A postmodernist’s progress: Thoughts on spirituality across the David Foster Wallace canon

Abstract

David Foster Wallace is known more for his postmodern styling, his examination of addiction, his humorous journalism, and his 2008 suicide, than for his exploration of Christianity. However, Christian themes and characters become more prominent in his later works, and critical attention to his work has long noted an “ethical” element in his writing. This article will explore both Wallace’s published works and materials available in his archive to argue, first, that we have strong reason to believe that Wallace’s spirituality was a genuine personal interest, not a pandering effort to embrace a Middle-American persona, nor a post-addiction safety blanket. Second, his interest in spirituality in general, and Christianity specifically, did not simply emerge in the last decade of his life, but rather developed out of a more psychologically charged investigation of the self, solipsism, and the individual’s drive to find fulfillment.