My Life With Footnotes/Endnotes.

February 11, 2004, 07:51 pm

Time to catch up with all the shit! A week (or was it two?) ago I finished reading House of Leaves by Mark Z. Danielewski, loaned to me by my sister. It was amazing. I guess its the closest thing to “an experience” that I've had with a book. It seriously freaked me out. I remember shortly after reading all of Johnny's Mother's letters in the appendix and then seeing a checkmark on the bottom right corner of the first page of some chapter and thinking, “Holy Shit! If this is here, imagine what else I've missed?” It's probably got the greatest “replay value” (or should I say “re-read value?”) of any book I've ever read.

One night I fell asleep while reading it and I woke up, confused and sweaty with a huge weight pressing down on my chest and it was the damned book! Lots of fun! It also makes prominent and creative use of footnotes, which I really enjoy. I really appreciated the footnotes in the Princess Bride. (I just now typed in the Princess Bridge. Haha.)

And now I'm reading Infinite Jest by David Foster Wallace, also loaned to me by my sister. I'm really liking it so far. It's the first book I've ever read with endnotes and I don't mind them, but everytime I turn back to read them, I flip the book over and see this little black-and-white bio pic of David Foster Wallace and it kindof freaks me out:

He almost looks like my parents' next-door neighbor, Jeff. And I imagine that his voice sounds... like he has a fat throat or frequently has a lot of spit in his mouth.

But other than that, it's awesome! Haha...