Cliché, Irony and the Necessity of Meaning in Endgame and Infinite Jest

Abstract

With reference to the work of the ordinary language philosopher Stanley Cavell, this essay argues that David Foster Wallace’s 1996 novel Infinite Jest deploys cliché to expose the workings of ironic language in a way that is complementary to a similar exposition in Samuel Beckett’s 1957 play Endgame.