...In 2005, David Foster Wallace, an instructor of English and writing as well as a novelist, gave a commencement speech to the graduating students of Kenyon College dubbed “This is Water.” In 2009, a year after Wallace’s suicide, Little, Brown, and Company published a book adaptation of the speech under the guise “This is Water: Some Thoughts, Delivered on a Significant Occasion, about Living a Compassionate Life.” At first glance one would think that the book would just be a direct transcription of the speech itself in order to reach a wider audience. However, at closer look, it is clear that the book version has multiple instances of alteration. These alterations are caused by both the publisher itself along with the very change of the medium. Throughout the book version of “This is...
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...The “commencement speech” is a genre of writing that does not like to color outside of the lines. In them, you will hear platitudes such as “this is the beginning of the rest of your life” and “go change the world” that never fail to make the audience roll their eyes. In the vast sea of mediocre commencement speeches, only a few stray from the typical commencement speech formula and are considered exceptional. One of these notable commencement speeches is “This is Water” by David Foster Wallace. In his 2005 commencement speech to Kenyon College, David Foster Wallace’s makes a complete one-eighty from the typical commencement speech; discussing complex topics that were all too vital to the baby-faced, liberal arts graduates. He tackled the...
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...York Times five years ago: “David Foster Wallace, whose prodigiously observant, exuberantly plotted, grammatically and etymologically challenging, philosophically probing and culturally hyper-contemporary novels, stories and essays made him an heir to modern virtuosos like Thomas Pynchon and Don DeLillo, an experimental contemporary of William T. Vollmann, Mark Leyner and Nicholson Baker and a clear influence on younger tour-de-force stylists like Dave Eggers and Jonathan Safran Foer, died on Friday at his home in Claremont, Calif. He was 46.” It’s not your conventional obituary. No, it has a literary style befitting the writer we lost on September 12, 2008. And five years after DFW’s death, we might want to pause and revisit his many stories and essays still available on the web. To mark this mournful occasion, we’ve updated and expanded our list, 30 Free Essays & Stories by David Foster Wallace on the Web, which features some timely and memorable pieces – “9/11: The View From the Midwest,” “Consider the Lobster,” and Federer as Religious Experience,” just to name just a few. Below we’ve also highlighted some of our favorite David Foster Wallace posts published over the years. Hope you enjoy visiting or revisiting this material as much as I have. David Foster Wallace’s 1994 Syllabus: How to Teach Serious Literature with Lightweight Books ‘This Is Water’: Complete Audio of David Foster Wallace’s Kenyon Graduation Speech (2005) David Foster Wallace Breaks Down Five Common...
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...“Third Person” George Saunders’s and David Foster Wallace’s speeches to graduating classes show differing views to the aspect of a selfish world. They similarly convey the effort for one to shift their perspective in order to be considerate of others is present, yet they differ in undertone. Saunders’ depicts the path of kindness as progress with an optimistic development in the eyes of retrospective, in contrast to Wallace’s more solemn, immediate depiction of the struggle to be compassionate to humanity with little promise of a better life. David Foster Wallace’s “This is Water” demonstrated how the typical human being is pre-disposed to the idea of selfishness, especially paired with a mundane life since the only aspect, the mundane “day...
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...Freedom of education prevents people from being enslaved to ignorance. Education gives people a sense of freedom, and it also gives them the option of “deciding what has meaning and what doesn’t” in their life. In David Foster Wallace’s commencement speech, The Water, he argues that education should teach us how to be well adjusted, deciding on how to think and what to pay attention to instead of going to our default setting of negativity. David Foster Wallace is right because he thinks that real education is learning to be well adjusted. Freedom of education teaches us how to decide what has and what does not have meaning in our lives, it should teach us how to think not what to think, it should be able to help us develop our critical and...
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...university, the best advice is given in preparation for adulthood. Mary Schmich’s ‘Wear Sunscreen’ (1997) and David Foster Wallace’s ‘This is Water’ (2009) are both unconventional commencement speeches which as a result have caused these speeches to gain great popularity. Despite these similarities, they both have different ways of presenting their non-traditional advice. Schmich conveys multiple points of life advice in a very concise way, whereas Wallace focus’ on the importance of the paying attention and learning how to think. This comparison of ‘Wear Sunscreen’ and ‘This is Water’, shows that audiences can have very positive reactions by bending a speech...
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...In David Foster Wallace’s commencement speech, This Is Water, argues that a person has the choice to think critically and should exercise that every day. With the help of intensive and obvious analogies he is able to connect with the audience to a whole another level. He establishes that he is not a wiser person, and that even though he has authority he won’t just tell them what to do. So he starts of by stating his flaws to appeal to others that he is also human and that the purpose of higher education was to teach you how to think. Foster uses logical and emotional appeals to discuss the importance of critical thinking. Wallace believes that we are so close minded that all our attention and thinking is constantly about us instead of others....
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...In David Foster Wallace’s speech This is Water, he puts a focus upon the gravity that adulthood is going to bring and that “everything to do with simple awareness; awareness of what is so real and essential, so hidden in plain sight” will be vital in the years to come. In Joyce Carol Oates’ Heat a narrator reverts back to a time in childhood when two neighborhood twins were killed, awakening her to how real violence is in reality. Both of these stories build off a reflection standpoint that connect and divide them equally. While both stories can connect to each other through the fact of understanding life, figuring out morals and that hardships are real, the This is Water speech focuses on how to get past yourself and on with life while Heat takes a focus on being stuck remembering and questioning oneself based on the past Getting...
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...The speech “This is Water” was given by David Foster Wallace at Kenyon College as a commencement speech for the class of 2005. This short summary will discuss the rhetoric Wallace introduces in his speech and whether or not it is successful. Although the traditional rhetoric style of commencements speeches is optimistic in their nature and hopeful in their message, Wallace explores the harsh and mundane realities of everyday life through symbolic narratives and metaphoric stories about fishes, suicide and your daily grocery store run. Wallace´s tendency to use narratives to illustrate his message builds up his pathos and credibility as a “wise old man”, which he contradicts with a laid back and informal language to encourage the younger audience...
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...“This is Water” Close Reading Analysis: The Fluidity of Life “This is Water,” written by David Foster Wallace, is a commencement address he gave to a graduating college class in 2005. In this text, Wallace uses water as a symbol for life. As a result of water referring to life, the theme of “This is Water” is the fluidity of life. He shows this to his audience through short stories within his speech. Wallace begins his address with a story about fish. It is mainly about three fish, two young and one old. The two younger ones do not realize they are swimming in water when the older fish asks them “how’s the water” (Wallace X)? They do not know they are submerged in water because they are young and inexperienced: they have not practiced everything...
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...In David Foster Wallace’s speech, "This Is Water"; he describes the purpose and the importance of a liberal arts education. He says that the whole purpose of higher education is to have the ability to carefully choose on how to perceive others rather than just make an opinion about them. Also, he used logical and emotional applications to explain the importance of rational or critical thinking. Wallace used the word conscious many times to confer it to critical thinkers, and he described that those who don't think critically are related to as unconscious. Also, Wallace’s main discussion was that a person can have the choice to think logically and should do it on a daily basis. Wallace also described that consciousness and unconsciousness centers...
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...In his 2005 commencement address entitled “This is Water”, author and speaker David Foster Wallace emphasizes the importance of rethinking the most obvious realities as well as practicing a less self-absorbed awareness. Wallace begins his speech with a parable about a fish asking “What the hell is water?” Going on to explain how blind certainty can be damaging, Wallace affirms his point that getting lost inside one’s own head is nowhere near as rewarding and educational as paying attention to what is going on outside of the mind. Wallace further accentuates this idea by commenting on the frustration and annoyance of a typical trip to a grocery store. Wallace then advises his listeners to choose to look differently at an unpleasant situation,...
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...The Way of Life The 2005 Kenyon Commencement Address was given by David Foster Wallace, a commencement speaker and a graduating student. DFW states stories that would happen realistically in anyone's lifetime due to the choices of one another. He points out certain flaws that each person has done but didn't realize it. He also explains the rules of patience, everyone has done it and repeats it; your actions influence another's mindset similar to yours and inflicts it on another individual who's innocent of his/her flaws. Although, people bring much negativity in the air, there is still room for positivity and that’s the drive of what keeps people going in life. In the 2005 Kenyon Commencement Address by David Foster Wallace, he preaches about the blockades that may be upon the path to your success after graduate school. DFW elaborates realistic conflicts throughout adulthood that brings about a whole other situation to achieve. For instance, "They're the kind of worship you just gradually slip into, day after day, getting more and more selective about what you see and how you measure value without ever being fully aware that that's what you're doing" (Wallace 2005 Kenyon Commencement Address). DFW demonstrates that one action would lead to another, it may be positive or negative, but that's how the way life goes. As flaws fade, don't look back and keep pushing forward. DFW states, "To have just a little critical awareness about myself and my certainties." He...
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...David Foster Wallace’s view on ‘This is Water’ helps us look around, open our eyes, and see the world from a fresh perspective. He started off by stating the fish analogy. It begins with two young fishes swimming and a big fish passed by saying to them, “Morning, boys. How’s the water?” and the two young fishes look at one another and goes “What the hell is water?” This is an example that shows us how unaware we become to our surroundings. Too often, we live in our own bubble and think we’re not affecting the environment around us. However, the truth of the matter is, the way we think will determine the consequences of our actions, whether it’s negative or positive. It’s human nature for people to automatically think about themselves first. For example, when you’re waiting in line and end up getting frustrated in the end, it’s hard to be reasonable and think...
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...In David Foster Wallace’s graduation speech, “This is Water”, presented to Kenyan College graduating class of 2005, Wallace influences the class to view the world as a whole rather than independently. Wallace opposes that we should not feel as though the world spins around just our needs additionally the needs of others however he makes a point to express that everybody has a decision of how to view the world. His argument is clear however but not accepted by most. Through his personal experiences and examples he gave in the speech every one of his parables conveys a different message. His credibility lies within freedom of choice he wants his audience to have the choice to make decisions that will positively affect them. Wallace discusses...
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