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DFW's Vocab List: "Tennis," Anyone?
Filed under: The Squib Report Tagged: David Foster Wallace, dictionary, Harry Ransom Center, vocabulary, writing
Martin Schneider writes:
A few weeks ago it was reported that the Harry Ransom Center in Austin, Texas, had purchased the letters and ephemera of David Foster Wallace. One item of note was his dictionary, which contained various markings. It's difficult to think of another writer for whom the personal dictionary would be of such special interest, but no popular writer ever used such pointedly obscure words so frequently and so winningly.
Now Slate has cleverly provided a list of words circled by Wallace. The words on the list couldn't be better, they are almost all quite obscure; I think many highly literate people will be unfamiliar with a great many of them. They are also quite Wallacean, and in certain cases the close reader of Wallace will be able to remember specific words and the exact context in which they appear in Wallace's works. (For example, I think "espadrille" makes an appearance in the opening pages of Infinite Jest.)
The least difficult word on the list may be "tennis," which pursuit had a particular importance to Wallace. It's remarkable to see that word, of all words, nestled between "tenesmus" and "tepefy."
Although the list is difficult, it also provides hope. For the implicit meaning of a word circled in the dictionary is that the word was a new acquaintance to the encircler. So in considering a writer of so vast a vocabulary as Wallace, even he had to do the ignoble legwork of tracking down these words, much the same way a foreign student of the language might have to circle "shoulder" or "carrot."
Learning about language is an inherently democratic pastime—and also one that never comes to an end.
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Dashes, some say, “are particularly useful in a sentence that is long and complex.” Emdashes—like an em dash itself—provides a thoughtful pause amid the hubbub.
Emdashes, founded in 2004, is written and drawn by Emily Gordon, Martin Schneider, Pollux, Jonathan Taylor, and Benjamin Chambers, as well as occasional guest contributors. All posts before October 2008 are by Emily Gordon.
The site was designed by House of Pretty with illustrations by Jesse R. Ewing.
Additional drawings are by Carolita Johnson and Pollux (author of our web comic, "The Wavy Rule"). The Emdashes pencil logo is by Jennifer Hadley, based on a 1943 Dorothy Gray ad.
Other writing by Emily Gordon
- Reviews: theater writing (for Time Out Chicago)
- Profile: Valerie Casey, Designers Accord founder, is spearheading the design of sustainability (for SXSW World)
- Feature: Rea Irvin: visionary art director, bon vivant, New Yorker founding father (for Print)
- Slide show: the Coney Island Mermaid Parade (for NYCgo.com)
- Feature: Muslim immigration iconography in the Netherlands, and an interview with Ayaan Hirsi Ali (for Print)
- Review: King's Gambit: A Son, a Father, and the World's Most Dangerous Game by Paul Hoffman (for Newsday)
- Homage: Celebrating lindy-hop legend Frankie Manning (for NYCgo.com)
- Inquiry: Does a New Republic redesign mean a change of tune? (for Print)
- Interview: James Surowiecki on what's next for the wisdom of crowds (for Assignment Zero)
- Interviews: four up-and-coming designers under 30 (for Print)
- Profile: novelist and dance critic Laura Jacobs (for Newsday)
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