizdat. It's not of uncertain origin. The auteur James Orin Incandenza created it.--Cyclone05 02:42, 5 February 2007 (UTC)

Marathe doesn't walk, he rolls.24.166.13.251 (talk) 03:13, 19 August 2008 (UTC)

Have we had a discussion on how it is exactly that Hal developed his nuerosis... there are the three possibilities mentioned in the book that I agree with but I was wondering if anybody had an arguement that one was more plausible than another???? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 12.201.233.116 (talk) 02:31, 9 January 2009 (UTC)

Possible explanation for Hal's neurosis: on page 10 Hal states "I cannot make myself understood, now" and "Call it something I ate". (Directly after this the mold-eating incident is described by Hal). However, on page 30 Hal is told by his disguised father:"...that her [i.e. Avril] introduction of esoteric mnemonic steroids...derived from a certain organic testosterone-regeneration compound distilled by the Jivaro shamen of the South-Central L.A. basin, into your innocent-looking bowl of morning Ralston..." So possibly the daily ingestion of the mnemonic steroids not only gave Hal super-memory but also damaged his brain in some way and led to his mental breakdown? Perhaps his frequent cannabis use was the only thing stopping his brain from melting down. Maybe the sudden cold-turkey quitting of a substance he was addicted to was too much for his damaged brain to handle?

See my answer concerning the question of Hal's psychosis below. The "Call it something I ate" is unquestionably in reference to the huge dose of DMZ he filches from Pemulis. Xsgenefuzz (talk) 09:35, 6 July 2009 (UTC)

Spoilers

Unresolved

Revent (talk) 18:06, 24 April 2013 (UTC)

From my point of view, details about the year naming convention and the other future dystopian circumstances are gradually revealed over the first couple hundred pages, which is part of what keeps you going through the book. I would kind of think that it would be good to have this information listed under the spoiler heading. In fact, I'd be hard pressed to think of anything in the book that wouldn't be a spoiler if known in advance. What do you think? --- Mike 02:41, 8 August 2005 (UTC)

If that's the case, then there's no reason to read the article at all, is there? It should be avoided entirely.--Vonbontee (talk) 07:45, 16 April 2009 (UTC)

Ennet endnote

Unresolved

Revent (talk) 18:10, 24 April 2013 (UTC)

The Setting section does a good job of providing an outline of time and place, except for the absurdly detailed inclusion of the tiny fact of the author, in one of the hundred pages of endnotes, picking a fight (unless it is even more cryptic than it appears) with the common distinction between the forms the course or treatment of the addiction process often takes, with in one case highly socially integrated, legally sanctioned alcohol, and in the other, highly socially stigmatized, illegal or "controlled" (i.e., banned in the absence of medical approval and onerously punished independent of any behavioral deviance) substances. (The distinction may be false in important ways, but if that deserves any mention in the accompanying article on the 1000-page book, it would not be in the "Setting" section -- nor thrown in anywhere else with so little meaningful relation to the surrounding material.)--Jerzy•t 06:20, 17 July 2010 (UTC)

Lyle

Unresolved

He is currently mentioned once, incidentally. Revent (talk) 18:14, 24 April 2013 (UTC)

Why hasn't Lyle been mentioned on the article page? He is integral to the novel. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 68.253.209.159 (talk) 14:48, 19 August 2010 (UTC)


NOTICE: Summary of current article/talk page status. Please help clean up?

At the current time (see my sig) there is an active discussion on /Literary Criticism about this article (It's a subpage, not an archive).

I've archived all the content discussion in one place, and (some) old resolved issues. I don't have time (or honestly, the interest) to check all the ones left now.

Other editors checking these multi-year old abandoned issues, and marking them resolved if appropriate would be helpful. At least some of the ones I marked resolved and archived were connected to content deletion by abandoned accounts that never edited another page. Revent (talk) 18:57, 24 April 2013 (UTC)

Use of 'ETA'

The abbreviation ETA should be E.T.A., at repeated places in the article, and should be defined where the school is first mentioned. I've been editing the hell out of this, and I'm not going to track them all down. Revent (talk) 21:25, 24 April 2013 (UTC)

Also, for readability, the text should be copy-edited to add variation between usage of E.T.A. and Enfield. Stating just the beginning of the name is appropriate, as the use in the article is unambiguous. A similar comment could be made about other places mentioned. Revent (talk) 21:29, 24 April 2013 (UTC)

Stylistic elements - lack of sources

Resolved

Revent (talk) 23:44, 24 April 2013 (UTC)

Does the stylistic elements section really need to cite any sources?

  • Endnotes are used frequently throughout the novel. In an interview with Charlie Rose, Wallace characterized their use as a method of disrupting the linearity of the text while maintaining some sense of narrative cohesion.

^ There are ~100 pages of endnotes = frequent use of endnotes. Maybe a link to the Charlie Rose interview would be in order, I think that the DFW interview video is available on his site.

  • Acronyms are another signature device in Wallace's work, and used frequently in the novel.

^ There are a lot of acronyms.

  • Wallace's writing voice is a postmodern mixture of high- and low-brow linguistic traits. He juxtaposes, often within a single sentence, colloquialisms and polysyllabic, highly esoteric words.

^ Open the book to a random page.

In before "original research bla bla bla" —Preceding unsigned comment added by 83.108.178.252 (talk) 22:53, 29 May 2008 (UTC)

The Ennet House Drug and Alcohol Recovery House (sic)

Unresolved

Revent (talk) 17:54, 24 April 2013 (UTC)

Should (sic) be added to any mention of the full name of Ennet House? I'm not sure how this would fly with Wikipedia policy, being just an anonymous unregistered editor, but AFAIK DFW adds it to the end of every mention of the full name of the House, almost making it apart of the name proper. 173.49.76.59 (talk) 03:38, 11 June 2009 (UTC)


It's typographically correct to use [sic] at any place (even inside a quotation) where the spelling or phrasing would seem to indicate a gross error to the casual reader. If it begins to seem repetitive, the solution is to copy-edit to (in this case) replace the proper nouns with pronouns.

I'd already made that change when fixing grammar, before I remembered this note. I'm going to leave it as is for now, unless someone explains to me that I'm wrong. Revent (talk) 04:46, 25 April 2013 (UTC)

Book review

Resolved

Subsumed into the creation and cooperative editing of Infinite_Jest#Critical_Reception at /Literary_Criticism. The use of this source has not been contested, and it is currently in the article. Revent (talk) 04:51, 25 April 2013 (UTC)

I don't know what the policy is on BRs, so I didn't add this link on the subject page, but here is the NYT review: http://www.nytimes.com/books/97/03/16/reviews/wallace-r-jest.html. Kdammers (talk) 07:33, 17 March 2011 (UTC)

Perhaps this deserves a mention, as a pop culture reference?

Resolved

The link is currently in External Sites, and nobody has questioned or removed it for years.

This section should probably stay on the main Talk page as a note to keep that particular reference during future cleanups. Revent (talk) 05:00, 25 April 2013 (UTC)

NPR on Calamity song, pop culture reference to Infinite Jest. Jodi.a.schneider (talk) 13:26, 24 August 2011 (UTC)

Yes, indeed - DavidWBrooks (talk) 13:27, 24 August 2011 (UTC)

Further reading.

The references are inconsistently cited, and the number of 'in-depth studies' is inordinate. Revent (talk) 21:21, 24 April 2013 (UTC)

See what I did to the 'Translations' section [1]. Revent (talk) 23:21, 28 April 2013 (UTC)

Regarding the alerts about article content

4-12-13: This page has flags at the top saying some of the problems with the article. One of them is that it seems to be more of an advertisement -- I think this is out of date. The article doesn't read like an advertisement to me, although I will agree it's mostly plot summary. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 69.170.25.90 (talk) 01:31, 5 December 2013 (UTC)

I agree. I think some of these flags are harsh or inappropriate. I'm going to take them down. Spicemix (talk) 18:19, 5 January 2014 (UTC)

Hal Incandenza mini Bio check the source

Apriv40dj (talk) 16:15, 18 February 2014 (UTC)When reading the mini Bio of Hal, I noticed the source sited an article called "online with David Foster Wallace" footnote number 7, and I am not convinced of authenticity of that online posted source. Can it proven that David Foster Wallace contacted the blog author and decided to tell all on Infinite Jest rather then giving this interview to perhaps the New Yorker? I am not debating the correctness of the data, but, I have theory the blog author wrote the article himself and claims he was online texting with David Foster Wallace. What if it was someone claiming to be David Foster Wallace It was not a phone conversation or an interview that was taped and no proof can given that source is quoting info actually came from David Foster Wallace. I have read all the biographies of David Foster Wallace and have not come across this being mentioned. Nor can I find it the books or studies on Infinite Jest. I would like to see more proof given to the source for footnote number 7. If you read the source there is a rather complex theory that the ghost of his father places mold that grows on mold on his toothbrush, but this could be speculation. It would be better to quote the actually text of Infinite Jest for Hal's mini Bio then follow some complex and unproven theory.

I would like to suggest we use the book Elegant Complexity: A Study of David Foster Wallace's Infinite Jest, as reference for Hal's bio. Here is the quote from the book.

"Hal’s communication problem in the Year of Glad may have begun on 20 November Y.D.A.U. and prompted a visit to the hospital on a psychiatric stretcher. It seems likely that withdrawal from marijuana, the onset of anhedonia, the pressures of competitive tennis, and Hal’s (and his family’s) obsessive nature have driven Hal to retreat internally, to regress to a state of incommunicability with others."

Carlisle, Greg, Elegant Complexity: A Study of David Foster Wallace's Infinite Jest: Sideshow Media Group. (2007-11-30). The book is 524 pages long and I can't see the page number in the kindle edition, but the quote is near the end of book, in the last few pages.

Having read the book, there is no evidence that the ghost of Hal's father placed anything on his toothbrush, so using the quote from the blog which may be the words of David Foster Wallace creates speculation. Also in the paragraph before the paragraph I quoted, Elegant Complexity explores the toothbrush issue and does not mention anything about the father's ghost.

” It is also unlikely that Hal has consumed the DMZ. Hal has sworn off drugs (p. 908),”

The blog used in the source also says " Hal never leaves his toothbrush unattended (870), but that’s no problem for a wraith. He places the DMZ on Hal’s brush and Hal brushes his teeth (860) and immediately begins experiencing symptoms: Ortho thinks Hal’s crying when Hal thinks he’s speaking in a neutral tone (862)."

I looked at page 860 and the passage is about Gately, and there is no mention of Hal, the toothbrush or the ghost or even the character Stice who was supposed to be in contact with the ghost. Why would James want his son to be misunderstood so no one could hear him? The father's goal was to get his son to talk and converse. What motivation would the father have to sending Hal to a mental hospital at the end of the last year in the book, The Year of Glad? One could say, (as the blog does) he wanted to communicate with his son from the after life, but there is no evidence of the father speaking to his son or having a conversation with him in the men's room or on the way to the hospital or at the hospital. Unless it's in the Infinite Jest, it can't be proven. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Apriv40dj (talk • contribs) 13:27, 19 February 2014 (UTC)

Roulants

"Rollents" makes no sense to me. Fauteuil is the French word for armchair, and roulants is the plural form of "rolling", so "fauteuils roulants" means "rolling armchairs", which is quite logical, and probably means "wheelchairs". 172.56.27.85 (talk) 09:07, 21 February 2014 (UTC)

Q.v. n222 QuentinUK (talk) 11:20, 19 April 2015 (UTC)

Irrelevant Click-Throughs: An All Too Common Wikipedia Problem.

In the first paragraph of this article we get " novel famously includes 388 endnotes."

The word "endnotes" is in blue, and if you click on it you'll get a long article on endnotes, particularly as they are important in typography and editing. All this is totally irrelevant to the person who came here interested in this particular, somewhat cultish apparently, book.

Equally inanely, I have run across "New York Times" as an anchor to an url which tells me about the good grey lady, rather than telling me about the particular NYT article relevant to the Wikipedia entry.

What can possibly be gong through the minds of the people who edit in these HTML links? Are they blinded by their pride in their new found internet "programming" skills?

Yes, it's interesting that there are 388 endnotes to this interesting book. I'm sure there are other authors who have used massed endnotes as a literary device; they might be worth a URL. If there were anything unusual about this guy's use of the device, that too might be worth an, ahem, html'd endnote. In fact there isn't.

So. Half-wits are going around sprinkling irrelevant html across the world. Can we at least keep them within bounds on Wikipedia?

DavidLJ (talk) 00:10, 23 June 2014 (UTC)

Wiki markup / HTML
QuentinUK (talk) 12:31, 19 April 2015 (UTC)

Mystery quote source

Someone named "Burns" is quoted in the second paragraph here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Infinite_Jest#Style, yet no explanation is provided of who this is. It is the only mention of "Burns" in the text. Interzone826 (talk) 05:38, 30 July 2015 (UTC)

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Ortho "The Darkness" Stice and black clothes

The article states that "He endorses only brands that have black-colored products" But I remember he requested black clothes from each sponsor? Trying to find source. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2600:8800:1180:1F8:807D:37C1:4506:C466 (talk) 22:56, 5 September 2016 (UTC)

O.N.A.N. and onanism

David Foster Wallace loved wordplay. He liked to indulge in scholarly references. There is no doubt that O.N.A.N. is a play on onanism. This word comes from Onan, the Biblical character who was admonished for "spilling his seed on the ground," or withdrawing, rather than impregnate his sister-in-law (see Genesis 38:9). "Spilling one's seed on the ground" later became a way to refer to masturbating. In Wikipedia, "onanism" redirects to the "masturbation" article.

The onanism reference was plain to me and I am kind of surprised that people take issue with it. This is not "a possible reference to onanism" but a definitive one. Here are some sources:

  • "The acronym O.N.A.N. is likely a reference to the biblical Onan, whose name has become synonymous with masturbation (onanism). Perhaps Wallace is trying to say that the United States is trying to remake Canada and Mexico in its image - a country that is wasteful and only concerned with self-pleasuring." "Poor Yorick Entertainment," a fictional independent film company created by James O. Incandenza in David Foster Wallace's novel,"Infinite Jest.
  • "O.N.A.N.ism: Onanism is another word for masturbation in the English language." David Foster Wallace Wiki
  • "I originally thought O.N.A.N. was just a cheap gag, in the same way Robert Anton Wilson called his supercomputer F.U.C.K.U.P. But David Foster Wallace does not do cheap gags. The book was taking place in a society literally named for masturbation, and its entire structure was based on pleasure without purpose." Book Review: Infinite Jest]
  • "...about an organization called ONAN, which a graduate student who spotted you reading the book explained was both a Biblical allusion and a masturbation joke." NY Daily News
  • "Organization of North American Nations, i.e., O.N.A.N., hahaha, I get it, masturbation, hilarious!" Energy without Mass
  • "...and the whole enterprise becomes solipsistic, masturbatory, onanistic. (It is no accident that Wallace’s conception of the newly formed North American nations in Infinite Jest uses the acronym ONAN, after that first biblical seed-spiller.)" Considering David Foster Wallace
  • "Geopolitical considerations have turned the United States, Canada, and Mexico into the Organization of North American Nations, or O.N.A.N. Yes, a masturbation reference..." "Infinite Summer."

I can find many references to this, but frankly, I'm surprised anybody doubts the reference. It's plain to see. Do people object because they are squeamish about masturbating? By the way, Dorothy Parker is supposed to have named her parakeet Onan because "he spilled his seed" so often. She wasn't squeamish. 76.14.66.186 (talk) 18:37, 22 August 2013 (UTC)

Duly noted, I'd restored the source you'd provided earlier, and added the "possible" based on the prior edit's summary, asserting that only some had made this connection. Though some of the add'l references you added may not meet WP:RS (visited some of these myself when I read this), you seem to have provided more weight to your argument here... Boogerpatrol (talk) 20:50, 22 August 2013 (UTC)
I don't doubt Wallace intended the reference. But the book doesn't make it explicit. Nowhere in the novel is a connection made between ONAN and onanism. To call ONAN "a reference to onanism", straight up, is therefore misleading.Wukai (talk) 20:01, 23 August 2013 (UTC)
What is an explicit reference? Do you make a distinction between explicit and vague references? There is no distinction. It's either a reference or it isn't. And this is a reference to onanism. That you and others didn't catch it doesn't make it invalid or "inexplicit." 76.14.66.186 (talk) 01:24, 24 August 2013 (UTC)
It's a perfectly clear distinction. If, in the world of the novel, ONAN had been named that in honor of onanism, that would be an explicit reference. Instead, it's presented merely as the acronym of the Organization of North American Nations. If at any point in the novel the acronym were suggested to be other than coincidental, either in the narration or by any character, that would be an explicit reference. There is nothing of the sort.Wukai (talk) 03:50, 24 August 2013 (UTC)
Maybe the problem is that this isn't a "reference" but an "allusion." An allusion, according to my dictionary, is "an expression designed to call something to mind without mentioning it explicitly; an indirect or passing reference." I'm going to change it to an allusion in the text of the article. 76.14.66.186 (talk) 16:42, 24 August 2013 (UTC)
Yeah, it's an allusion. I still wouldn't mention it in the article. The book makes countless allusions of all kinds, most of them not mentioned here. It seems pretty pedantic to point them out, especially obvious ones like this.Wukai (talk) 06:39, 26 August 2013 (UTC)

The novel is pretty clearly influenced by Neil Postman's 1986 cultural study Amusing Ourselves To Death. The central plot device is, after all, a video that people are compelled to keep watching, wearing nappies for the purpose, till they die of dehydration and starvation. (And the video's compelling power results from it being shot with a special lens that mimics an infant's field of vision, causing regression in the viewer.) The fact that the North American countries have now become ONAN ties in with that. And the use of comedy acronyms is a borrowing from Thomas Pynchon, the novel's style being a homage to or pastiche of Pynchon's. Khamba Tendal (talk) 12:55, 19 July 2017 (UTC)

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Avril's supposed cavortings with 30 Near Eastern medical attachés

The article indicates that the following text is an accurate representation of the book:

'Her sexual relationships with men are a matter of some speculation/discussion; one with John "No Relation" Wayne is depicted.

'In one scene, James, speaking to Hal, refers to Hal's "mother's cavortings with not one not two but over thirty Near Eastern medical attachés".'

That second quoted sentence should be deleted, because its inclusion is not very honest i.e. not reasonably supportable, for each following reason:

- James is raving on that page (p.30).

- Such allegation by James is non-credible on its face (i.e. it would be difficult for one person to find thirty Near East medical attaches, let alone have relations with thirty of them).

- There is no support for such allegation in the other 1100 pages.

Some other editor might want to simply delete the entire sentence immediately; deletion would not even require an adjustment to the remaining text. I myself am not going to delete the allegation immediately, because it seems important to the user 'Wukai', who reverted a deletion of that erroneous Wikipedia text. But that user has disappeared from the discussion. -Bo99, 2017 Dec

In what sense have I disappeared? What does it mean for me to be present on this page? —Wukai
Disappearing means the person at issue has stopped contributing to the page at issue and seemingly stopped watching the page; others probably have to presume that the person is not watching-and-withholding but rather that if the person were watching then he would have acted in good faith and would have fulfilled his duty to cooperate and respond.
The raving that Avril cavorted with 30 Near East medical attaches should be deleted, right?, because it's not an accurate summary of the book. Bo99 (talk) 14:22, 15 December 2017 (UTC)


Forget it. Someone has finally deleted the allegation from the article. Bo99 (talk) 14:32, 15 December 2017 (UTC)

Trial-size Dove Bar interpretation

The article links to Dove chocolate. My change, linking it instead to Dove toiletries, was reverted.

The reason for my change was that there’s no such thing as a “trial size” chocolate bar, however, a small bar of soap (Dove soap, that is) could be referred to as trial-size.

Having no sources for either claim, I suggest the link be reverted back to Dove toiletries. If this cannot be done, it’s imperative that the link be removed entirely. Treesearcher (talk) 18:24, 1 April 2018 (UTC)

There's no definitive answer within the book or a quote from Wallace to substantiate either claim. Unwikilinking. Icarus of old (talk) 10:42, 2 April 2018 (UTC)
If you search the web for discussions of this question, you'll find that Wallace reportedly confirmed that the reference was to the ice cream, not the soap. But no definitive source exists to cite, so I'm happy to leave it unlinked. Treesearcher, of course the trial-size Dove Bar does not exist; the book is fiction, set in the future. And bars of Dove soap are not called "Dove Bars." Dove Bars are ice cream.Wukai (talk) 01:46, 3 April 2018 (UTC)

Mario

I'm not sure about Mario being described as "mentally slow". He appears to be that way because he's completely without guile, but the book spends a fair amount of time on his film, and the film is pretty brilliantly written. He also, in his rather guileless way asks some fairly probing questions.

165.225.39.73 (talk) 16:40, 8 May 2018 (UTC)

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