David Foster Wallace

David Foster Wallace (February 21, 1962 – September 12, 2008) was an American writer and professor who published novels, short stories, and essays. He is best known for the 1996 novel ''Infinite Jest'', which ''Time'' magazine listed as one of the 100 best English-language novels published from 1923 to 2005. In 2008, David Ulin wrote for the ''Los Angeles Times'' that Wallace was "one of the most influential and innovative writers of the last twenty years".

Wallace grew up in Illinois. He graduated from Amherst College in Massachusetts, and then the University of Arizona. His honors thesis at Amherst, about modal logic, was adapted into his debut novel ''The Broom of the System'' (1987). In his writing, Wallace intentionally avoided tropes of postmodern art such as irony or forms of metafiction, saying in 1990 that they were "agents of a great despair and stasis" in contemporary American culture. His next novel, ''Infinite Jest'', is known for its unconventional narrative structure and extensive use of endnotes.

Wallace published three short story collections: ''Girl with Curious Hair'' (1989); ''Brief Interviews with Hideous Men'' (1999), which was adapted into a 2009 film; and ''Oblivion: Stories'' (2004). His short stories and essays were published in major outfits like ''The New Yorker'' and ''Rolling Stone'' magazines. Three collections of his nonfiction essays were published as books: ''A Supposedly Fun Thing I'll Never Do Again'' (1997); ''Consider the Lobster'' (2005); and ''Both Flesh and Not'', published posthumously in 2012.

Wallace also taught English and creative writing at Emerson College in Massachusetts, Illinois State University, and Pomona College in California. After struggling with depression for many years, in 2008, he died by suicide at age 46. His novel ''The Pale King'' was published posthumously in 2011, and became a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction in 2012. Provided by Wikipedia