I think it is a tribute to David Foster Wallace's genius that no one who has taken the time to read him feels indifferent about his death. I love Hemingway but I could understand feeling meh about him. But DFW inspires such passion, either loathing or love. To quote my father:

"The disturbing thing to me is that I saw/see him as a really life-affirming author with whom I share a number of important interests (Wittgenstein, drugs, county fairs, and even lobsters). His description of his female companion's being shaken upside down on some illinois fair ride by a lecherous carny is one of the funniest (and, I think, full of life) things I have ever read."

And to quote the AVclub:

"His specialty, to me, was always the seriousness with which he surveyed those little private moments that engender shame, that special kind of embarrassment-before-self that makes us wither and recoil when we're left alone in churning judgment of ourselves and all the ways we flounder in the world. Maybe it was always darker than I knew, but I've always read him in those moments as possessed by a special kind of glee. He was so good at it, so piercing and poignant, that I assumed Wallace must thrill over his own work as much as those of us who lapped it up so electrically. Maybe he did, maybe he didn't."

I know I already wrote about him but I just keep crying about it. Which is inexplicable. But still it happens.