YES.

I've just passed page 500.
Not quite the halfway point...but counting the endnotes (now into the 200's) perhaps I am almost halfway through. 17 + 34 = 51 pages of endnotes, so YES. I am halfway through now.
That took about a month and a half with a week taken out for vacation (from IJ).

Huh. So at this rate I'll perhaps finish the second week in September.
I either need to speed up or just be ready to read it at school and finish with everyone else at I-S.

Whew.

VD6

mysticetously: in the manner of a baleen whale (wallacewiki)

crèche-type : Nativity scene, a group of figures arranged to represent the birth of Jesus Christ (wiki)

propinquous: nearness or proximity, similarity or affiliation (wiki)

finial: an ornament at the top of a spire or gable; usually a foliated fleur-de-lis (Princeton Word Net)

stelliform: shaped like a star (wiki)

cerise-gloved: gloves that are red like the color of ripe cherries (PWN)

teratoid: An abnormal tumor similar to a teratoma; A mutant; Monster-like, exhibiting abnormal development (wiki)

patina: (in this context) a sheen on wooden furniture (wiki)

culcate: Page 488, 10 lines from bottom: culcate, doesn’t appear to be a real word, but inculcate means to impress upon somebody’s mind; to fix something in somebody’s mind through frequent and forceful repetition. The latin root, inculcare, means literally “to stamp in”, from its root calcare, meaning “to step on or press in”. In this sense, culcate might mean to impress upon somebody’s mind but without the frequent and forceful repetition. (View from the Cage, another Blogspot blog)

inguinal canal: The inguinal canal is a passage in the anterior (toward the front of the body) abdominal wall which in men conveys the spermatic cord and in women the round ligament. The inguinal canal is larger and more prominent in men. (wiki; creepers that broomstick was shoved all the way down there?!)

palisade: A palisade is a steel or wooden fence or wall of variable height, usually used as a defensive structure. (wiki)

metastisate: sic- metastasize: the spreading of a disease (especially cancer) to another part of the body (PWN)

dihedral triangle: A right triangle is one whose largest angle is 90º. Dihedral means "having two sides." (thank you wallacewiki)

ebullient: joyously unrestrained (PWN)

Powell's "Peeping Tom": Michael Latham Powell (1905-1990) was a British filmmaker, and Peeping Tom was one of his films. (wallace wiki)

anechoic: not having or producing echoes; sound-absorbent; "an anechoic chamber" (PWN)

catalepsy: a trancelike state with loss of voluntary motion and failure to react to stimuli (PWN)

anhedonia: an inability to experience pleasure (PWN)

styptic: contracting tissue (wallacewiki)

samizdat: a system of clandestine printing and distribution of dissident or banned literature (PWN)

jongleur: French wandering minstrels (which included musicians, acrobats, jugglers, and clowns), usually from the lower class (www.renaissancemagazine.com)

pantalone: is a stock character that is classified as one of the vecchi (old men) in Commedia dell'arte. He is a miserly and often libidinous character who is portrayed as a Venetian and often speaks in the Venetian dialect. (wiki)

VD5

I haven't read IJ since...last Tuesday, but I MUST do a vocab recap before I go any further.


Uberad: Like a "super" ad. (wallacewiki.com)

The Sherman Act: The Sherman Antitrust Act (Sherman Act, July 2, 1890, ch. 647, , ) was the first United States Federal statute to limit cartels and monopolies. (wikipedia)

declivity: descent- a downward slope or bend (Princeton Word Net)

mafficking: Noisy rejoicings of a multitude (wiki. and AWESOME)

cuirass: medieval body armor that covers the chest and back (PWN)

vig: A commission taken for certain bets by the house. (crapspit.org)

Kafka-esque rules: (interesting enough that I'll copy the whole thing. Wiki)

"Kafkaesque" is an eponym used to describe concepts, situations, and ideas which are reminiscent of the literary work of Prague writer Franz Kafka, particularly his novels The Trial and The Castle, and the novella The Metamorphosis.

The term, which is quite fluid in definition, has also been described as "marked by a senseless, disorienting, often menacing complexity: Kafkaesque bureaucracies"^[1] and "marked by surreal distortion and often a sense of impending danger: Kafkaesque fantasies of the impassive interrogation, the false trial, the confiscated passport ... haunt his innocence" — The New Yorker.^[2]

It can also describe an intentional distortion of reality by powerful but anonymous bureaucrats. "Lack of evidence is treated as a pesky inconvenience, to be circumvented by such Kafkaesque means as depositing unproven allegations into sealed files ..." Another definition would be an existentialist state of ever-elusive freedom while existing under unmitigatable control.

The adjective refers to anything suggestive of Kafka, especially his nightmarish type of narration, in which characters lack a clear course of action, the ability to see beyond immediate events, and the possibility of escape. The term's meaning has transcended the literary realm to apply to real-life occurrences and situations that are incomprehensibly complex, bizarre, or illogical.

cordite: A smokeless propellent made by combining two high explosives: nitrocellulose and nitroglycerine used in some firearm ammunition (wiki)

yutz: Yutz is a commune in the Moselle department in Lorraine in northeastern France. (wiki)

OR from the Yiddish, it means ditz, clutz, dumkoft, ninny, nincompoop, socially incompetant boob, twit, dumbass. (urbandictionary.com)

orts: the entrails and internal organs of a butchered animal. (wiki)

acromegalic: marked or affected by enlargement or hypertrophy of the extremities or the face; "a protruding acromegalic jaw" (PWN)

tract house: Tract housing (also known as cookie-cutter housing) is a style of housing development in which multiple identical or nearly-identical homes are built to create a community. (wiki)

genuflecting: genuflect - bend the knees and bow in church or before a religious superior or image (PWN)

revenant:

• a person who returns after a lengthy absence
• of or relating to or typical of a revenant; "revenant shrieks and groans"
• someone who has returned from the dead
• recurring: coming back; "a revenant ghost" (PWN; how many times have I had to look this up?)
• Hal, according to Schtitt.

picric: Designating a type of bitter yellow acid (wiki; and you thought it was "picnic" misspelled.)

Gaugin-motif:
Here is a painting by Gaugin called "Where Do We Come From? What Are We? Where Are We Going?" (wiki commons)


morendo: musical term- fading away in tone or tempo (wiki)

misprision: neglect or wrongful execution of official duties; misinterpretation or misunderstanding (wiki)

spic: Spic is an ethnic slur used in English speaking countries for a person of Hispanic descent. (wiki; I love that I have to look up ethnic slurs. Egad.)


Finished for now.
Gonna dive in even though I can't even dive in real water.

An affinity, a sadness.

According to the Handy-Dandy Infinite Summer Reading Schedule and Bookmark In One, I've made it to August.
It's getting to the point where the weeks in pages are flying by and I can't help it.
I have to keep reading. I can't wait around for all the discussion and recapping. I have to know what happens to Hal and to Mario and to Pemulis and Don W. Gately and to Joelle Van Dyne and hear more about J. O. Incandenza (is it any coincidence that his initials spell out JOI? Joy...Jest? anyone? )

It appalls me how much I am enjoying this novel. Laughing is understandable--Infinite Jest is a satire, after all. But aside from all the humor, there is so much pain and dysfunction (relationships, bodies, Substances, ambition gone awry, suicide, abuse, etc etc etc) in the novel I'm surprised I haven't broken down crying yet.

A fellow colleague commented (obliquely) on how he's jealous of my emotional connection to the novel.
I find myself doing things like making literal thumbs-ups at characters (today at D. W. Gately on him "now go[ing] to Any Lengths to stay clean") or wincing in pain (at Detox stories) or just wanting to give some of these characters hugs (Mario, of course) and of course, laughing aloud REAL laughs at some of the ridiculous comparisons or roundabout references (the 'Help' lady from the Alzheimer's center at Ennet Marine was heard at the dawn drills at ETA).

DFW, somehow, has taken all these characters from somewhere inside of his brain and captured them in a web of connections, albeit in a fascinatingly fragmented fashion.
But what's most fascinating to me is that he's made me Love Them.
I'm drawn day after day to the bright blue cover with green letters because of the people inside who aren't actually existent but who are nevertheless compelling Alive, though only on paperback-weight leaves of an off-white mass-produced beige.

Many of the commentators on IJ at Infsum have said that by reading DFW's novel again (or for the first time, or all the way through for the first time, etc) they are again slapped in the face with the loss the literary world has suffered since DFW passed away.
The blog entry from one of his colleagues was especially touching to me. She emphasized the importance of not trying to understand Wallace and his decision to "eliminate his personal map" (as he'd put it IJ would put it) through his fiction... not looking for it to explain anything.
Separating 'Wallace' from 'Dave' was how she put it.

I've never read DFW before but I too am finding that I am sadder and sadder as I read IJ because the astounding mind that crafted this novel is no more. There's still plenty more of his that I haven't read, but that's hardly a consolation in comparison with a vibrant intellectual life.

Anyway, more Marathe/Steeply tomorrow.

Vocab dump FOUR

Eventually I will have other posts that don't appear to be dalliances with Google define.
I should move up to a fling with the OED.

confluential: confluence - a place where things merge or flow together (especially rivers); "Pittsburgh is located at the confluence of the Allegheny and Monongahela rivers" (Princeton Word Net)

apr'es-garde: "after guard"--- DFW-derived, referring to J.O. Incandenza's filmic category. (Google shenanigans)

atavism: (how many times have I defined this?) a reappearance of an earlier characteristic (PWN)

abstruse: difficult to penetrate; incomprehensible to one of ordinary understanding or knowledge (PWN)

chyme: a semiliquid mass of partially digested food that passes from the stomach through the pyloric sphincter into the duodenum (PWN)

William Blake: visionary British poet and painter (1757-1827) (PWN) (apparently Patti Smith likes him too.)

sucrotically: something to do with sugar?

hats:

1. toque:

2. aigrette: I believe it is the feathery part that is in fact the aigrette.


3. sallet:



4. calpac:



5. harquebus

Apparently is also spelled arquebus: an obsolete firearm with a long barrel (PWN)
Couldn't find an image of a hat by this name.

6. calotte:



7. shako (I have a note that says "bearskin" next to it):




amanuentic: amanuensis- One employed to take dictation, or copy manuscripts; A clerk, secretary or stenographer, or scribe (wiki)

agnation: patrilineage: line of descent traced through the paternal side of the family (PWN)

jingoist: One who is overly patriotic or nationalistic (wiki)

muftipants: motorcyclewear?


jejune:

• insubstantial: lacking in nutritive value; "the jejune diets of the very poor"
• adolescent: displaying or suggesting a lack of maturity; "adolescent insecurity"; "jejune responses to our problems"; "their behavior was juvenile"; "puerile jokes"
• insipid: lacking interest or significance or impact; "an insipid personality"; "jejune novel" (PWN)

fulgurant: dazzling: amazingly impressive; suggestive of the flashing of lightning; (PWN)

glabrous: having no hair or similar growth; smooth; "glabrous stems"; "glabrous leaves"; "a glabrous scalp" (PWN)

hagiography: a biography that idealizes or idolizes the person (especially a person who is a saint) (PWN)

turpitude: Inherent baseness or depravity; corruptness and evilness; An act evident of such a depravity (wiki)

sigmoid:

• curved in two directions (like the letter S)
• of or relating to the sigmoid flexure in the large intestine (PWN)

panatela: a long slender cigar (PWN)

Merry Widow : A strapless corset with long garters and half cups for the breasts (wiki)

dirndls: a type of traditional dress worn in southern Germany, Liechtenstein and Austria, based on the historical costume of Alpine peasants. Dresses that are loosely based on the dirndl are known as Landhausmode. (wiki)

infarction: localized necrosis resulting from obstruction of the blood supply

aspersion: a) an unfavorable or damaging remark; slander b) the act of defaming or slandering 2. a sprinkling, as with water or dust, in a literal sense 3. [rare] a sprinkling with holy water, as at a baptism (thank you http://www.gdiproductions.net/srdamd/)

saprogenic: causing or resulting from putrefaction

faute-de-mieux: For want of something better; for lack of an alternative. OR A loose, practical or formal method of proof. (wiki)

Tyrolean-hats: county of Tyrol in the Austrian Alps (wiki)



bien sur: French for "well" (google)

brinkmanship: Pursuit of an advantage by appearing to be willing to risk a dangerous policy rather than concede a point (wiki)

imbroglio:

• an intricate and confusing interpersonal or political situation
• a very embarrassing misunderstanding (PWN)

pique:

• tightly woven fabric with raised cords
• cause to feel resentment or indignation; "Her tactless remark offended me"
• a sudden outburst of anger; "his temper sparked like damp firewood" (PWN)

catastatic: catastasis - In classical drama, the third and penultimate section, in which action is heightened for the catastrophe (wiki)

M.O. :

Modus operandi (often used in the abbreviated forms M.O. or simply Method) is a Latin phrase, approximately translated as "method of operating".^[1] The plural is modi operandi ("methods of operating"). The term is used in English to describe someone's habits or manner of working, the method of operating or functioning. It is often used in a criminal sense, to profile the methods employed by individuals during the execution of a crime, and may also be used in offender profiling,^[2] where it can also be used to find clues to the perpetrator's psychology.^[3] It largely consists of the methods used to execute the crime, prevent detection, and facilitate escape.^{[1] (wiki, of course)}

^{meme: French--}

1. same
2. actual
3. selfsame

Vocab dump 3

It's thundering and lightning-ing outside, but my library slip is now completely stuffed with words that need defining, if only for my own benefit.

thanatopic: thanatosis - The act of feigning death (wiki)

advertorial: an advertisement that is written and presented in the style of an editorial or journalistic report (Princeton Word Net, PWN...the irony of which I think just hit me)

microcephalic: having an abnormally small head and underdeveloped brain; "a nanocephalic dwarf" (PWN)

finski: a five dollar bill (urbandictionary.com)

eminence grise: (French) a secret or unofficial decision-maker ; the power behind the throne (wiki)

Kertwang: A term used in the novel Infinite Jest roughly meaning to insult or mess with someone. It can be used as a noun, e.g. Bobby felt his third nipple was an existential kertwang. Or a verb, e.g. God enjoyed kertwanging Bobby by sending gusts of wind to blow up his shirt to reveal his third nipple. (thank you AllExperts.com)

solander: A box, in the form of a book, used for keeping botanical specimens etc (wiki)

imbricate: place so as to overlap; "imbricate the roof tiles" (PWN)

peritonitis: is an inflammation of the lining of the body cavity and the surface of organs within it. Ruptured ulcers lead to peritonitis when the gut wall is no longer intact. There is seepage from the gut into the body cavity and adhesions may form. (www2.dpi.qld.gov.au/pigs/4449.html)

nephritis: an inflammation of the kidney (PWN)

Balaclavan: A wool hood covering the head and neck, first worn by troops in the Crimean War. Balaclava (or Balaklava) was the focal point of the "Charge of the Light Brigade."
(thank you www.civilwarhome.com)

prognathous: having a projecting lower jaw (PWN)

enuresis: inability to control the flow of urine and involuntary urination (PWN)

onanism:

• masturbation: manual stimulation of the genital organs (of yourself or another) for sexual pleasure
• coitus interruptus: a method of birth control in which coitus is initiated but the penis is deliberately withdrawn before ejaculation
  (PWN; this brings whole new levels of irony to the organization O.N.A.N.)

coprophilia: a marked interest in excrement; especially the use of feces or filth for sexual excitement (wiki)
coprophagia: eating feces; in human a symptom of some kinds of insanity (PWN)

fremitic: fremitus - a sensation felt by a hand placed on a part of the body (as the chest) that vibrates during speech (thank you www.history.navy.mil/library/online/influenza_terms.htm)

magisculed: Majiscule- uppercase (www.reference.com)

cunctations: procrastination: the act of procrastinating; putting off or delaying or defering an action to a later time (PWN. ... That sounds so dirty.)

venulated: ?

aphasiac: someone who has: Partial or total loss of the ability to articulate ideas or comprehend spoken or written language, resulting from damage to the brain caused by injury or disease. (thefreedictionary.com)

schlep:

• schlepper: (Yiddish) an awkward and stupid person
• shlep: pull along heavily, like a heavy load against a resistance; (PWN)

The end. FOR NOW.

Moar vocab

This seems to help me remember the words better. And no one reads this (that I know of, sneaker mcsneakersons) so it'll only annoy me when it comes time to scroll.

proviso: a stipulated condition (Princeton WordNet, hereafter known as PWN)

breviary: RCC - a book of prayers to be recited daily certain priests and members of religious orders (PWN)

gynecopia: DFW-constructed. Use your imagination.

solecistic: solecism- a grammatical mistake or absurdity. (wiki)

lissome: flexible (Webster)

cui bono: "to whose benefit?" is a Latin adage that is used either to suggest a hidden motive or to indicate that the party responsible for something may not be who it appears at first to be. (wiki)

falcate: shaped like a sickle (wiki)

Anchluss: (German for "link-up"), also known as the '''''', was the 1938 incorporation of Austria into Greater Germany by Nazi Germany. (wiki. Don't know what's going on with those wild air-quotes)

blepharoprothesis: prothesis for the eyelid (South Plains College Biology)

corticate: sheathed in bark or in a cortex (wiki)

mucronate: having an abruptly tapering point (wiki)

hyperfloriate: floriate : made of or decorated with floral ornamentation. (dictionary.com)
Over flowered?

attenuate: reduce in strength (PWN)

a-clef : ? does the context have anything to do with music? I can't remember.

ablate:

• wear away through erosion or vaporization
• remove an organ or bodily structure (PWN)

redemised: Reconveyed, as an estate. (Webster's 1828 dictionary)

Gaudeamas Igitur : De Brevitate Vitae (on the Shortness of Life), more commonly known as the Gaudeamus, is a popular academic commercium song in many European countries, mainly sung or performed at University graduation ceremonies. Despite its use as a formal graduation hymn, it is a jocular, light-hearted composition that pokes fun at university life. The song dates back to 1287[1], and was already known by the time of the founding of the alma mater of all European universities, the University of Bologna. It is in the tradition of carpe diem (seize the day), with its exhortations to enjoy life. (thank you wiki)

frisson: an almost pleasurable sensation of fright; "a frisson of surprise shot through him"
(PWN, I must start using this word)