This Is Water
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This Is Water Audible Audiobook – Unabridged

4.6 out of 5 stars 2,330
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Only once did David Foster Wallace give a public talk on his views on life, during a commencement address given in 2005 at Kenyon College. The speech is reprinted for the first time in book form in THIS IS WATER. How does one keep from going through their comfortable, prosperous adult life unconsciously? How do we get ourselves out of the foreground of our thoughts and achieve compassion? The speech captures Wallace's electric intellect as well as his grace in attention to others. After his death, it became a treasured piece of writing reprinted in The Wall Street Journal and the London Times, commented on endlessly in blogs, and emailed from friend to friend.

Writing with his one-of-a-kind blend of causal humor, exacting intellect, and practical philosophy, David Foster Wallace probes the challenges of daily living and offers advice that renews us with every reading.
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  1. Listening Length
    23 minutes
  2. Author
    David Foster Wallace
  3. Narrator
    Amy Wallace-Havens
  4. Audible release date
    April 8, 2009
  5. Language
    English
  6. Publisher
    Hachette Audio
  7. ASIN
    B0026N9M08
  8. Version
    Unabridged
  9. Program Type
    Audiobook
  10. See all details
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Product details

Listening Length 23 minutes
Author David Foster Wallace
Narrator Amy Wallace-Havens
Audible.com Release Date April 08, 2009
Publisher Hachette Audio
Program Type Audiobook
Version Unabridged
Language English
ASIN B0026N9M08
Best Sellers Rank #148,582 in Audible Books & Originals (See Top 100 in Audible Books & Originals)
#330 in Ethics & Morality Philosophy
#1,030 in Consciousness & Thought Philosophy
#1,597 in Education (Audible Books & Originals)

Customer reviews

4.6 out of 5 stars
4.6 out of 5
2,330 global ratings

Top reviews from the United States

Maureen Johnston
5.0 out of 5 stars Great read
Reviewed in the United States on October 9, 2023
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I’ve picked up and reread this book three times since I bought it, and keep it in my coffee table for an easy grab. It only takes a short while to read, and you feel better once you’re done. I’ve since bought a couple as gifts since then, too. Very thought provoking.
2 people found this helpful
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VSL
5.0 out of 5 stars Well Appreciated
Reviewed in the United States on June 21, 2023
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I am a big DFW fan, so I was bound to like this anyway. This is a great hard bound edition that looks like it cost double - really, really nice. It is really meant for college grads, but the life lessons give a good head start to high school grads as well. My daughter is a deep thinker, so it was a good thought stimulator for her. This was a good traditional graduation gift and a great way to share my appreciation of DFW.

I will definitely purchase another copy when my next child graduates.
2 people found this helpful
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Tina the S.
5.0 out of 5 stars This Is Water: Some Thoughts, Delivered on a...
Reviewed in the United States on October 31, 2017
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I lovely short boo..each page reads almost like a Japanese koan, which was why, I think, it is written this way. One sentence to a page.. The texture of the boo also makes it a nice formal read. One can stop and reflect upon each Wise sentence as one carefully absorbs the rich meaning behind what is said and how the author chooses to say it. The book presentation is part of what the author intended to enhance meaning and it works! The audio book does not let in these pauses and the meaning and power of the words suffer from it. This book is NOT for listening, but is a short enough thing to have, to touch and to think upon as one goes through it... It clearly explains deep concepts about how adults should approach complex issues which require more than knee-jerk thoughts in response to what is written. The texture of this little book, it pages, its small size, all belie the raw power of the thoughts expressed so gently and with compassion for the reader and the author, both. DEEP nut simple. Lie zen for the American mind.
2 people found this helpful
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Adam Z.
4.0 out of 5 stars A Sad Prediction Come True
Reviewed in the United States on July 18, 2023
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Wallace cuts through the fog of popular psychology with refreshing clarity. The plain truth, he tells us, is that life and the world do not revolve around you. The sooner we figure this out, and sort our lives accordingly, the more likely we are to muddle through with a reasonable chance of staying sane. Sad that Wallace mentions suicide a number of times. Was he even then perhaps considering…?
2 people found this helpful
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Crislaurys Torres
5.0 out of 5 stars Straight to the point
Reviewed in the United States on November 26, 2023
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Truly Enjoyed this book. Opened my eyes about compassion and doing whatever it take to keep going in life.
2 people found this helpful
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Ahura Tzara
5.0 out of 5 stars These Are Words To Live By
Reviewed in the United States on August 14, 2019
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I honestly do not even know where to begin in describing this book. Fosters concise insights into the human condition are a revelation. I've purchased this book several times as a gift for friends, family, and co-workers because of my belief in the usefulness of this book. That's a funny way to describe a book isn't it? Useful. Certainly books can expand the mind and offer new ways of thinking about things, but often the enlightenment they offer is not practical. Plato's Republic is bound to give you plenty to think about and illuminate your understanding the human condition, but how can you truly put those lessons to use in the modern era? This is Water is a guide to life. Foster offers scenarios we are all familiar with and our reactions to them. He then proposes an alternate approach to these mundane activities that can relieve the stress and tension they so often create. My two takeaways from this book would be mindfulness and humility. Mindfulness in understanding that you are not alone in how you feel and that unknown circumstances you could sympathize with may be at factor in your interaction with others. Humility in that you do not know everything and that you are not the center of the universe. The ideas in This is Water are bound to be so obvious that you might dismiss it altogether, but that's the point. Foster explains how often it's the things right in front of us that we take for granted and the solution is putting that understanding in the forefront of our thoughts more often. William S. Burroughs famously said "The job of the artist is to show you what you already know." And in my opinion Foster satisfies that function.
33 people found this helpful
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Carol Metcalf
5.0 out of 5 stars Thought provoking
Reviewed in the United States on December 2, 2023
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Page turner with something to think about on each page
One person found this helpful
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Sara Grimsrud - A Howler to the End
5.0 out of 5 stars As a brand new graduate.... thank you....
Reviewed in the United States on May 24, 2017
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It is always refreshing to read words about awareness in a world that is, at an accelerating speed, becoming less and less aware and more self-centered. As a healthcare worker, I am often counseled, in ways far more subliminal than this beautifully worded lecture by Mr. Wallace, by my patients about how to be more aware and how a situation can be perceived in many ways. These experiences have gifted me with above average emotional maturity and an appreciation of what it means to "choose how and what to think about." These lessons are exceedingly and increasingly more difficult to understand in our ever evolving world and Mr. Wallace just beautifully summed them up in a short, sweet, well-worded and hopeful speech.
4 people found this helpful
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Top reviews from other countries

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Cristian
5.0 out of 5 stars Excelente
Reviewed in Mexico on December 26, 2023
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Es un gran libro, muy rápido para leer, realmente muy rápido y es una gran opción para regalar.
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Stephen A
5.0 out of 5 stars Inspirational read
Reviewed in Canada on July 19, 2021
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This speech puts things into perspective and what's REALLY important. A definite 1 sitting read.
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Murad Saidov
5.0 out of 5 stars Read in 15 minutes, remember for a life time
Reviewed in the United Kingdom on September 22, 2023
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Poignant and thought provoking, really enjoyed this short speech. Reading this reminded me that despite so enjoying infinite jest , I never followed up on reading his other essays and works - something this speech has ensured that I’ll be addressing immediately
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Cla81
5.0 out of 5 stars A different way of thinking, to survive this world
Reviewed in Italy on January 5, 2020
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Read it. It is really inspirational, it has very much in common with what I read about Sikhism. Read it.
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Vivek Tejuja
5.0 out of 5 stars A read that will stay for life.
Reviewed in India on November 2, 2019
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I have read quite a few commencement speeches by authors. Authors who celebrate creativity (Rowling), some who talk about making art great again or creating good art (Gaiman) and some others who speak of the future and what it has in store (Saunders). And then there is someone like Foster Wallace who gives it to you the way it is – the real world, with no sugar-coating whatsoever.

I knew that would be the case once I received this backlist title from the good folks at Hachette India. David Foster Wallace has left behind a legacy. A cannon of work that I at least read in bits and pieces because sometimes what he says is too much to bear.

This is Water is a speech given by Foster Wallace to the graduating class at Kenyon College in 2005. He starts with a little parable – the one that seems like one, and quickly goes on to break that mode of starting a commencement speech. David’s speech is a trove of wisdom and compassion, thought provoking, and what it means to live in the 21st century.

I think the thing about such books that there is no single universal message. There is something that relates with everyone. The message of giving up on the rat-race (is that even possible?), the one that speaks about awareness, self-consciousness before saying or doing what we say or do (this one hit home real hard), or just the one to understand what it means to give and sometimes sacrifice a little bit, if you have to.

David Foster Wallace doesn’t speak of glory in the most basic terms. There is glory in empathy. There is glory in understanding. There is glory in small efforts as he rightly puts it. This is Water is the kind of book that is needed at every stage of life. The speech will resonate throughout.

I will leave you with this thought that is my favourite from this read:

“The really important kind of freedom involves attention and awareness and discipline, and being able truly to care about other people and to sacrifice for them over and over in myriad petty, unsexy ways every day.”
10 people found this helpful
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