Over the past few series, Short Stop has focused on stories that fall under the fiction umbrella. While some have been autobiographical, they present something more creative within the framework that is deserving of exploration. The chance to dive into what interests an author becomes a rewarding experience as I broke down themes and found interesting tidbits. While this will be the same for the upcoming series, the approach will be a little different. I’ve been a fan of David Foster Wallace ever since reading “Infinite Jest” years ago and have been curious to delve into his essays. In an effort to better understand his potential as a writer, I am going to be spending this column exploring the seven entries for “A Supposedly Fun Thing I’ll Never Do Again.” Will the mix of analysis and autobiography provide something rewarding, or will I never do a nonfiction column again? Join me and find out. The only caveat is that due to some of these being lengthier, there’s an off chance the entries will take longer to release. Keep that in mind and let’s delve into one of the most unique voices of the late 20th century.
My one hope for this series is that it doesn’t meet the same demise as my cursed Amnesia Series. Efforts to expand the potential failed and I have no plans to finish that headache-inducing project. And yet, as I embark on this journey, there’s hope this will go better. In general Wallace is a figure who has resonated with me and I have appreciated his maximalist and sincere view of the world. The only downside is that this often means his work feels too lofty to read casually and has kept me from further exploring his work. Even in this premiere piece, I laughed at the appearance of paragraphs that sometimes went beyond the page. Aesthetically, it’s not my favorite thing as I treat the breaks like a rhythmic measure. Then again, Wallace is the type to get lost in thought and it works because he’s someone with great introspection.
That is evident throughout “Derivative Sport in Tornado Alley.” Anyone who has read “Infinite Jest” will know that he’s someone who is a bit obsessed with tennis. The amount of detail he goes into suggests it is personal and speaks to something at his core. As someone who doesn’t actually appreciate tennis, it is always interesting to hear a self-described expert go on and on. To an outsider, tennis is merely a sport where two people bop a ball around. However, Wallace suggests that it’s a way of life and, in this inaugural piece, the very essence of his being.
My initial concern for this series was that the essays would be too impersonal and I would spend more time breaking down everything but Wallace. Even if I could dedicate some room to prose deconstruction, what was this saying about him as an author? Luckily, he doesn’t take long to reveal that this is the equivalent of the opening chapter of an unconventional biography.
Some interesting parallels are brought up throughout the text that makes me think I should be more familiar with tennis. He lists several schools in Southern California with prestigious programs, including Cal-Fullerton. I have family who has attended that school, so it makes the larger piece feel personal. I have toured that campus and seen the various fields where athletes train. In a region that is overactive with every type of person imaginable, it’s hard to think of tennis becoming the runaway phenomenon that it must’ve been in Illinois. Even if I have visited Chicago (in winter) as a child, I couldn’t tell you a single thing about the state that wasn’t first crafted by Sufjan Stevens.
Meanwhile, Wallace treats this essay like a chance to create the ultimate defense for the outer regions of Illinois. His romanticization of the banal gives everything a vividness that makes you feel like you’re with him on a walking tour. While this is a story that begins about tennis, it comes to encapsulate everything that makes him love Illinois. He claims that Chicago may be “The Windy City,” but it’s much worse where he lives. The wind gets so bad that most people can’t ride bicycles despite living in a notoriously flat region of the nation. The only real benefit they have is that the absence of stimulation means that they can see the clouds off in the distance and predict the weather just by sight.
Wallace seems more invested in what Illinois means to him than what the greater sport was. This is why the opening paragraph centers around him going away to college. Even if he’s not long for the sport, his emphasis turns to math. Without context, the reader becomes intrigued why Illinois feels like a bunch of degrees and lines. Through a clever deconstruction, he begins by talking about how every patch of land from the sky looks like tight angles on a graphing paper. Everything has geometric potential and serves a function.
Returning to Earth, he gives one of the most intriguing details about tennis that I have read. According to him, most courts in his area were simply paved over the ground underneath. There was no need to reconstruct the dirt because it was considered flat and wouldn’t provide many problems for the players. However, Wallace noticed. There’s a small dip that may not impact larger play, but becomes the first thing to bother him. There’s a sense that he wished more people cared about the geometry of a court as much as he did because it won’t be long until he delves into how nature and his own biology impacts his gameplay.
The most important thing is that Wallace had stamina. He may sweat a lot, but he could outlast the more classically attractive opponent. In between discussion of his father driving him to tournaments, he takes time to discuss how he became a renowned player in the program’s “western” division. His ability to interpret direction based on the wind gave him an advantage over opponents because he knew the best angles to hit the ball. Where most were yelling with frustration, he remained calm. Because of this, he was ranked seventh in the division.
Wallace’s style is rooted in the familiar lengthy paragraphs that have details upon details. For as exhausting as this could seem, it’s a chance for him to tie really complicated thoughts together. He’s an intellect with an enviable vocabulary that knows how to mix sport and math metaphors together along with the personal self-actualization of aging. Even as he discusses a row of highlights, he can’t help but acknowledge that his time in the sport was coming to an end. He was good for an Illinois player, but taking him out of that context removed something essential. There’s consideration for the wind, but it was also how much of the state felt like math to him. Everything had a practicality that California and other places didn’t have. Once he was forced to play in more conventional environments, he was finding his potential crumbling.
Another thing that’s interesting about this is how little dialogue is in it. Everything is presented with the impersonal focus of facts on a page. Even pivotal conversations one assumes he had with his father are absent in favor of introspection and trying to grapple what tennis means to him. It’s something that defined his early youth and became the one thing he was really good at. His acknowledgment that he wasn’t the best adds a level of bittersweet to the whole thing and may inform the rising subtext of depressive episodes as his body becomes less functionable. By the end he emphasizes how out of control he was from his movements. He ends by discussing how a reckless accident leaves his friend’s retina detached caused him to not be the same ever again. In a sense, it was his way of admitting that time wears on everybody and his was fairly tragic.
Would Wallace have been the great tennis player? Nothing about the piece suggests that he would’ve. However, it does raise the hypothetical on whether he would’ve become the renowned author that he became. It’s not discussed within the essay whether he was a passionate writer, though one would have to believe his emphasis on education suggests he used his downtime with a nose in a book learning words. Still, would he have done things like submit this story to Harper’s for publication? Is it possible that “Infinite Jest” would’ve become a hit at all?
In general, there is something disillusioning about the piece because it feels bittersweet by the end. For someone who dedicated so much of their passion to one activity, it must be heartbreaking to give it up and never reach a professional potential. It’s the downside of any competitive field and likely would’ve hit him even if he was a master. However, having it at a young age feels in a sense like losing one’s identity. When the only thing you’re known for loses its potential, what is there to say about you? I have to believe Wallace had some scholarly pursuits in his back pocket (I don’t know his life story) just because of how appealing he is as a writer. However, I think it informs the somberness with which he sometimes writes. The need to restart must’ve been difficult.
I am unsure if the pieces will all tie together by the end, but this is a phenomenal way to open an anthology. As someone not familiar with tennis, I admire the way that he works to tie every fiber of his being into the greater text. It’s a story about how much he loves tennis, Illinois, and math. It’s about acceptance and letting go of what he can’t change. It’s clear that the sport lives on as a special interest, but this isn’t rooted in too much “What if?” mentality. It is less about regret than trying to acknowledge the joy that the moments brought. It’s a preservation of his own worth and trying to figure out where he goes from there. His body may have created a dilemma by the end, but it was clear that everything else had been wearing on him the entire time.
The title so far is accurate. Tennis is supposedly fun and it doesn’t sound like Wallace ever did it again. My hope is that the remainder of these essays tie into the theme and create a greater self-portrait. This is as much an argument for why tennis is this wonderful, complex sport as it is about his personal journey as an individual. I doubt that everything from here will feel as indebted to his youth, but that’s part of the fun. I will only know when I get there. For now, I come away with a bigger appreciation for Illinois and tennis courts in general. I feel like for a few pages I was there alongside Wallace looking at every possible angle. I’m curious to see how many more there are.
Coming Up Next: "E Unibus Pluram: Television and U.S. Fiction"
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