DAVID FOSTER WALLACE - THE LAST INTERVIEW AND OTHER CONVERSATIONS, by Melville House Publishing

Bought from: an airport bookstore.

Read in nearly two dozen shittings, from the last interview back to the earliest published in the book. I'm a very big DFW reader, so I was very happy to find that I had only previously read two of the six interviews in the book, both interviews I was very happy to reread. Curious feature in the book, chronicling six interviews from between 1996 and 2008 the editor and publisher deemed important enough to include, was how DFW moved from wide-eyed yet pensive philosopher to nervy irate/impatient thinker who'd rather be left alone with his dogs; or more pedestrianly, from guarded generosity to a guy forced to make and share his reflections in a Catholic school retreat.

Interesting revelation was how DFW's essay work were all hackwriting assignments given to him by a generous editor in Harper's. His typically detailed descriptions of his struggles with editors always make for interesting reads, and the book is peppered with them, glimpses of which to be found even in the smallest places (a bit where he explains preferring written interviews to spoken as he gets to be draft-happy and thus more eloquent in written-form than in actual personal audio-video interviews).

What I love about the interviews is that DFW gives no practical advices about writing, no real kernel of wisdom deployed as packaged digestible pithiness, in large part because he outright refused to give any practically every time he was asked in the interviews included precisely for the pithiness required when giving kernels of wisdom.

Ultimately, nothing is said in the book that devoted DFW readers - my perceived target market for the book - haven't already read from the more expansive DFW interviews or reviews (the older interview from REVIEW OF CONTEMPORARY FICTION (Vol 13, No 2, from twenty years ago, my goodness, Spring 1993), or his famous TV/fiction essay published in A SUPPOSEDLY FUN THING I'LL NEVER DO AGAIN), but maybe the weekend DFW reader will find this a touchstone read. One can definitely do worse when looking for something to read while taking a shit.