At the beginning of 2009, I set out for myself a rather ridiculously impressive list of goals I hoped to accomplish in the year to come. I’ve done really well on some of them–for example, by my becoming fully financially independent and buying a house of my very own (and let’s not play around, that’s pretty impressive given that I’m 26)–and less well for others, like, say, writing 150 posts in this blog.
One of my goals was to finally read, in full, Infinite Jest by David Foster Wallace. I bought the book a few years ago, and like so many other people, I got to approximately page 163 and then happened to set the book down and never pick it up again. This year, though, I was determined to get the book read. As meaningful as the work of David Foster Wallace is to me, I can hardly call myself any sort of fan when I hadn’t managed to finish The Big Book. While other goals fell by the wayside, I remained committed to reading Infinite Jest over the summer.
And that is why I was ecstatic when I discovered that there was an online community of people planning to do exactly the same thing.
Given that my job is kind of crazy right now, and I’ve been frantically busy moving into a new house and helping get another one ready to go on the market, I had been concerned that the Infinite Jest goal might be another one of my resolutions that ended with not much more than a pathetic attempt. But not now!
There are few things in life I love more than being a part of a community. It’s why I’m fascinated by online fandom, and why I loved going to midnight release parties for Harry Potter, and why I even kind of enjoy going to the mall on the day after Thanksgiving. I feel such stupid, giddy contentment in sharing an experience with strangers. And so, if I have to work through this book in order to share the experience with others, THEN BY GOD, I WILL GET THROUGH IT.
As today was the first day of summer, today was the official kick-off for Infinite Summer. I spent the day packing boxes and stressing out about the fact that the air conditioning is broken at my new house and feeling completely overwhelmed by everything I have to do before I move into my new house this Friday. However, at 9:20 tonight, I sat down with my dinner and I read the first 16 pages of Infinite Jest.
In the company of a community of readers, I can’t help but resist the possibility that I might be left out.
So! 16 pages down, 1063 or so pages to go.
that’s 1.5% of the entire book, you gotta start somewhere
I have bought Infinite Jest for my planned participation in Infinite Summer but I’ve yet to actually start reading yet. I hope to knock out the first 75 pages or so this weekend. We can encourage each other along!