a stolen gift from my brother

Read a great article in the latest newyorker about the life, writing, and struggles of David Foster Wallace. 

The writing of DFW is what really got me going in those early days. It was my way in when I had no idea how to start, when I was lost in that wilderness of the unknown (a wilderness I find myself returning to these days, but at least now I know my way out).

I decided early on that a proper author does research. I started looking up smoking information but it didn't feel right. It felt like that path of medical research would lead me to write scientifically, and even then I knew that wasn't where this book was headed. 

Instead I wanted to research ideas I had stuck with me from my undergraduate studies. My main character in the novel is comrade calculator a robot built from human parts who was made to calculate infinity. I was fascinated in my Chaos class and Number theory class when we talked about infinity, and I needed more. So I set about reading a wide variety of math non-fiction on this abstract topic.

This is where I ran into problems. I couldn't  finish any of these books. In one case I couldn't finish the first chapter. The problem was that the books were either written by Philosophers or Mathematicians. The books by Philosophers were thick with Importance, constantly drawing out Deep Meaning from the math by using as many big words as possible. The books by Mathematicians fared better (especially if they were Math Historians) but even then they became tedious and confusing in the same way that a really smart Math Teacher will eventually lose you because you are simply not smart enough to understand what they are saying. The writing gets lost in its own explanations, leaving you behind, while they carry on a conversation with themselves all in Math-speak.

Long after I had given up on spending money on these books that I never finished I found DFW's Everything and More sitting on my brother's bookshelf. He had yet to read it. My brother has a knack for picking out good non-fiction and so I asked if I could borrow the book. Almost a year later it still sits on my bookshelf.

What makes the book so much better then the others is that DFW writes as a regular person. Sure he is regular person that knows unending amounts of information about Math, History, and Philosophy but he uses that knowledge in a way that includes you, taking you under his wing. The book start exploring the idea of a person, anyone, trying to get out of bed but being weighed down by infinity.

Throughout the whole book he maintains a sense of humor that is sorely needed when you dive this far into abstract math. It is a vulnerable humor, revealing the challenge he faced of having to simplifying the math for his reader (and editors) without losing the mathematical essence. Even when he doesn't hit this balance you know he is trying, really really hard, which makes you want to try harder to understand.

This is what makes his writing so good: that he never reaches for the Deep Meaning of infinity that explains the universe, and he also doesn't get lost in himself and Mathematical ideas, instead he know that everything important lies in that moment where YOU get it, where you understand the essence, the moment where you solve the problem. He helps as much as he can to help you get to this moment but it is up to you, and when you make it all come together, it is a rewarding experience unlike any other.

This is how it began, spending days while Jen was in class, sitting in the Hamilton General Hospital's cafeteria with my laptop and DFW. Reading and stopping to write down any ideas that came to me, then reading again. It allowed me to turn on my mind and my imagination.

As I was nearing the end of the book, I realized I really liked the guy. You could tell he just loved the math and wanted to show you why he loved it so much. He was the sort of dude you wouldn't mind having a drink with just so you could hear him rant on for hours. And so I looked him up on google. I wanted to know what else he had written.

It was September 13th 2008. The first page that came up on the search was a newspaper article reporting David Foster Wallace's suicide which had taken place the day before, Sept. 12th, 2008. 

I still don't know how to react.