Permanently Deleted
You should read the piece he did on John McCain in 2000 for Rolling Stone. That’s the one piece that always stuck with me in regards to DFW, and how his writing almost always gets bogged down to the ‘individual’, instead of focusing on the more systematic nature as to why a guy like McCain could be principled in one respect, but a craven individual as a politician. The idea is that maybe a guy like McCain deserves a chance, deserves a vote, because he refused freedom to stay with the rest of the POWs. What’s completely glossed over is that McCain didn’t have any qualms about serving in the war, and spent the rest of his life restating the belief that it was a just war. DFW then has a bit of a moral crisis towards the end of the article, as it becomes more and more apparent that McCain is…a politician. So what does it mean? It means that we should keep in mind both of these sides of John McCain, and what it means to us as individuals.
The end of the article is so ridiculously meek, and really just emblematic of liberal dead ends. And honestly this evasiveness seems to be in all of DFW’s works. It’s a shame because he really was an amazing writer. I have to wonder if his suicide had something to do with the sense of futility that seemed to litter his writings, even as he sensed that the capitalist order sucked and maybe we should be more emphatic.
Yeah, he battled depression and was on meds. He tried to get off of them due to the terrible side effects, and ended his life shortly afterwards. As someone who has been on and off meds for anxiety and depression, I don’t blame him for being sick and tired of them.
I remember reading that he was especially interested in Ludwig Wittgenstein, which would explain his flirtations with fatalist and solipsist thought. I think you’re spot on with the observation that he was unsure of himself. I think that reflected heavy in his writing, and why even in that famous Kenyon College address, he dispensed out moral wisdom in terms of being more emphatic and caring, and then later on in the same address tells students to not take everything he’s saying as gospel. I don’t think it was some brand of cowardice. I just think it’s part and parcel of being in a society that grounds down individuals, exacerbates or even creates their mental battles, and historically unmoors them at birth. Plenty of leftists have fallen into those same depths of despair and mental anguish
i also recommend his 9/11 article
Being anti-capitalist is completely compatible with being a lib. It’s like a release valve for them.
Being anti-capitalist is completely compatible with being a lib.
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