Abstract
This article argues that law is a central character and subject in David Foster Wallace’s unfinished, metafictional novel, The Pale King. As a subject of the novel, the so-called author disclaims this legal character, while also subjecting himself to it, which provides this text with its extra-textual and metafictional aspects. These aspects raise unanswerable questions, like ‘who is the author?’ and ‘is it finished?’ In showing that the ‘Pale King’ is the legal character, this article contends that The Pale King is a meditation on legal subjection that also, importantly and didactically, demands that readers performativity engage in processes of legal subjection.