Quotes from book
Infinite Jest

Infinite Jest
David Foster Wallace

Infinite Jest is a 1996 novel by American writer David Foster Wallace. The novel is widely noted for its unconventional narrative structure and its experimental use of endnotes . It has been categorized as an encyclopedic novel and made TIME magazine's list of the 100 best English-language novels published between 1923 and 2005.Infinite Jest is regarded as a literary bestseller, having sold 44,000 hardcover copies in its first year of publication. It has since exceeded a million copies in worldwide sales.

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“It's weird to feel like you miss someone you're not even sure you know.”

David Foster Wallace book Infinite Jest

Source: Infinite Jest

David Foster Wallace photo

“The man who knows his limitations, has none.”

David Foster Wallace book Infinite Jest

Source: Infinite Jest

David Foster Wallace photo

“If, by the virtue of charity or the circumstance of desperation, you ever chance to spend a little time around a Substance-recovery halfway facility like Enfield MA’s state-funded Ennet House, you will acquire many exotic new facts…That certain persons simply will not like you no matter what you do. That sleeping can be a form of emotional escape and can with sustained effort be abused. That purposeful sleep-deprivation can also be an abusable escape. That you do not have to like a person in order to learn from him/her/it. That loneliness is not a function of solitude. That logical validity is not a guarantee of truth. That it takes effort to pay attention to any one stimulus for more than a few seconds. That boring activities become, perversely, much less boring if you concentrate intently on them. That if enough people in a silent room are drinking coffee it is possible to make out the sound of steam coming off the coffee. That sometimes human beings have to just sit in one place and, like, hurt. That you will become way less concerned with what other people think of you when you realize how seldom they do. That there is such a thing as raw, unalloyed, agendaless kindness. That it is possible to fall asleep during an anxiety attack. That concentrating intently on anything is very hard work. That 99% of compulsive thinkers’ thinking is about themselves; that 99% of this self-directed thinking consists of imagining and then getting ready for things that are going to happen to them; and then, weirdly, that if they stop to think about it, that 100% of the things they spend 99% of their time and energy imagining and trying to prepare for all the contingencies and consequences of are never good. In short that 99% of the head’s thinking activity consists of trying to scare the everliving shit out of itself. That it is possible to make rather tasty poached eggs in a microwave oven. That some people’s moms never taught them to cover up or turn away when they sneeze. That the people to be the most frightened of are the people who are the most frightened. That it takes great personal courage to let yourself appear weak. That no single, individual moment is in and of itself unendurable. That other people can often see things about you that you yourself cannot see, even if those people are stupid. That having a lot of money does not immunize people from suffering or fear. That trying to dance sober is a whole different kettle of fish. That different people have radically different ideas of basic personal hygiene. That, perversely, it is often more fun to want something than to have it. That if you do something nice for somebody in secret, anonymously, without letting the person you did it for know it was you or anybody else know what it was you did or in any way or form trying to get credit for it, it’s almost its own form of intoxicating buzz. That anonymous generosity, too, can be abused. That it is permissible to want. That everybody is identical in their unspoken belief that way deep down they are different from everyone else. That this isn’t necessarily perverse. That there might not be angels, but there are people who might as well be angels.”

David Foster Wallace book Infinite Jest

Infinite Jest (1996)

David Foster Wallace photo

“… logical validity is not a guarantee of truth.”

David Foster Wallace book Infinite Jest

Source: Infinite Jest

David Foster Wallace photo

“That you will become way less concerned with what other people think of you when you realize how seldom they do.”

David Foster Wallace book Infinite Jest

Source: Infinite Jest (1996)

David Foster Wallace photo

“Please learn the pragmatics of expressing fear: sometimes words that seem to express really invoke.
This can be tricky.”

David Foster Wallace book Infinite Jest

Source: Infinite Jest

David Foster Wallace photo

“Mario, what do you get when you cross an insomniac, an unwilling agnostic and a dyslexic?"

"I give."

"You get someone who stays up all night torturing himself mentally over the question of whether or not there's a dog.”

David Foster Wallace book Infinite Jest

Source: Infinite Jest

David Foster Wallace photo

“She had a brainy girls discomfort about her own beauty and its effects on folks.”

David Foster Wallace book Infinite Jest

Source: Infinite Jest

David Foster Wallace photo

“… the sun would leave my sky if I couldn't assume you'd simply come and tell me you were sad.”

David Foster Wallace book Infinite Jest

Source: Infinite Jest

David Foster Wallace photo

“Almost nothing important that ever happens to you happens because you engineer it.”

David Foster Wallace book Infinite Jest

Source: Infinite Jest

David Foster Wallace photo

“the soul's certainty that the day will have to be not traversed but sort of climbed, vertically, and then that going to sleep again at the end of it will be like falling, again, off something tall and sheer.”

David Foster Wallace book Infinite Jest

Source: Infinite Jest (1996)
Context: These worst mornings with cold floors and hot windows and merciless light—the soul’s certainty that the day will have to be not traversed but sort of climbed, vertically, and then that going to sleep again at the end of it will be like falling, again, off something tall and sheer.

David Foster Wallace photo

“sarcasm and jokes were often the bottle in which clinical depressives sent out their most plangent screams for someone to care and help them.”

David Foster Wallace book Infinite Jest

Source: Infinite Jest

David Foster Wallace photo

“My chest bumps like a dryer with shoes in it.”

David Foster Wallace book Infinite Jest

Source: Infinite Jest (1996)

David Foster Wallace photo

“Try to learn to let what is unfair teach you.”

David Foster Wallace book Infinite Jest

Source: Infinite Jest

David Foster Wallace photo

“I read,' I say. 'I study and read. I bet I've read everything you've read. Don't think I haven't. I consume libraries. I wear out spines and ROM drives. I do things like get in a taxi and say, "The library, and step on it.”

David Foster Wallace book Infinite Jest

Source: Infinite Jest

David Foster Wallace photo

“What if sometimes there is no choice about what to love?”

David Foster Wallace book Infinite Jest

Source: Infinite Jest (1996)
Context: What if sometimes there is no choice about what to love? What if the temple comes to Mohammed? What if you just love? without deciding? You just do: you see her and in that instant are lost to sober account-keeping and cannot choose but to love?

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