The editors close the book with a selection of "Notes and Asides" taken from the rough-draft manuscript. These are touching, humanizing. Here are Wallace's questions, his attempts to figure things out, his "process." There is something alive in these eight pages, something fragile, huge-brained. Wallace's work is challenging and flawed, but it wasn't a stunt. He wasn't trying to trick us. He was trying to help us understand. I'll do my best to take The Pale King for what it is. What that is is up to you.
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Editor's Note: This story originally appeared in the February 20, 1998 edition of the Boston Phoenix .
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