Master of Arts in English, Cleveland State University, 0, College of Liberal Arts and Social Sciences

The Pale King is a fragmentary work which many critics see as an examination of boredom. This is an interpretation put forth by Wallace's editor Michael Pietsch while attempting to unify the disparate components of the text as it remained after the author's untimely death in 2008. As Pietsch argues in the 2011 edition's introduction, “David set out to write a novel about some of the hardest subjects—sadness and boredom” (ix). Though boredom is indeed a theme throughout the novel (and one Wallace himself spoke of at length (D.T. Max 281), The Pale King may also be read as a deep examination of gender identity in America in the latter half of the twentieth century. David Foster Wallace is not often thought of as a writer preoccupied with gender, yet it vexed him throughout his career, evidenced by his depictions of femininity and masculinity (frequently at odds with one another) in Infinite Jest, Oblivion, and most importantly, Brief Interviews with Hideous Men. Wallace's use of reconstructed gender identities in The Pale King represents his most profound and patriarchy-defying depiction of the subject.

Committee: Jeff Karem (Committee Chair); James Marino (Committee Member); Adam Sonstegard (Committee Member) Subjects: American Literature; Gender Studies; Literature

Doctor of Philosophy, The Ohio State University, 2019, English

The power and intimacy of Wallace's narrative voices allow him to affect his readers powerfully on multiple levels: cognitively, linguistically, and affectively. The Voices of David Foster Wallace: Comic, Encyclopedic, and Sincere offers a systematic analysis of Wallace's poetics of voice, identifying a dominant voice for each, pinpointing its techniques and influences, and casting it in a career arc of Wallace's evolving novelistic purposes. The careful shaping of voice is central to Wallace's distinctive prose and its impact on contemporary American fiction. The project identifies Wallace's three dominant voices—comic, encyclopedic, and sincere—and shows how voice identifies not just the particular agent communicating with the reader but creates a global atmosphere in texts, deeply shaping our experiences and interpretations. Drawing on and refining James Phelan's model of voice for Wallace's fiction, I define voice as the synthesis of values, tone, style, and rhythm, elements that come together in complex ways to create the gestalt effect of narrative voice. I develop tools for examining the micro elements that create the macro quality of the reading experience—helping illuminate how Wallace uses voice to “rewire” the way readers see and feel, changing our relation to language and to the world. Further, I emphasize the sonic dimension of reading whereby Wallace's sentence and paragraph rhythms impact the cognition of readers, thus joining the recent turn in literary studies toward reading with the grain, by advancing and synthesizing approaches to rhetoric, affect, formalism, and literary phenomenology. The picture of Wallace that emerges from my analysis is one of uncertainty (and ambition) regarding his place in the literary world, a restless desire to add more voices to his repertoire. Adopting comedy, knowledge, and finally emotional depth as his purposes, Wallace progressively widens his ideal audience, reaching readers in a variety of ways in his ongoing pr (open full item for complete abstract)

Committee: Brian McHale (Advisor); James Phelan (Committee Member); Sandra Macpherson (Committee Member) Subjects: American Literature; Language; Literature

Bachelor of Arts, University of Toledo, 2018, English

David Foster Wallace's interest in the duality of irony and sincerity as both a philosophical and literary problem is especially apparent in his 1996 novel Infinite Jest. Responding to the shortcomings of postmodern fiction critically, Wallace's essay, “E Unibus Pluram,” calls for the American literary movement New Sincerity, or post-postmodernism, to provide a viable alternative to the ironic mode's greater existential entrapments. Several scholars have commented on New Sincerity's presence within Infinite Jest, and a consensus suggests that the movement manifests itself in Wallace's general tone––or, as Adam Kelly's scholarship notes, in Wallace's “regular thematic treatment of sincerity” (131). I continue this conversation with a greater focus on characterization, suggesting that the narratives of protagonists Hal Incandenza and Don Gately embody, respectively, the duality of irony and sincerity. Infinite Jest, I contend, successfully uses fiction as a literary medium to engage a philosophical discussion because Wallace offers us characters who are larger than themselves, who embody ideas beyond the novel's invented world. Ultimately, I believe that conversations regarding irony's shortcomings promote the relevance of community and defend the validity of human pain––while also offering us hope: We can transcend adversity. We can find meaning by choosing to cultivate mental discipline for the sake of empathy and altruism.

Committee: Benjamin Stroud (Advisor); Melissa Gregory (Committee Member); Russ Reising (Committee Member) Subjects: American Literature

BA, Kent State University, 2015, College of Arts and Sciences / Department of English

The publishing industry has experienced major evolutions during the last century. Everything from the format of publishing to the use of operating systems and means of department communication underwent changes as the result of new technologies. Coinciding with these changes, a clear evolution in the role of the editor took place. The technological revolution taking place in the late twentieth century forced editors to adapt and take on new roles created by the advancing industry. In filling these new roles, editors faced the special challenge of balancing the old ways of editing with new technology so that they could maintain the close relationships of traditional editor-author partnerships, while also continuing to support the publishing industry as it transitioned into the twenty-first century.

Committee: Claire Culleton Dr (Advisor) Subjects: American Literature; Literature; Modern History; Modern Literature

Master of Arts in English, Cleveland State University, 2014, College of Liberal Arts and Social Sciences

Infinite Jest has been viewed by champions of its cause as a solution to the defeatist irony of postmodernism and by critics as a postmodern gag in which the reader falls victim to intellectual “jest.” Exploring the text's initial affiliations with Hamlet is a fundamental move toward stabilizing Infinite Jest's status as a sincere and authentic representation of American life at the turn of the twenty-first century. The shattered nature of reality and the “stinking thinking” inherent in addiction are depicted through the narrative structure, in which the time is literally “out of joint,” and the “antic disposition” of various characters who are evocative of both the melancholic and heroic sides of the play's lead. Hamlet operates as a primary textual constraint in which the matrix of plot, device, methodology, and motif intersect and envision one of the Western world's most recognizable stories transposed on 1990s America. Infinite Jest is a closed system in which geometry and literature converge by way of a customized Oulipo method that uses constraint as an improvisatory means to inhabit the space where things “fragment into beauty” (Infinite Jest 81): the glory of infinity.

Committee: James J. Marino PhD (Advisor); Adam T, Sonstegard PhD (Committee Member); F. Jeff Karem PhD (Committee Member) Subjects: American Literature; Ethics; Language Arts; Philosophy; Spirituality; Theater Studies; Therapy