Death is really the best publicity, especially when it’s dramatic. I’ve had a book by David Foster Wallace on my bookshelf for some months now and only picked it up to read after his suicide on September 12 of this year. I didn’t follow his work too closely, but I’ve always been interested in things he’s had to say. I’ve been surprised at how much his unexpected death has been on my mind. I’ve been reading The Broom of the System, his first novel, and starting to understand the development of his writing style.
Something I really like about Wallace is his ability to write about anything in the world and still make you think about it for the rest of the day. In 2004, he wrote an article, titled "Consider the Lobster", for Gourmet Magazine. His assignment was to cover a lobster festival in Maine. But he turned it into a piece about the ethics of capturing, boiling, dismantling, buttering and consuming lobster all for our personal pleasure. After discussing the history of these crustaceans and details about the possibility of their ability to feel pain, he asks the question, “…what ethical convictions do gourmets evolve that allow them not just to eat but to savor and enjoy flesh-based viands (since of course refined enjoyment, rather than ingestion, is the whole point of gastronomy)?” But it was more than a PETA pamphlet. Wallace offers an open discussion, after presenting the hard facts of lobsters and their preparation, about the simple morality of inflicting pain on another creature. He was not vegetarian or vegan, just a thinker who was willing to research and discover for himself the truth behind the delicacy of lobster. And this was published in a magazine for gourmets and cooks to flip the pages for recipes on lobsters, and crabs, and chicken, and veal for the matter. He acknowledges his audience as such, but continues to keep them thinking, no doubt.
The literalism of Roland Barthes’ essay titled “Death of the Author” in situations like these seems to evoke an opposite approach. Instead of deriving meaning out of an author’s work while ignoring his identity (including his views, race, childhood, religion, etc.), I cannot read a piece by Wallace without considering his history and his past up until the time he was writing. I can’t help but wonder about his psychological development while reading his novels, essays, and articles about inflicting pain on another creature. I had hoped for another forty years of writing. But some things that go on inside are too difficult to explain in a novel.
No comments:
Post a Comment