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David Foster Wallace
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Oblivion: Stories Paperback – August 30, 2005

by David Foster Wallace (Author)
4.4 4.4 out of 5 stars 467 ratings
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In the stories that make up Oblivion, David Foster Wallace joins the rawest, most naked humanity with the infinite involutions of self-consciousness -- a combination that is dazzlingly, uniquely his.

These are worlds undreamt of by any other mind. Only David Foster Wallace could convey a father's desperate loneliness by way of his son's daydreaming through a teacher's homicidal breakdown ("The Soul Is Not a Smithy"). Or could explore the deepest and most hilarious aspects of creativity by delineating the office politics surrounding a magazine profile of an artist who produces miniature sculptures in an anatomically inconceivable way ("The Suffering Channel"). Or capture the ache of love's breakdown in the painfully polite apologies of a man who believes his wife is hallucinating the sound of his snoring ("Oblivion").

Each of these stories is a complete world, as fully imagined as most entire novels, at once preposterously surreal and painfully immediate.

"Stunning...Wallace is an astonishing storyteller whose fiction reminds us why we learned to read in the first place." --San Francisco Chronicle
Previous page
  1. Print length
    336 pages
  2. Language
    English
  3. Publisher
    Back Bay Books
  4. Publication date
    August 30, 2005
  5. Dimensions
    5.5 x 1 x 8.25 inches
  6. ISBN-10
    9780316010764
  7. ISBN-13
    978-0316010764
  8. See all details
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Editorial Reviews

Review

""David Foster Wallace has earned a place as one of America's most daring and talented young writers....His eye for cultural detail is ever sharp, his humor ever dry."

About the Author

David Foster Wallace was born in Ithaca, New York, in 1962 and raised in Illinois, where he was a regionally ranked junior tennis player. He received bachelor of arts degrees in philosophy and English from Amherst College and wrote what would become his first novel, The Broom of the System, as his senior English thesis. He received a masters of fine arts from University of Arizona in 1987 and briefly pursued graduate work in philosophy at Harvard University. His second novel, Infinite Jest, was published in 1996.

Wallace taught creative writing at Emerson College, Illinois State University, and Pomona College, and published the story collections Girl with Curious Hair, Brief Interviews with Hideous Men, Oblivion, the essay collections A Supposedly Fun Thing I'll Never Do Again, and Consider the Lobster. He was awarded the MacArthur Fellowship, a Lannan Literary Award, and a Whiting Writers' Award, and was appointed to the Usage Panel for The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language. He died in 2008. His last novel, The Pale King, was published in 2011.

Product details

  • ASIN ‏ : ‎ 0316010766
  • Publisher ‏ : ‎ Back Bay Books; Reprint edition (August 30, 2005)
  • Language ‏ : ‎ English
  • Paperback ‏ : ‎ 336 pages
  • ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 9780316010764
  • ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-0316010764
  • Item Weight ‏ : ‎ 10.4 ounces
  • Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 5.5 x 1 x 8.25 inches
  • Customer Reviews:
    4.4 4.4 out of 5 stars 467 ratings

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David Foster Wallace

David Foster Wallace

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David Foster Wallace wrote the acclaimed novels Infinite Jest and The Broom of the System and the story collections Oblivion, Brief Interviews with Hideous Men, and Girl With Curious Hair. His nonfiction includes the essay collections Consider the Lobster and A Supposedly Fun Thing I'll Never Do Again, and the full-length work Everything and More.  He died in 2008.

Customer reviews

4.4 out of 5 stars
4.4 out of 5
467 global ratings

Top reviews from the United States

Destpo out of repose
5.0 out of 5 stars Beautiful
Reviewed in the United States on September 2, 2010
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I was turned on to DFW after hearing an interview on Bookworm (podcast) and after reading Infinite Jest I decided to read all of his other books in publication order. I was worried about Oblivion because I had heard it was a very sad collection. But I fell in love with it. I think it is his best work, which makes his death that much sadder. He had his best work yet to do.

The stories are beautiful and absurd and more accessible

Scanning other customer reviews I saw much reference to DFW's self-indulgence. To be fair he is that, but that's what books are. To avoid self-indulgence, you need to not write. And would you rather have covert or overt self-indulgence? I want overt, because it is honest, and whatever faults he has, DFW was as honest a writer as one can ask for.
13 people found this helpful
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Edoardo Angeloni
5.0 out of 5 stars Wallace is a great of actual literature.
Reviewed in the United States on July 1, 2016
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The first story of this book is about the focus groups and the expertize. After Wallace introduces several facts no very clear by a traditional view, but those have a significate in relation to the way which with those are made, that is the importance of auto-references. The effect born with a good use of mathematics, particularly logics and chaos theory. But the cultural contexts which from are given certain situations are very great. So Wallace has written stories whom loook like a mix between a traditional narration and a continuous critics about his positions, something which should have an effect of sure interest for his lectors.
2 people found this helpful
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Janet
4.0 out of 5 stars Dark but thought provoking
Reviewed in the United States on February 6, 2014
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I started my David Foster Wallace obsession several years ago (shortly after I learned of his suicide) while reading his masterwork, Infinite Jest. That book ranks as one of my favorite pieces of literature of all time, right up there with Proust's "In Search of Lost Time," and just as challenging. I have since read several of his other works, including his early novel "The Broom of the System" and 2 other collections of short works. While reading "Oblivion" my first thought was "this is my least favorite DFW work." It is very dark. One of the stories, "Good Old Neon" is devoted to suicide and a meditation on self-loathing, and a minor character named "David Wallace" is mentioned towards the end of the story. The title story ("Oblivion") completely turned on its head in the last page. With the help of Wikipedia and other on-line sites that discussed the work I was able to get a better understanding and appreciation of the stories. So, in short, this is not my favorite DFW book, but definitely worth reading if you are willing to do a little work.

I first purchased this book (from Amazon) in paperback, because even though I prefer reading on my Kindle so I can adjust the type size, I always bought DFW books in print editions due to fear of problems dealing with the footnotes and/or endnotes. However, after reading the first one or 2 stories I purchased it for Kindle due to my usual problems with eye strain. A few of the stories have footnotes--i.e. in the print version they are at the bottom of the page. Please note that in the Kindle edition they are all at the back of the book. It was not that difficult to navigate once I got the hang of it. However, I also noticed that some squiggles between sections of one of the longer stories were not in the Kindle edition--perhaps this is not an issue with the Kindle Fire.
22 people found this helpful
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Sophisticated Whimsy
5.0 out of 5 stars Love love this book
Reviewed in the United States on April 26, 2014
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David Foster Wallace was a genius. These stories are funny and brilliantly written. The Suffering Channel is the most incredible story...image an "artist" whose art just happens to be perfectly formed repliques of famous paintings and sculptures that he craps out combined with a television station that shows people suffering 24 hours a day. Then for extra strangeness add a reporter from a fictional magazine called Style that just happens to be based in the World Trade Center. Now set the story just weeks before 911 and for contrast to that Armageddon sprinkle heavily fashion crazed interns. Truly amazing.
One person found this helpful
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Jon Waters
5.0 out of 5 stars Wide-ranging, clear-eyed insights, these short stories have a ...
Reviewed in the United States on November 2, 2015
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Wide-ranging, clear-eyed insights, these short stories have a psychological depth combined with - sometimes outrageous - fantastical elements, having you believe the author is capturing and detailing a brief segment of the actual lives of his subjects and their imaginations, each pulled from much longer narratives present in his mind. The stories don't so much conclude as abruptly terminate mid-stream in the author's mind as he turns his full attention to yet another narrative stream. (My favorites were "Mr. Squishy" - you get used to the prolific acronyms - and "Oblivion," which each can be read in one sitting. Though it is longer than the other stories, don't skip the last story, "The Suffering Channel.")
2 people found this helpful
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Ian
5.0 out of 5 stars One of the best books by one of the greatest writers of all ...
Reviewed in the United States on August 12, 2015
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One of the best books by one of the greatest writers of all time. I must have read this 3 or 4 times already and I still dont understand WTF is going on exactly. If someone can explain any of these stories to me Ill give you a million dollars. The first story especially
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Top reviews from other countries

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monica prado
5.0 out of 5 stars He is the best
Reviewed in Brazil on December 11, 2023
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DFW is a genious
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Kindle Customer
5.0 out of 5 stars Great collection
Reviewed in Canada on September 8, 2023
Verified Purchase
These stories are such a tease. They promise so much more in a longer format and maybe the fact that they leave so much unresolved is their power. Without being told who the author is you could easily recognize his style in all of these tales. Reading his story about suicide is a disturbing example of fiction becoming reality
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Alejandro
5.0 out of 5 stars La mayoría me gustaron
Reviewed in Mexico on August 1, 2021
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La mayoría de las historias son 7/10 para arriba, pero a mí me gusta mucho el estilo de Wallace así que mi opinión es un poco sesgada.
Si eres fan de DFW no te arrepentirás, si no eres tan fan yo creo que hay mejores libros que comprar primero.
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Chai Lover
5.0 out of 5 stars ein Kommentar
Reviewed in Germany on March 3, 2017
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abzugeben ist nur ein Spiegelbild dessen was DFW in all seinen Texten thematisiert, insofern grotesk als Aktion und an sich ein Resultat dessen was er schon in den 1990ern beschreibt, nämlich wie oberflächlich, gefangen und depressionsgefährdet Menschen sind und sein können. Aber jetzt das Offensichtliche: genial, traurig, schmerzvoll, alternativlos.
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Curly
5.0 out of 5 stars Dark and funny
Reviewed in the United Kingdom on August 7, 2014
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I was recommended this by a friend (a huge Wallace fan) and while I've only read a couple of the short stories (Good Old Neon and whichever comes after, with the unfortunate cosmetic surgery incident), I've come to love the sombre yet darkly humorous tone that is apparently characteristic of Wallace.

Get it!
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