A David Foster Wallace Style-Parody in Three Drafts, with Annotations

David Foster Wallace at the Hammer Museum in L...

The Howling Fantods recently did a contest to win the new book about David Foster Wallace. The rules said entrants had to write a 400-word (!) parody of David Foster Wallace’s style, and this piece had to include a car driving up and a “David-Foster-Wallace-Like Pop Culture Reference”.

It took me a long time to decide whether or not I would actually enter. I finally decided I would a couple days before the contest ended, mainly because I didn’t have anything to do that night. Also, I figured I’d probably end up buying the book offered as the prize anyway, so I might as well attempt to save 40 dollars.

I ended up getting an honorable mention — meaning that I got a special mention, although I still had to buy the book.

I actually kind of like this piece. I found that while writing it, the hardest thing was actually getting the word-count right, since for an author known for his eloquence and, well, wordiness, it’s difficult to pare something down that short. (It doesn’t help that I tend to ramble on and on myself.) I didn’t have too much trouble mimicking the style (I tend to be pretty decent at getting speech patterns down), although there were a few things I had to consult my copies of Brief Interviews with Hideous Men and Infinite Jest over; most notably, whether or not Wallace used “&c.”, “etc.” or “and c.” – turned out, he’s used all of those. I like “&c.”, so I’m pretty sure that’s the one I ended up going for. There was a couple of other subtle word-choice-things I’m awfully proud of, even though I don’t think anyone noticed them; for example the onomatopoeia (whoo – spelled right on the first try!) “snick”, which tends to pop up a lot in Wallace’s works. (It’s true! You can check!)

I had the basic idea already when the contest was announced; it was just a matter of actually deciding whether or not to sit down and write it. When I did, I figured that even though I’d have to pare things down, it’d be easier to just write a first draft that was as-long-as-it-needed-to-be, and then go in there and razor things down to the bone. I kept my drafts, and I’ve included them here – there’s a lot of jokes and stuff that I ended up cutting from the first draft to get the length down to the 400 words. The first draft was 738 words, and the final was 381. As for the pop-culture reference, I had originally intended it to just be the thing about the Weego, but I thought that might have been too obscure, and so I threw in the thing about Back to the Future as well.

I’m not sure why I didn’t win. Reading his book, it seemed that Boswell (the author of the prize book and also a judge) prefers the earlier David Foster Wallace style of books like Broom of the System and Girl with Curious Hair, rather than the later era I preferred and parodied, including Infinite Jest, A Supposedly Fun Thing I’ll Never Do Again and Brief Interviews with Hideous Men.

I suppose the fact that I based my parody on quite possibly the most obvious David-Foster-Wallace-based joke ever didn’t really help my case much either.

FIRST DRAFT:

The[1] car[2] pulled[3] up[4] into[5] the[6] driveway[7]. Daniel[8] locked[9] up[10], and[11] went[12] inside[13].

—

[1] Since you, the reader, haven’t been acquainted with this particular car yet, perhaps it would be better to say “a car”, with the indefinite article rather than the definite, although on this one you’ll just have to trust me[a].

[a] I know how difficult and let’s just come out and say it tired it is to

have to trust the author on something and in most cases the reader would read the lines “you’ll just have to trust me” and throw the book or story or pamphlet or whatever it should happen to be down and in most cases she’d be right to do so (i.e. throw the reading material away), and in this instance she’d still probably be right to do so but regardless I, the author, hope that you, the reader, doesn’t and keeps on (i.e. reading) because it’s very short[i], I swear.

[i] Despite appearances.

[2] The car was a standard blue 2002 Acura RSX, which had served Daniel[a] well, although there were times when Daniel had wished he had bought what he had always heard termed as a “Weego” or perhaps “We-Go” a/k/a “driver’s ed car” with two sets of controls (i.e. pedals, steering columns, turn signals, &c.). Not because he was teaching driving or was even a bad driver, but because he always thought they looked cool[b].

[a] The driver-slash-owner.

[b] The only other car that Daniel thinks is cool: the DeLorean. It’s a combination of the way the doors open up and how he can make stupid jokes about going back in time when he hits 88 m.p.h.[i]

[i] (or is it 85? – he can never remember).

[3] Or, rather, glided up, as Daniel made sure to take very good care of his cars, despite not being that much of a car person.

[4] “Up” has always struck him as an odd term in relation to moving laterally as Daniel doesn’t even have a driveway on a slight incline, but rather a straight shot all the way, with not even a curb to go up as he lives in what he jokingly refers to as “the boonies” despite the fact that it (i.e. “the boonies”) is a relatively affluent area.

[5] Daniel also regards “into” as he does “up”, considering that there are no walls or anything to make an “in” to go “to”.

[6] See note 1 supra.

[7] It’s actually not even really a driveway but more like a stretch of road that turns onto his property rather than another like stretch of road like at a corner. Again, no curbs even, like you get on some of those like rural roads which is especially odd considering that “the boonies” isn’t even remotely rural.

[8] Daniel J. Hobart (1975-2036?), businessman of little import, has always liked his name well enough, although has never been one to go by diminutive forms like say “Dan” or “Danny” and has been that way even as a child when such names (i.e. “Danny” especially) are commonplace.

[9] He had one of those fancy remote-control door locking mechanisms which made things easier, or rather so he’d tell himself since really now is it so difficult to turn around and put a key in a lock and turn it until you hear the snick of the doors locking?

[10] Strangely enough, this use of the word “up” didn’t bother him in the slightest despite it being even more seemingly ill suited (i.e. “up”) considering nothing really even moved when he locked the doors, and even if something had (i.e. moved) the direction of the door lock-signifier-peg would have been down, not up.

[11] The use of the word “and” is a nice little editing device here, as he didn’t go immediately inside his house, but rather walked slowly up the driveway-that-wasn’t-really-a-driveway, kicked some gravel, picked up a flower, smelled it, threw it back down, and walked the rest of the way up to the door, unlocked that, swung it (i.e. the door) open, and walked inside. And even this leaves out the like motion of his feet as he’s walking up the DTWRAD, &c.

[12] Daniel never liked the way the word “went” sounded, but it was still one of his most used words, next to “also” and “um.”[i]

[i] Which is hardly even a word, really.

[13] (i.e. his house.)

I although thought it might be interesting to throw in one of the middle drafts; there’s a few differences – some jokes swapped in for others; different wording. It’s still too long by half, though. Also, for the record, I’ve never actually seen an Acura RSX, though I know they are real, as I looked up a car before writing this. (I don’t drive, and I know squat about types of cars. At least Daniel is established as “not a car person”, so any mistakes that may appear in here about cars are his, not mine.)

AN INTERMEDIARY DRAFT:

The[1] car[2] pulled[3] up[4] into[5] the[6] driveway[7]. Daniel[8] locked[9] up[10], and[11] went[12] inside[13].

—

[a] Anyway, it should be obvious, since the reader would assume that the car would be definite-article-worthy, otherwise she wouldn’t be reading about it, and any implied apology for the obviousness of this note becomes some poorly-done and equally obvious attempt by the author at bonding with the reader by coming out and addressing her, rather than attempting to do so with quality writing and believable characters.

[2] The car was a blue 2002 Acura RSX, which had served Daniel[a] well, although Daniel often wished he had bought what he had always heard called a “Weego”[b] a/k/a “driver’s ed car” with two sets of controls (i.e. pedals, steering columns, &c.). Not because he was teaching driving or was even a bad driver, but because he always thought they looked cool[c].

[a] The driver-slash-owner.

[b] (or perhaps “We-Go”)

[c] The only other fantasy Daniel has w/r/t cars: the DeLorean. Mainly for the stupid jokes he can make about going back in time when he hits 88 m.p.h.[i]

[i] (or is it 85? – he can never remember).

[3] Or rather glided, as Daniel takes very good care of his cars, despite not being a “car person.”

[4] “Up” has always struck him as an odd term to use in this sense as Daniel’s driveway isn’t on a slight incline as most are but rather flat all the way with not even a curb to go over.

[5] Daniel also regards “into” as he does “up”, considering that there are no walls to make an “in” to go “to”.

[6] See note 1 supra.

[7] It’s not even really a driveway but more like a stretch of road that turns onto his property rather than another like stretch of road like at a corner. Again, no curbs, like you get on some rural roads which is especially odd considering that “the boonies”[i] isn’t even remotely rural.

[i] (as he calls his neighborhood, despite it being relatively affluent)

[8] Daniel J. Hobart (1975-2036?), has always liked his name well enough, although he has never gone by diminutive forms like say “Dan” or “Danny” and has been that way even as a child when such names (i.e. “Danny” especially) are commonplace.

[9] He had a remote-control door locking mechanisms which made things easier. Or so he’d tell himself since turning around and putting a key in a lock and turning it until you hear the snick could hardly be called “difficult”.

[10] Strangely enough, this use of the word “up” didn’t bother him in the slightest despite it (i.e. “up”) being more ill-suited considering nothing moved when he locked the doors, and even in older cars where something would move, the direction of the door-lock-peg would have been down, not up.

[11] He didn’t actually go immediately inside his house, but rather walked slowly up the driveway-that-wasn’t-really-a-driveway, kicked some gravel, picked up a flower, smelled it, and walked the rest of the way up to the door, unlocked that, swung it (i.e. the door) open, and walked inside. And even this leaves out the like motion of his feet as he’s walking up the DTWRAD, &c.

[12] Daniel never liked the way the word “went” sounded, but it was still one of his most used words, next to “also” and “um”[i] [i] Which is hardly even a word, really.

[13] (i.e. his house.)

This is the version that was submitted (as you can tell from the contest website). Much shorter and stripped down, but still pretty good, I think. I wish it had won, but no big deal, since I got the book anyway (and I got it for a discount, so it only cost me about 27 bucks!) .

FINAL DRAFT

The[1] car[2] pulled[3] up[4] into[5] the[6] driveway.[7] Daniel[8] locked[9] up,[10] and[11] went[12] inside.[13]

—

[1] Since the reader hasn’t yet been acquainted with this particular car, perhaps she would prefer the indefinite article be used instead.[a]

[a] Even though it’s obvious the car is definite-article-worthy, otherwise she (i.e. the reader) wouldn’t be reading about it.

[2] A blue 2002 Acura RSX. Though Daniel[a] often wished he bought what he had always heard called a ‘Weego'[b] a/k/a ‘driver’s ed car’ with two sets of controls (i.e. pedals, steering columns, &c.). Not because he was teaching driving or was even a bad driver, but because he always thought they looked wicked.[c]

[a] The driver-slash-owner.

[b] (or perhaps ‘We-Go’)

[c] The only other fantasy Daniel has w/r/t cars: the DeLorean, mainly for the stupid jokes he can make about going back in time when he hits 85[i] m.p.h.

[i] [sic]

[3] Or rather glided. Daniel takes very good care of his car despite not being a ‘car person.’

[4] ‘Up’ has always struck him as an odd term to use in this sense. Daniel’s driveway isn’t on a slight incline as most are, but flat with not even a curb to go over.

[5] Daniel also regards ‘into’ as he does ‘up’, considering that there is nothing to make an ‘in’ to go ‘to’.

[6] See note 1 supra.

[7] It’s not even really a driveway but more like a very short private road.

[8] Daniel J. Hobart (1975-2036?) has always liked his name, but never diminutive forms like ‘Danny’, not even as a child when such names are commonplace.

[9] He had a remote-control lock that made things easier. Or so he’d tell himself since turning around, putting a key in a lock and turning it until you hear the ‘snick’ could hardly be called ‘difficult’.

[10] Strangely, this use of the word ‘up’ didn’t bother him at all.

[11] He didn’t actually go immediately inside his house, but rather kicked a stone and dawdled a bit before walking to the door and letting himself in.

[12] Daniel never liked the way the word ‘went’ sounded, but it was still one of his most used words, next to ‘also’ and ‘um’.[i] [i] Which is hardly even a word, really.

[13] (i.e. his house)