Tuesday, October 21, 2008

J/K Before, I do know how to read.

I was sitting in a doctor's office (more on that later) where I read this passage in a David Foster Wallace essay The Big Red Son. Here the author covers the adult film industry and the bunny slipper clad performers that comprise it. Having now brought you up to speed on the plot, let's have a quick read:

There is, first, the matter of having seen the various intimate activities and anatomical parts of these starlets in videos heretofore and thus (weirdly) feeling shy about meeting them. But there is also a complex erotic tension. Because porn films' worlds are so sexualized, with everybody seemingly teetering right on the edge of coitus all the time and it taking only the slightest nudge or excuse- a stalled elevator, an unlocked door, a cocked eyebrow, a firm handshake- to send everyone tumbling into a tangled mass of limbs and orifices, there's a bizarre unconscious expectation/dread/hope that this is what might happen in Max Hardcore's hotel room. Yr. corresps. here find it impossible to overemphasize the fact that this is a delusion. In fact, of course, the unconscious expectation/dread/hope makes no more sense than it would make to be hanging out with doctors at a medical convention and to expect that at the slightest provocation everyone in the room would tumble into a frenzy of MRIs and epidurals. Nevertheless the tension persists...

I just feel "to send everyone tumbling into a tangled mass of limbs and orifices" bears repeating*.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

To further emphasize your point: post the album cover of Remedy by Basement Jaxx.