Notes on David Foster Wallace's INFINITE JEST Dan Schmidt HOW HAL ACQUIRES HIS SPEECH IMPEDIMENT It's my belief that Hal's body has itself synthesized DMZ, perhaps provoked by his marijuana withdrawal. It sounds farfetched, but check this out: - p. 10 "`I cannot make myself understood, now.' I am speaking slowly and distinctly. `Call it something I ate.'" This passage is followed directly by the story of Hal's eating the mold. - The mold is described (p. 10) as "horrific: darkly green, glossy, vaguely hirsute, speckled with parasitic fungal points of yellow, orange, red"; note that the yellow-orange-red mold is growing on the green mold. I believe that in Orin's own description of this scene (p. ??) he also talks about one mold growing on another. - On p. 170 Pemulis researches DMZ: "The incredibly potent DMZ is synthesized from a derivative of fitviavi, an obscure mold that grows only on other molds." - p. 1064, Pemulis again: "`Have I mentioned DMZ doesn't show up on a G.C./M.S.? Struck tracked this down off an obscure Digestive-Flora footnote. It's the fitviavi-mold base. If the stuff shows up at all it shows as a slight case of imbalanced yeast.'" Digestive-Flora: Hal ate the fitviavi mold years ago, and now it's living in his digestive system. - From the description of the medical attache on p. 33: "The medical attache's partciaulr expertise is the maxillofacial consequences of imblances in intestinal flora. Prince Q--- ... suffers chronically from Candida albicans, with attendant susceptibilities to monilial sinusitis and thrush, the yeasty sores and sinal impactions of which..." Note the intestinal flora-yeast connection again. Doesn't Hal have a toothache (p. ??)? Note that Hal's behavior is somewhat consistent with the case of the guy who sings Ethel Merman tunes (p. ??); he tries to say something but is perceived as making another noise. We still need to figure out just what triggers the DMZ synthesis (I'm assuming it has something to do with marijuana withdrawal), but I think there are too many obvious clues here for it not to be connected. THE LOCATION OF "INFINITE JEST," THE ENTERTAINMENT First of all, there are repeated references to Hal and Gately digging up Himself's head. I am told by a med-school acquaintance that putting's one head in a microwave would probably result in one's brain's being blown out through one's eye sockets, so a skull might remain. In Hal's description (p. 250), he doesn't come right out and say that the head was completely obliterated. In any case, Gately has a dream about digging up Himself's head (p. 934): "He dreams he's with a very sad kid and they're in a graveyward digging some dead guy's head up and it's really important, like Continental-Emergency important ... the sad kid is trying to scream at Gately that the important thing was buried in the guy's head and to divert the Continental Emergeny to start digging the guy's head up before it's too late, but the kid moves his mouth but nothing comes out [I guess the DMZ effects are in full swing by now], ... the sad kid holds something terraible up by the hair and makes the face of somebody shouting in panic: Too Late." Of course, if we're to take this at face value, he is dreaming of events to come. Then we have Hal (p. 16): "I think of John N. R. Wayne, who would have won this year's WhataBurger, standing watch in a mask as Donald Gately and I dig up my father's head." But here's the kicker: Himself posing as a professional conversationalist talking to Hal in what may or may not actually be a scene from It Was a Great Marvel that He Was in the Father Without Knowing Him (p. 992): 'That your quote-unquote "complimentary" Dunlop widebody tennis racquets' super-secret-formulaic composition materials of high-modulus- reinforced polycarbonate polybutylene resin are organochemically identical I say again identical to the gyroscopic balanc sensor and mise-en-scene appropriation card and priapistic-entertainment cartridge implanted in your very own towering father's anaplastic cerebrum...' Himself may be out of his mind, but this does totally fit with Hal's and Gately's scenes. WHAT'S REALLY UP WITH JOHN WAYNE John Wayne certainly has some secret-Quebecois-group ties, if you ask me. Here's the data: Geoffrey Day's article on Les Assassins des Fautueils Rollents and Le Jeu du Prochain Train which Struck is plagiarizing says (p. 1060) "Far beyond prohibited, not to jump at all is regarded as impossible. To "perdre son coeur [lose one's heart]" and not jump at all is outside le Jeu's limit. The possibility simply does not exist. It is unthinkable. Only once, in le Jeu du Prochain Train's extensive oral history, has a miner's son not jumped, lost his heart and frozen, remaining on his jut as the round's train passed. This player later drowned. "Perdre son coeur," when it is mentioned at lal, is known also as "Faire un Bernard Wayne," in dubious honor of this lone unjumping asbestos miner's son about whom little beyond his subsequent drowning in the Baskatong Reservoir is known, his name denoting a figure of ridicule and disgust among speakers of the Papineau region vulgate." So the A.F.R. have some connection to the Wayne family. On p. 262 it is mentioned that Wayne's father is an asbestos miner. On p. 16 Hal's quote about digging up his father's head mentions John Wayne standing watch in a mask. What is Wayne doing there? The A.F.R. wear masks in one scene (p. 486). That's all the data I have, but if you ask me, he's up to something. WHAT'S REALLY UP WITH AVRIL INCANDENZA I think she still has some Quebecois ties as well. Well, here's something interesting for a start: "Avril I." = "April 1" in French/Quebecois. The date April 1 shows up a lot; it is also the day on which the medical attache receives his copy of the Entertainment, labelled HAPPY ANNIVERSARY (p. 36). And one of Himself's crazy assertions on p. 30 is about Avril's "cavortings with not one not two but over thirty Near Eastern medical attaches." Then on p. 957 Hal thinks about Avril having sex with a number of people, including "the Islamic M.D. Himself had found so especially torturing." Hmm. Plus there's Avril's connection with Wayne near the end of the book. Note also that the third Quebecer at E.T.A., Thierry Poutrincourt, is missing on the climactic exhibition day (p. 965). HAMLET I thought I would throw together all the Hamlet references I could find. Of course, there's the title: here's the quote from Hamlet, Act V Scene i (which Wallace references in footnote 337 (p. 814)): Alas, poor Yorick! I knew him, Horatio: a fellow of infinite jest, of most excellent fancy: he hath borne me on his back, a thousand times; and now, how abhorred in my imagination it is! my gorge rims at it. Here hung those lips that I have kissed I know not how oft. Where be your gibes now? your gambols? your songs? your flashes of merriment, that were wont to set the table on a roar? Not one now, to mock your own grinning? quite chap-fallen? Many of Himself's movies are made for Poor Yorick Entertainment Unlimited. In Gately's dream, "Joelle van D. appears with wings and no underwear and asks if they knew him, the dead guy with the head," which to me resonates with "I knew him, Horatio." Of course, picking up Himself's skull is directly analogous to the corresponding scene in Hamlet. (p. 171) "Hal is sitting in windowlight with the Riverside Hamlet he told Mario he'd read and help with a conceptual film-type project based on part of." Hal's essay (p. 140) (referenced on p. 7 as "The Emergence of Heroic Stasis in Broadcast Entertainment", with its discussion of a hero of non-action, seems a direct reference to Hamlet. The situation with James dying and Tavis usurping his role and taking up with Avril is directly analgous to Claudius and Gertrude in Hamlet. PLAYING WITH NAMES Marathe might relate to Marat, as in the 18th-century French revolutionary who was murdered in his bathtub. "Marathe" would be pronounced with a T. Incandenza just reminded me of incandescent. One of Himself's films (which Gately and Fackelmann watch), Kinds of Light, I thought was relevant. A really stupid faux-translation of Antitoi would simply be "against-you" (anti-toi). One odd thing was that Luria P----'s real name is given exactly once, the first time that she is mentioned. The name is Perec, which I imagine is just a reference to Georges Perec, the French author and member of the experimental group OuLiPo. He wrote a book, La Disparition, entirely without the letter E. Somehow, leaving out the other letters of his name seems a propos. A. R. Luria, while we're talking about that name, is a famous Russian neurologist from the mid-20th century who researched various forms of injuries to the brain and their effect on mental processes. SOME QUESTIONS The contents of the Entertainment are described differently by Molly (p. 787) and Joelle (p. 937), although Molly does say that it's just "her understanding" of the movie. Also apropos the Entertainment, "Madame Psychosis" = "metempsychosis", or the transmigration of souls, which of course fits in perfectly with the subject of the movie. I assume that Himself's wraith is moving objects around at E.T.A.? But Why is it so connected with Stice? Stice was also moving the tennis ball around during his match with Hal (p. ??). Who does Hal see outside the window in the snow on Exhibition Day (p. 867)? I'm assuming that the first year of Subsidized Time is 2002, since the sixth year is the Year of the Yushityu 2007. On the morning of November 20th, Hal sees a display in the bathroom that says "11-18-EST0456". Is this just the misperception of time caused by DMZ? Who sold the DMZ to the Antitois on p. 481? He is discribed as "a wrinkled long-haired person of advanced years." He speaks in "West-Swiss-accented French"; Luria P---- and Marathe both pretend to be Swiss; is there an A.F.R. connection? The Antitoi's trade a blue lava lamp and a lavender apothecary's mirror for it; do these objects show up anywhere else in the book? Tim Ware (redbug@best.com) has answered this question; it's Sixties Bob (p. 927).