The Grammy Music Awards committee will posthumously name writer David Foster Wallace as a recipient of a Lifetime achievement award in February.
The news was met with quizzical looks and murmurs of "WTH?"
Joyce Muenzler, a self described "huge fan" of Wallace's work, was set against the idea of a Grammy for the novelist when she talked to this reporter.
"It just doesn't make sense," Muenzler said. "It's like your husband may do all sorts of wonderful things for you, but you're not going to give him an award for nuclear physics--because there is no connection there between the two. What they're doing diminishes both the Grammys and Wallace's work. I think he might be amused if he were around for this, it sounds like one of his stories."
Former president George W. Bush weighed in saying he was a fan of Wallace as well.
"I'm a big fan of the man's work, you know I loved the part about the Wheelchair Assassins in Infinite Rainbow. But, really, can't we give him a better award more appropriate to a writer?"
Bush indeed is a fan and is said to have made Dick Cheney read passages of Wallace's work to him over and over, mostly for safety reasons: Bush is a lip mover when he reads and he once got a severe facial cramp when he couldn't put down Wallace's novel Broom Of The System. Bush recovered from the incident after being treated with tranquilizers and Botox.
Not to be outshone by the Grammys, Dancing With The Stars is contemplating a special award for Stephen Hawking.
Stephen Hawking as well as Wallace's family are staying silent on the new awards, all have so far declined requests for comments.
