Before this topic moves on from DFW, anyone managed to read Pale King? I started to read it, but couldn't really find a good narrative thread to grasp. But I got hints of DFW's indepth self-effacing analysis, which is kind of what I like about him. Like in IJ, Hal being hyperliterate and analytical - like DFW - then, any time he's described in another person's narrative or in third-person there's this inexplicable revulsion about him. It seems like the whole idea of Pale King is acknowledging the monotony of trawling through endless, uninspiring data, and maybe finding ecstasy in it, which could be a self-indulgent reference about IF or Pale King itself, or a haunting last cry to explain himself. I remember a talk he did where he was trying to articulate to a group of students (?) just how uninspiring and monotonous adult life can be, and how the biggest challenge is to overcome the dread of boredom. Like the myth of Zen students being forced to mow a lawn with a pair of scissors.
But forgetting Pale king, I've just reread Skagboys by Irvine Welsh and highly recommend it. On the surface it just seems super violent, sexual, and needlessly offensive. But it has some of the most well-developed, real-feeling characters i've ever read, and is surprisingly moving and insightful in between fighting fucking and shooting up