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The Latest Breaking News from David Foster Wallace

Science news this week: Physicists witness faster-than-light darkness pinpricks, humans are still evolving, and some polar bears are getting fatter than ever

April 18, 2026: Our weekly roundup of the latest science in the news, as well as a few fascinating articles to keep you entertained over the weekend

LiveScience

Friday essay: ‘red flags’ and ‘performative reading’ – what do our reading choices say about us?

What do our reading choices say about us? When teaching creative writing and literature classes, I always ask my students about their favourite genres and current reading in the first week. It is a good way to get a sense of their interests, gauge how they will respond to set…

The Conversation

Debunking the myth of the toxic ‘Infinite Jest bro’

COMMENT: Thirty years after publication, David Foster Wallace’s 1996 opus remains a seismic literary achievement, writes Louis Chilton. Anyone complaining about its readership is fixating on the wrong thing

The Independent UK

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Friday essay: weirdly old-fashioned and wildly uneven – David Foster Wallace’s Infinite Jest at 30

Thirty years ago, living in Cambridge, England, I wandered into Heffers Bookshop and picked up a monstrous new novel on the display table. It had a title out of Hamlet, a Simpsons-sky dustjacket, hundreds of endnotes, and ran to almost 1,100 pages. Infinite Jest occupied much of that cold February…

The Conversation

AI is filling the God void for many – but is ChatGPT really something to worship?

Comforting reassurance was once the work of the church. Now it’s increasingly being sought from the machine

The Guardian - AU

Is it OK to read Infinite Jest in public? Why the internet hates ‘performative reading’

Posts mocking strangers for cracking open classics have become popular. So where are we supposed to read them?

The Guardian - US

David Lynch transcended film: he was one of America’s greatest artists

David Lynch’s death marks the passing of a true instinctive genius who stood apart from the rest of Hollywood

Evening Standard

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David Lynch, the visionary artist who made films that no one else could

TRIBUTE: The singular American filmmaker died this week at the age of 78, leaving behind a legacy like no other. Louis Chilton looks at the life and work of a man who redefined what cinema itself could achieve

The Independent UK

Jesse Eisenberg opens up about filming tough movie scene: ‘I couldn’t stop crying’

‘I was glad when the movie ended,’ said actor

The Independent UK

The 32 greatest A24 movies

Sad androids, criminal bodybuilders, and forest witches galore

Total Film

Do you ever get the feeling that we’re living in a postmodern fiction? You’re not alone

The once outlandish predictions of Ballard, DeLillo and (yes) The Simpsons are coming true. It’s time to author our own future, says writer Dan Brooks

The Guardian - UK

OPINION - Labour will need to do more than offer the 'Cakeism of Remainers'

On the same day Arsenal defeated Manchester United on penalties to win the 2005 FA Cup final, David Foster Wallace delivered perhaps the most celebrated commencement speech of modern times. Standing in front of graduating students at Kenyon College, Ohio, he opened with a joke:

Evening Standard

21 of the Greatest American novels that everyone should read

From historical classics to postmodern marvels

Evening Standard

Anna Funder rescues George Orwell's wife Eileen from being 'cancelled by the patriarchy' – and reminds us he's a sexual predator

In the summer of 2017, Anna Funder found herself “at a moment of peak overload”. Juggling the competing demands of getting her children ready for the new school year, grocery shopping, home maintenance and caring for members of her extended family, Funder felt she had been spiritually drained by the…

The Conversation

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Los Angeles Times

Jason Segel finds his calm even amid the comically dark territory of 'Shrinking'

LOS ANGELES — Jason Segel is sitting at a table outside Jones Coffee on Mission Street in South Pasadena, a short walk from his home — too short, in fact, if he's hoping to make much of a dent in the 15,000 steps he needs to do today as part…

The Guardian - UK

Deviant obsessions: how David Lynch predicted our fragmented times

His work is freaky and frightening, yet today the Twin Peaks director cuts an almost cosy figure. As he turns 77 – a number of significance – we explore how real life caught up with his dark visions

The Guardian - UK

‘Could I understand the people who rushed into the Capitol?’: George Saunders on how stories teach empathy

The Booker-winning author on how fiction unites us as societies become ever more fractured

Sports Illustrated

Roger Federer Leaves Behind Distinct, Beautiful Mark on Tennis

The 20-time major winner has announced his retirement from professional tennis. He leaves behind a distinct, beautiful (of course) mark on the sport.

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Newsroom.co.nz

Book of the Week: Half good Ross Taylor

A review of the Ross Taylor bestseller

The Independent UK

Pizza Hut, luxury luggage and Spitting Image: How Mikhail Gorbachev became an unlikely cultural icon

The last leader of the Soviet Union, who has died at 91, enjoyed an unusual second act as a spokesperson for Western brands. Kevin E G Perry looks back at how Mikhail Gorbachev came to embody the triumph of capitalism

Input

Meet the Bored Ape Yacht Club founders in their first video interview

Greg Solano and Wiley Aronow talk creating BAYC, arguing over David Foster Wallace, and the mom test.

Evening Standard

Serena Williams is living proof that going out on top is hugely overrated

There is something seductive about going out on top. Few things in sport are more shrouded in legend than the walk-off home run, the last-minute winner or the champion who retires undefeated. Always leave them wanting more, the thinking goes. Except, I’m almost certain this is horribly wrong.

Los Angeles Times

Michael Hiltzik: Chevron builds a 'newsroom' to tell stories it doesn't think an independent press will cover

Mother Nature, as the adage goes, must really abhor a vacuum. The evidence is how assiduously she has filled the ever-expanding vacuum in local and investigative news with fakery on a scale that gives the very concept of vacuums a bad name.

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