Photo: Steve Rhodes / CC BY 2.0 (source: Wikimedia Commons)
My Take
David Foster Wallace is one of those writers who genuinely rewired how a generation thinks about fiction, irony, and what it even means to be alive inside media-saturated late-20th-century America. Infinite Jest is a beast — nearly 1,100 pages with footnotes that practically constitute a second novel — but the madness is the point: he was trying to build a form capacious enough to hold the entire anxious, entertained-to-death consciousness of his era. His essays might be even better, honestly. The cruise ship piece, the state fair piece, the tennis writing — all of them crackle with this almost painful intelligence that somehow never tips into cold cleverness. He died in 2008 at 46, and the loss still stings. The Pale King came out posthumously, unfinished, and even incomplete it showed he had more to say than most writers manage in a full career.
1. Profile
- Name (English)
- David Foster Wallace
- Name (Japanese)
- デヴィッド・フォスター・ウォレス
- Reading
- でゔぃっど・ふぉすたー・うぉれす
- Born
- February 21, 1962 – September 12, 2008
- Zodiac / Chinese zodiac
- Pisces / Tiger
- Origin
- Ithaca, New York, United States
- Occupation
- writer / novelist / essayist / university teacher
2. Background
- High school
- Urbana High School
- University
- Amherst College
Awards & achievements
- MacArthur Fellows Program
- 1996 Lannan Literary Awards
- 1987 Whiting Awards
4. Personality
Motto
Private
5. Works & records
| Category | Title | Role | Year |
|---|---|---|---|
| Notable work | Infinite Jest | — | |
| Notable work | The Pale King | — | |
| Notable work | A Supposedly Fun Thing I'll Never Do Again | — | |
| Notable work | Brief Interviews with Hideous Men | — | |
| Notable work | The Broom of the System | — | |
| Notable work | Everything and More | — |
6. Links
Frequently asked questions
When was David Foster Wallace born?
February 21, 1962 – September 12, 2008.
Where is David Foster Wallace from?
David Foster Wallace is from Ithaca, New York, United States.
What does David Foster Wallace do?
David Foster Wallace works as writer, novelist, essayist, university teacher.
What is David Foster Wallace known for?
Notable works include Infinite Jest, The Pale King, A Supposedly Fun Thing I'll Never Do Again.
Writer — see all → · Novelist — see all → · More people from United States →
7. About this entry
Tags
- Last updated
- 2026-06-02
Facts are limited to publicly available information up to 2024; non-public or unconfirmed items are omitted. English text is machine-assisted (facts translated by Sonnet, "My Take" written by Opus 4.8). The Japanese page is the source of record.