When I was in college a friend of mine thought of Gravity's Rainbow as though it were a frikkin' religious experience. At the time I had not read it, and kept putting it off, since I didn't *have* to read it for a class, and of course just to torture my friend who wanted to talk about it with me - like, all the damn time.
So he started leaving copies for me on the sly - he tried giving me a copy and I gave it back to him - so he'd sneak a copy into my apt., or leave one where he knew I'd be, like in the English Club office (I was pres. and he was also a member, so I had "office hours" where I'd man the office).
Eventually copys would materialise in rooms where I had classes, one left casually at my usual lunch table in the caf, and sometimes on my doorstep outside my apt.
I started collecting them, and ended up with about 15 copies, which I sold to the used bookstore across from campus.
My friend, of course, denies to this day ever leaving copies anywhere for me, even the ones inside my apt. when he was the only one who could have put a copy there that day.
In any case, I finally broke down and read it the summer after college, while I was first building Plagiarist.com 1.0.
It still doesn't replace Ulysses as being the end of books, but it was good.
Confidential to Andalucia: You wouldn't have found that line offensive if you've ever been fucked so good you stayed fucked. I'm just saying.
P.S. If you found "Tropic of Cancer" overly offensive, you may not want to read Gravity's Rainbow or Ulysses either. Or Naked Lunch. Or Frisk. Or White Noise. Or the Great Gatsby.
It just seems that all of the greatest novels of the past 100 years or so are offensive in some way, at least if you're easily offended.
Heck, if you find ToC offensive I would certainly NOT recommend you read Achewood.
Author
Topic: David Foster Wallace (Read 5870 times)