[ale]

Agreed. Lerner has an unique way of digging into solipsism that's truly genuine and comical (whereas I feel Knausgård and most of the autofiction crowd's stuff comes across as glorified navel-gazing). It's no wonder he's been compared to Foster Wallace in that regard, who also wrote about deeply human struggles yet still is dismissed as a lit-bro pseudointellectual.

[MrOrelliOReilly]

Yeah, good comparison. To Lerner's credit, he is always a poet at heart, which leads to concise, lyrical prose. DFW is voluminous in comparison; when it lands, its great, but it can feel overinflated/overdone when it doesn't.