David Foster Wallace, RIP
I was very sad to learn that David Foster Wallace has committed suicide at the age of 46. There doesn't seem to be any information beyond the fact that his wife came home to discovere that he had hung himself.
Although his fiction and essays had darkened over the years, I never thought of him as a person consumed by what he tackled in his art. He seemed to have an analytical approach, and a great sense of humor, and the capacity to contain the sometimes terrible things he explored. He wrote with a purpose.
I have to wonder if something had happened to cause him to descend to the point of taking his own life, as opposed to ongoing despair or depression. He just didn't seem the type, but of course I only knew him based on his work.
America has lost one of its great writers.
Although his fiction and essays had darkened over the years, I never thought of him as a person consumed by what he tackled in his art. He seemed to have an analytical approach, and a great sense of humor, and the capacity to contain the sometimes terrible things he explored. He wrote with a purpose.
I have to wonder if something had happened to cause him to descend to the point of taking his own life, as opposed to ongoing despair or depression. He just didn't seem the type, but of course I only knew him based on his work.
America has lost one of its great writers.
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