Do lobsters feel pain? Did Franz Kafka possess a funny bone? What’s John Updike’s deal, anyway? And what goes on when adult video starlets satisfy their fans in person?

David Foster Wallace answers these questions and even more in essays that are also enthralling narrative adventures. Whether covering the three-ring circus of John McCain’s 2000 presidential race, plunging into the wars between dictionary authors, or confronting the World’s Largest Lobster Cooker on the annual Maine Lobster Festival, Wallace projects an excellent of thought that’s exclusively his and a voice as powerful and distinctive as any in American characters.