I’m in the midst of completing my dissertation on David Foster Wallace, and found myself trying to explain to someone the other day how Infinite Jest changes your life (this is a cliche, I don’t care, if you read it you’ll know exactly what I mean). One of the things I described was how, for at least a month after I finished reading - and still now, at times - words or phrases from the book pop into my head, and I find myself describing things (only internally, obviously) in Wallace’s lingo. Language can do strange things to you.
I’ve had a look on the internet, and found a ‘wiki’ for Infinite Jest, but nowhere that seems to detail particular phrases that he uses that you could actually use (if you ever find yourself in a situation with a gun and some weed). So, here is a (by no means exhaustive) guide to Infinite Jest’s wonderful, idiosyncratic lexicon.
Head-gaming/ Jonesing/ Mokus - Intellectual play: ‘I hate Todd, he’s always jonesing’.
Map - Head: ‘My map is in a mess right now’.
Eliminate/d ‘his/her’ map - killed him/her: ‘Billy eliminated Joe’s map’.
[to] Eat cheese - Rat someone out, inform: ‘John went to jail and ate cheese’.
Screaming Fantods - the creeps: ‘that movie gave me the screaming fantods’.
Greebles - those bits of tissue that are left when you rub something wet/‘sleep’ in the corner of your eye: ‘there are some greebles in your eyes’.
Item - Handgun: ‘Tom pulled out his handgun’.
Material/Bob Hope - Dope: ‘Hey, you got any material?’
The Disease - Addiction: ‘the Disease ate away at him’.
I’ll probably add more as I remember them! But, here you go, some new ways of thinking, new ways of talking: that can never be a bad thing.
JEM.
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