{"product_id":"understanding-david-foster-wallace","title":"Understanding David Foster Wallace","description":"Since its publication in 2003, \u003ci\u003eUnderstanding David Foster Wallace\u003c\/i\u003e has served as an accessible introduction to the rich array of themes and formal innovations that have made Wallace's fiction so popular and influential. A seminal text in the burgeoning field of David Foster Wallace studies, the original edition of \u003ci\u003eUnderstanding David Foster Wallace\u003c\/i\u003e was nevertheless incomplete as it addressed only his first four works of fiction--namely the novels \u003ci\u003eThe Broom of the System\u003c\/i\u003e and\u003ci\u003e Infinite Jest \u003c\/i\u003eand the story collections \u003ci\u003eGirl with Curious Hair\u003c\/i\u003e and \u003ci\u003eBrief Interviews with Hideous Men\u003c\/i\u003e. This revised edition adds two new chapters covering his final story collection, \u003ci\u003eOblivion\u003c\/i\u003e, and his posthumous novel, \u003ci\u003eThe Pale King\u003c\/i\u003e. \u003cp\u003eTracing Wallace's relationship to modernism and postmodernism, this volume provides close readings of all his major works of fiction. Although critics sometimes label Wallace a postmodern writer, Boswell argues that he should be regarded as the nervous leader of some still-unnamed (and perhaps unnamable) third wave of modernism. In charting a new direction for literary practice, Wallace does not seek to overturn postmodernism, nor does he call for a return to modernism. Rather his work moves resolutely forward while hoisting the baggage of modernism and postmodernism heavily, but respectfully, on its back. \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eLike the books that serve as its primary subject, Boswell's study directly confronts such arcane issues as postmodernism, information theory, semiotics, the philosophy of Ludwig Wittgenstein, and poststructuralism, yet it does so in a way that is comprehensible to a wide and general readership--the very same readership that has enthusiastically embraced Wallace's challenging yet entertaining and redemptive fiction.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"University of South Carolina Press","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":40081216700499,"sku":"","price":104.99,"currency_code":"EUR","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0278\/1295\/4195\/products\/9781643360683.jpg?v=1682068951","url":"https:\/\/agendabookshop.com\/products\/understanding-david-foster-wallace","provider":"Agenda Bookshop","version":"1.0","type":"link"}