The essay "Consider the Lobster" has changed my life. David Foster Wallace's ruminations on lobster are thought-provoking and eye-opening, no matter what your personal beliefs about lobsters, boiling and pain are. So, to be fair, I'll give you my beliefs upfront: lobster is way too much work to eat, way too tasteless without butter, and it doesn't interest me at all. At the same time, I worry much more about force-fed ducks and debeaked chickens (I am an omnivore, yes) than I do about boiled-alive lobsters.

Wallace has made an important academic contribution on the subject of consuming meat, whether it be mammals or shellfish. His assigned magazine task for the title essay was covering the Maine Lobster Festival. Let me give you a smattering of the questions he raised for me (which still resonate with me weeks later): Why do we call meat by pseudonyms like beef and pork, while sea-dwelling animals are called by their common animal names? Should Maine look down on the Lobster Fest as a tourist trap, when all of us must admit to being tourists at one time in our lives? Really, how is eating lobster on a paper plate with chintzy paper napkins any different than any Midwest festival celebrating beef or corn? Is celebrating the "World's Largest Lobster Cooker" a little obscene -- would we celebrate beef by cheering at the world's biggest slaughterhouse?

The highlight of the essay is Wallace's cogitation on pain -- on what pain is, what thinking animals are, what preferences are, basic neuroscience, a comparison of mammals to humans and other life forms, and the behavior of lobsters in boiling water. Then comes the downfall of Wallace, the attitude which ruins every essay he writes. He's not satisfied to write a few pseudo-apologetic sentences about how Gourmet magazine readers may not want to read about the ethical aspects of their food, but he hopes they should open their minds. Nope, he harps endlessly in his conclusion about how the magazine's reader base needs to consider moving out of their sheltered gourmet-loving lives and listen to his arguments. As someone who had already been moved by his arguments, I was repulsed by his concluding lecture -- almost enough just to adopt a contrary point of view to spite him.

So, now you know my take on Wallace. There are some gems in his musings, but his uppity attitude overshadows any insightful comments he makes. In his essay on 9/11/2001, he comments on the lovely, educated, but woefully mis-informed Midwestern church ladies he spent the day of September 11th with. They were just sad and woeful, but they didn't have the cynicism (intellect?) of a New Yorker who would notice that President Bush's speech was eerily similar to certain movie lines, that the television networks only showed x, y and z, that it was a good career boost for the president, and so on. Let me set the record clear -- I am a cynical liberal Northeasterner. I lived in New York on 9/11/2001. I despise President Bush. And I (along with my extreme left-wing and anarchist roommates) spent the entire day of September 11th sobbing in the living room, watching television. We made no snarky comments. We grieved. I might have developed some conspiracy theories later, but trust me, I was right there with Mrs. T in Bloomington, Illinois, on that fateful day. Our whole nation was in pain, and just because Wallace was a super-cool former NY resident who happened to be in IL at the time, he is no better than his peers in the Midwest. I am disgusted that he used the tragedy of 9/11 to write an essay that elevates his status as one of the Americans (a.k.a. New Yorkers) who the terrorists really hate (as opposed to the Midwest Americans). (While that is not a direct quote, that is precisely the sentiment of Wallace's concluding remarks in his 9/11 essay).

The remainder of Wallace's essays did not win me over. He attended the Adult Video News annual pornography awards, and the resulting essay is aimless. He opens by celebrating the lack of pretension in the porno industry -- by admiring their pure financial success when compared to the Hollywood Oscar-obsessed world. He later contradicts himself by attacking the AVN voting system and mocking the nom de guerres of the voting committee. Wallace's pseudo-intellectual statements on porn are just wrong -- in 1997, he thinks that porn is going so extreme that snuff films are right around the corner. He claims that bizarro filth means that we will be wanting to see girls die on camera. So, there are a few extreme wackos, and there are extreme fetishes in this industry -- that means that all of American is jonesing for snuff films?? (I do, of course, have the benefit hindsight on these predictions, but even so, porn is mainstream, and no women are going to get killed to sell more videos. Your reviewer promises you this. Call me in 20 years and I'll still be right.)

How much more can I beat up on this man? Ahh, the Tracy Austin memoir essay, of which 70 percent is pure brilliance -- as a book review. I haven't read Austin's memoir, but I believe Wallace -- Austin is a brilliant tennis player, but a terrible narrator, and anyone looking for inspiration should steer clear of her book. As a book review, this essay is spot-on, and one of my favorite literary pieces. But Wallace doesn't stop there. Nope, he needs to lecture on (1) how the athlete autobiography always leaves the reader in this unsatisfied position and (2) what Tracy Austin should have written about. Wallace seems to think that his disappointment in his hero (Austin) sums up everyone's experience with hero worship. Most of us know not to expect musical or athletic heroes to write literary masterpieces. Wallace can't accept that, and wants to reprimand his hero, even if he gives an "out" in the end by stating that athletic brilliance requires a certain cluelessness about their natural genius. He also makes blanket statements about "athlete autobiographies" with no supporting evidence other than his experience with Austin's memoir.

No matter how spot-on Wallace's observations are, he twists his remarks to denigrate either the reader or his subjects. The writing is top notch, the research is impeccable, but the experience of listening to this man can leave the reader with negative feelings.