r/books • u/[deleted] • Aug 21 '16

One of the most powerful descriptions of suicide I've ever read. David Foster Wallace - Infinite Jest

"The so-called ‘psychotically depressed’ person who tries to kill herself doesn’t do so out of quote ‘hopelessness’ or any abstract conviction that life’s assets and debits do not square. And surely not because death seems suddenly appealing. The person in whom Its invisible agony reaches a certain unendurable level will kill herself the same way a trapped person will eventually jump from the window of a burning high-rise. Make no mistake about people who leap from burning windows. Their terror of falling from a great height is still just as great as it would be for you or me standing speculatively at the same window just checking out the view; i.e. the fear of falling remains a constant. The variable here is the other terror, the fire’s flames: when the flames get close enough, falling to death becomes the slightly less terrible of two terrors. It’s not desiring the fall; it’s terror of the flames. And yet nobody down on the sidewalk, looking up and yelling ‘Don’t!’ and ‘Hang on!’, can understand the jump. Not really. You’d have to have personally been trapped and felt flames to really understand a terror way beyond falling."

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u/[deleted] Aug 21 '16

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u/swagswindler Aug 21 '16

"This motion picture is loosely based on transcripts from an interview David consented to eighteen years ago for a magazine article about the publication of his novel, 'Infinite Jest.' That article was never published and David would never have agreed that those saved transcripts could later be repurposed as the basis of a movie."

I was under the impression that the film is based on (and this sounds like a similiar description of) the book Although Of Course You End Up Becoming Yourself by David Lipsky? In which Lipsky chronicles his experience riding alongside DFW on his Infinite Jest book tour. For any fans of DFW i recommend this book if you have yet to come across it.

Edit: tried to quote properly but struggling on mobile

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u/[deleted] Aug 21 '16

The book is basically just transcripts

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u/[deleted] Aug 21 '16

And they had the original tapes to make the movie

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u/pigglybiggly Aug 21 '16

The book is the transcripts of when lipsky interviewed wallace for rolling stone

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u/shayshay2k Aug 21 '16

Not saying it was "right" what the production did. But if you grant someone an interview, you have zero say in how it's used. You've made the decision to open up to a writer/reporter, with no pretense about privacy. It's not like the author lied about why he was there.

Maybe the estate wouldn't have wanted the movie, and I'm empathetic to that. But David agreed to the interviews -- it's out of his/the family's hands at that point, even if they don't like the end result.

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u/supkristin Aug 21 '16 edited Aug 22 '16

That's so dirty of them. Yuck. I won't watch it either after reading that. Thank you.

Edit: After reading through all the comments, I agree that it's important to make movies and docs like this for many reasons. But, the yuck was just my first reaction to the idea. It just didn't sound like something a nice person would do.

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u/logged_n_2_say Aug 21 '16

How so? I think there's a lot of great material out there that probably wouldn't have the consent of estates and trusts. Doesn't mean it's unlawful or unjust.

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u/SerenadingSiren Aug 21 '16

But this time they literally said they didn't want it to happen

I think people deserve to say no don't write a book about me or my dead dad or whatever

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u/logged_n_2_say Aug 21 '16 edited Aug 21 '16

i respect their opinion, but i think you set an unrealistic precedent by saying people and their estates can prevent use of material not in their possession or held rights.

i say this without having read the book nor seen the movie.

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u/SerenadingSiren Aug 21 '16

I think it should be sort of like copyright (but less fucked up). For so many years after someone's death you need permission from the estate to write about them

Now, ianal, but that seems reasonable and something that could be implemented

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u/Bowldoza Aug 21 '16

You think that it should be illegal to put words to paper regarding someone else's existence? That is safe spaces taken to a whole new level and it's pathetic.

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u/SerenadingSiren Aug 21 '16

Not forever. But it would allow the family not only to get compensation for the book but to stop any defamation.

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u/logged_n_2_say Aug 21 '16

that seems extremely unreasonable. i respect liable laws and such, but the rights of the material should stay with the content creator.

imagine being held to that standard for people history has panned, like nixon or pol pot, and how skewed our views would be.

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u/SerenadingSiren Aug 21 '16

Well, I understand where you're coming from.

But if someone writes a book about your family at the very least you should be able to negotiate compensation imho

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u/notfromchicago Aug 21 '16

That is a pretty dangerous way of thinking.

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u/[deleted] Aug 21 '16

Eh, the estate says a lot of things, and usually more so when there's money involved, and it's easy to say the deceased would "never agree" to X. Happens every day. More documentaries, more art, more fair use = objectively good thing.

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u/King_of_Mormons Light in August Aug 21 '16

The foreword to The Pale King basically ends by saying David Foster Wallace definitely wouldn't want this published because it's unfinished, but he's dead so he can't do anything about it.

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u/flipshod Aug 21 '16

But he did leave a bunch of the manuscript typed up and neatly stacked on his otherwise messy desk to be found after his body. Is that what he wanted published? We don't know, but as a huge fan (devotee?), I'm glad Pietsch (his editor for Infinite Jest) put TPK together.

And I didn't see the movie, I did read the Lipsky book based on those transcripts and loved it.

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u/King_of_Mormons Light in August Aug 21 '16

The Pale King is probably my second favourite Wallace work, so I'm also glad it was published, but it's difficult to say what he wanted done with the manuscript and notes he left. I'd personally say he left it for his wife and editor to address, but he must've known that in doing so, there would be a chance that it would end up published, so maybe it's a roundabout way of approving.

The movie is alright if you just want to see Jesse Eisenberg and Jason Seagell be actors, and it's an interesting character study on the writer in success and failure, but eh, I wouldn't say it taught me anything about DFW.

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u/BilBallsBaggins Aug 21 '16 edited Oct 15 '16

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u/King_of_Mormons Light in August Aug 21 '16

I'd argue there's a slight difference from writing something about a man from the 1700's who has become a largely historic and public figure and an author whose family members are still alive.

Also I'd be way more annoyed about someone publishing my own unfinished work posthumously than an adaptation regarding me though; people approach adaptations with some question of artistic license, but a lot of people are going to give the same legitimacy of an unfinished manuscript as a work that's been painstakingly edited and rewritten. Hamilton was even a little on the nose about adaptation, with the song Who Lives, Who Dies, Who Tells Your Story.

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u/DigitalMindShadow Aug 22 '16

You're missing out, it's a great film.