This Is Water

In this rare peak into the personal life of the author of numerous bestselling novels, gain an understanding of David Foster Wallace and how he became the man that he was. Only once did David Foster Wallace give a public talk on his views on life, during a commencement address given in 2005 at Kenyon College. The speech is reprinted for the first time in book form in This is Water. How does one keep from going through their comfortable, prosperous adult life unconsciously? How do we get ourselves out of the foreground of our thoughts and achieve compassion? The speech captures Wallace's electric intellect as well as his grace in attention to others. After his death, it became a treasured piece of writing reprinted in The Wall Street Journal and the London Times, commented on endlessly in blogs, and emailed from friend to friend. Writing with his one-of-a-kind blend of causal humor, exacting intellect, and practical philosophy, David Foster Wallace probes the challenges of daily living and offers advice that renews us with every reading.

Recommended by 3 people

Shane Parrish: “If you don't buy this book and read the compilation of interviews, at least watch his 2005 commencement speech, This is Water. If the goal of an artist is to forever change someone, DFW has accomplished that with me.”
Peter Attia: “David Foster Wallace has talked about this so eloquently in his talk, which is one of my favorite talks, This Is Water.”
Hugh Jackman: “he gave me two books that I now gift very regularly. One is E.B. White's Here is New York. The other one is David Foster Wallace's speech, This Is Water, his commencement speech.”