“If you spend enough time reading or writing, you find a voice, but you also find certain tastes. You find certain writers who when they write, it makes your own brain voice like a tuning fork, and you just resonate with them. And when that happens, reading those writers ... becomes a source of unbelievable joy. It’s like eating candy for the soul. And I sometimes have a hard time understanding how people who don’t have that in their lives make it through the day.” PeopleIfsWritingSoulSometimesHardEnoughHappensJoyCertainReadingUnderstandingVoiceBrainSourceTasteEatingHard TimesUnbelievableCandyEnough TimeForksTuningReading Or Writing Author:David Foster Wallace
“a large percentage of bright young men and women locate the impetus behind their career choice in the belief that they are fundamentally different from the common run of man, unique and in certain crucial ways superior, more as it were central, meaningful - what else could explain the fact that they themselves have been at the exact center of all they've experienced for the whole 20 years of their conscious lives? - and that they can and will make a difference in their chosen field simply by the fact of their unique and central presence to it...” MenWayYearsHas BeensDifferentWholeFactsRunningYoungCertainChoicesBeliefDifferencesCommonBehindsCareersFieldsUniqueConsciousMen And WomenMeaningfulChosenSuperiorsYoung ManMaking A DifferenceCrucialPercentagesImpetusCareers Choices Author:David Foster Wallace
“There's a certain kind of neurological makeup that goes along with being a writer, and having been in the room with a few other writers at the same time, it's rather wearing to be around. And it does - there is a kind of hypervigilance about it. Unfortunately it's got disadvantages. If you turn that hypervigilance on yourself and, for instance, whether or not you have a pimple on the end of your nose, it can get really depressing.” IfsKindDoeEndsCertainTurnsRoomsInstanceNosesMakeupDepressingGet RealDisadvantagesPimplesReally Depressing Author:David Foster Wallace
“The point here is ... to be just a little less arrogant. To have just a little critical awareness about myself and my certainties. Because a huge percentage of the stuff that I tend to be automatically certain of is, it turns out, totally wrong and deluded.” LittlesCertainTurnsStuffAwarenessHugeCriticalCertaintyArrogantPercentagesDeluded Book:This Is Water: Some Thoughts, Delivered on a Significant Occasion, about Living a Compassionate Life Source: This Is Water: Some Thoughts, Delivered on a Significant Occasion, about Living a Compassionate Life
“I perhaps could have been somewhat better. One of the interesting things about playing competitive sports as a child is that you confront your own limitations rather starkly at a certain point.” ChildrenHas BeensCertainSportsInterestingLimitationCould Have BeenInteresting ThingsCompetitive Sports Author:David Foster Wallace
“I mean the people who seriously, seriously play devote their lives to it sort of the way monks do. I mean you don't date, you go to bed at a certain time, you eat certain ways, you practice 10-12 hours a day. And I mean, the difference between practicing three hours a day and practicing 12 hours a day is everything. And I certainly never - I never trained seriously after the age of 16.” PeopleWayMeanPlayAgeCertainThreeHoursDifferencesPracticeBedMonk Author:David Foster Wallace
“Like most North Americans of his generation, Hal tends to know way less about why he feels certain ways about the objects and pursuits he's devoted to than he does about the objects and pursuits themselves. It's hard to say for sure whether this is even exceptionally bad, this tendency.” KnowsWayFeelsDoeHardCertainGenerationsObjectsMindsetPursuitTendenciesDevotedInfinite Jest Author:David Foster Wallace
“....there is an ending [to Infinite Jest] as far as I'm concerned. Certain kind of parallel lines are supposed to start converging in such a way that an "end" can be projected by the reader somewhere beyond the right frame. If no such convergence or projection occured to you, then the book's failed for you.” IfsWayKindBookEndsCertainLinesReaderConcernedInfiniteParallelsProjectionJestConvergenceInfinite JestParallel Lines Author:David Foster Wallace
“My own terror of appearing sentimental is so strong that I’ve decided to fight against it, some; but the terror is still there. . . . Do you identify with a distaste/fear about sentimentality? Do you agree that, past a certain line, such distaste can turn everything arch and sneering and too ironic? Or do you have your own set of abstract questions to drive yourself nuts with?” StillsPastCertainTurnsFightingStrongLinesMy OwnDecidedAgreeTerrorAbstractIronicNutsSentimentalAppearingSentimentalityArchesDistaste Author:David Foster Wallace
“Certain sincerely devout and spiritually advanced people believe that the God of their understanding helps them find parking places and gives them advice on Mass. Lottery numbers.” PeopleGivingBelieveHelpingCertainUnderstandingNumbersAdviceMassSincerelyLotteryParking Book:Infinite Jest Source: Infinite Jest
“My whole life I've been a fraud. I'm not exaggerating. Pretty much all I've ever done all the time is try to create a certain impression of me in other people. Mostly to be liked or admired. It's a little more complicated than that, maybe. But when you come right down to it it's to be liked, loved. Admired, approved of, applauded, whatever. You get the idea.” PeopleTryingLittlesIdeasDoneWholeCertainComplicatedWhole LifeImpressionFraudApprovedExaggerating Author:David Foster Wallace
“Some words have to be explicitly uttered, Lenore. Only by actually uttering certain words does one really DO what one SAYS. 'Love' is one of those words, performative words. Some words can literally make things real.” WritingDoeRealCertainLove IsLenore Author:David Foster Wallace
“You have a great deal of yourself on the line, writing- your vanity is at stake. You discover a tricky thing about fiction writing; a certain amount of vanity is necessary to be able to do it all, but any vanity above that certain amount is lethal.” WritingAbleCertainLinesDealsFictionAmountVanityStakesTrickyFiction Writing Book:The David Foster Wallace Reader Source: The David Foster Wallace Reader
“Great short stories and great jokes have a lot in common. Both depend on what communication-theorists sometimes called "exformation," which is a certain quantity of vital information removed from but evoked by a communication in such a way as to cause a kind of explosion of associative connections within the recipient.” WayKindPersonsSometimesStoriesCertainCausesCommonInformationCommunicationDependsJokesConnectionsInsightfulShort StoryQuantityExplosionsTheoristsGreat Short Author:David Foster Wallace
“Lucky people develop a relationship with a certain kind of art that becomes spiritual, almost religious, and doesn’t mean, you know, church stuff, but it means you’re just never the same.” PeopleKnowsKindMeanArtSpiritualCertainStuffChurchReligiousLucky Author:David Foster Wallace
