(New) Sincerity in David Foster Wallace's “Octet”

Abstract

David Foster Wallace's “Octet” provides a singular example of how he endeavors to negotiate with the ever-present specter of irony and interrogate the efficacy and applicability of sincerity within the millennial zeitgeist. By requiring of his readers a vast investment of time and concentration, acknowledging and working through the specter of irony while proleptically anticipating theoretical rebuttals, and resisting both a retrograde appeal for “pre-ironic” sincerity and a reductive synthesis of irony and sincerity, Wallace achieves a “new” position of sincerity that is ostensibly unchallengeable. This, however, exposes an underlying conservative individualism and suggests that the very need for a New Sincerity might be the preserve of a relatively empowered, elite section of U.S. society.