"liebestod," meaning love-death, here is interesting; the connection of love with death further highlights the notion of death as a consummation
footnote 17. referring to IJ p884
simultaneously aggravating and obviating the distinction between self and other
[...] the narrator despises this girl's lifestyle and outlook, yet finds himself almost obsessively in need of her approval and love. As a consequence, he attempts to master her, to prove his own superiority, in much the same way as Wallace described the tendency he saw in his own and others' work …
Wallace finds another way of resisting apocalyptic postmodern anomie
referring to BI and his use of a monologue/dialogue hybrid
Randall [...] has an elevated opinion of his own intellectual standing. [...] unnecessary Latin phrases, italicization, and the use of exaggerated inverted commas as a sort of conversational crutch, ostensibly indicating his disdain for contemporary argot, but actually revealing a narrator uncomfor…
