Performative Reading Is Good for Literary Culture

There’s a hilarious sketch with the Wasian actor Quentin Nguyen-duy where he’s duel-wielding an OG copy of DFW’s Infinite Jest and a matcha latte while he’s trying to pick up a woman outside a subway station in Manhattan.

One of the funniest things you can see in New York, of course, is the Men Who Are Reading in Public, that is to say, they are transparently “reading” a paper book as a bit—as a form of attention-seeking behaviour so that they can get laid. Aside from the charming guilelessness of youth, this is indeed an incredibly funny indictment of how post-literate our society is.