White Noise Part 1

White Noise.

Don DeLillo.

Introduction by Mark Osteen

White Noise has often been dubbed Don DeLillo's "breakout book." This term is usually meant in one of two ways: either that the work has achieved greater commercial success than an author's previous works, or that it has raised the author's art to a higher level. In the case of has often been dubbed Don DeLillo's "breakout book." This term is usually meant in one of two ways: either that the work has achieved greater commercial success than an author's previous works, or that it has raised the author's art to a higher level. In the case of White Noise, White Noise, the second is arguable, but the first is definitely true, for the novel garnered the best reviews and strongest sales of DeLillo's career to that point. It is not difficult to understand why it became one of the most widely acclaimed fictional works of the 1980s: its mordantly witty anatomy of the postnuclear family; its sly satire of television, advertising, and academia; its letter-perfect portrayal of the sounds and sights of supermarkets, malls, and tabloids all strike chords that reverberate strongly with contemporary Americans. the second is arguable, but the first is definitely true, for the novel garnered the best reviews and strongest sales of DeLillo's career to that point. It is not difficult to understand why it became one of the most widely acclaimed fictional works of the 1980s: its mordantly witty anatomy of the postnuclear family; its sly satire of television, advertising, and academia; its letter-perfect portrayal of the sounds and sights of supermarkets, malls, and tabloids all strike chords that reverberate strongly with contemporary Americans.

When White Noise White Noise was first published in January 1985, reviewers were struck by its timeliness; indeed, appearing only a month after a toxic chemical leak at a Union Carbide plant in Bhopal, India, killed some 2,500 people, DeLillo's novel-with an "airborne toxic event" at its center-seemed almost eerily prescient. Although a few reviewers criticized its plot (or alleged plotlessness), found its witticisms too clever, or accused the author of "trendiness," these voices were drowned out by a chorus of praise. As they did in his earlier novels, reviewers recognized the validity of DeLillo's insights about the oppressive effects of contemporary cultural inst.i.tutions and applauded the astonis.h.i.+ng linguistic gifts was first published in January 1985, reviewers were struck by its timeliness; indeed, appearing only a month after a toxic chemical leak at a Union Carbide plant in Bhopal, India, killed some 2,500 people, DeLillo's novel-with an "airborne toxic event" at its center-seemed almost eerily prescient. Although a few reviewers criticized its plot (or alleged plotlessness), found its witticisms too clever, or accused the author of "trendiness," these voices were drowned out by a chorus of praise. As they did in his earlier novels, reviewers recognized the validity of DeLillo's insights about the oppressive effects of contemporary cultural inst.i.tutions and applauded the astonis.h.i.+ng linguistic gifts White Noise White Noise displays in its sparkling dialogue and in Jack Gladney's alternately bemused, frightened, and self-critical narrative voice. Many readers found Gladney more approachable than the alienated protagonists of DeLillo's previous works; many adults- especially, I suspect, academics-would echo Gladney's blend of denunciation of and baffled appreciation for popular culture. But the novel's most immediately appealing quality is its humor: it's simply a very funny book. I remember reading aloud to friends Jack and Babette's precoital conversation about "entering," Heinrich's stubborn refusal to accept his senses' evidence of rain, and the uproarious one-upmans.h.i.+p of the American Environments department. Although DeLillo's earlier novels were also humorous, they carried a more sardonic, Swiftian edge that lacerated with a cooler precision. Many readers have found displays in its sparkling dialogue and in Jack Gladney's alternately bemused, frightened, and self-critical narrative voice. Many readers found Gladney more approachable than the alienated protagonists of DeLillo's previous works; many adults- especially, I suspect, academics-would echo Gladney's blend of denunciation of and baffled appreciation for popular culture. But the novel's most immediately appealing quality is its humor: it's simply a very funny book. I remember reading aloud to friends Jack and Babette's precoital conversation about "entering," Heinrich's stubborn refusal to accept his senses' evidence of rain, and the uproarious one-upmans.h.i.+p of the American Environments department. Although DeLillo's earlier novels were also humorous, they carried a more sardonic, Swiftian edge that lacerated with a cooler precision. Many readers have found White Noise's White Noise's humor more palatable because it is leavened by a warmth and compa.s.sion less obvious in DeLillo's earlier work. humor more palatable because it is leavened by a warmth and compa.s.sion less obvious in DeLillo's earlier work.

Much of this warm comedy is derived from DeLillo's slightly skewed depiction of the postmodern family, where the once-solid core of mom, dad, and kids has given way to a loose aggregate of siblings, step-siblings, and ex-spouses rotating in various impermanent groupings. Jack Gladney, professor of Hitler Studies at the College-on-the-Hill in a town called Blacksmith, has four children: Mary Alice (age 19) and Steffie (9), from his first and second marriages to Dana Breed-love; Heinrich (14), from his marriage to Janet Savory (now known as Mother Devi); and Bee (12), from his marriage to Tweedy Browner. Only Heinrich and Steffie live with Jack. His wife Babette's three children are Denise (age 11), Eugene (8), and Wilder (about 2). As Thomas Ferraro points out, since Wilder is not Jack's child, this "family" can have been together no more than two years; moreover, not one child is living with a full sibling (Ferraro 1991, 17). This condition of permanent impermanence affects all of Blacksmith, a place of "tag sales and yard sales" where "failed possessions" testify to failed marriages (White Noise, (White Noise, 59). Things change so rapidly that even the family members seem unclear about the details. No wonder Jack sees the family as the "cradle of the world's misinformation" (81). 59). Things change so rapidly that even the family members seem unclear about the details. No wonder Jack sees the family as the "cradle of the world's misinformation" (81).

But though the family's handle on facts is hilariously shaky, their conversations also suggest the unfunny results of living in a high-technology society: there is abundant information around, but n.o.body seems to know anything. And just as the family members gorge themselves with disposable information and fast food, so are they also inundated by consumer goods, not only when they visit the supermarket and the mall, but also when they are at home watching television, which they seem to do constantly. Indeed, White Noise White Noise is preoccupied with consumerism and with the values inherent in a consumer society. DeLillo's treatment of these ubiquitous features of contemporary life is surprisingly balanced: although he satirizes the family's addictions, he gives many of the best lines to Jack's colleague Murray Jay Siskind, who enthusiastically celebrates television and shopping as contemporary religious rituals. DeLillo dramatizes the omnipresence of TV and consumerism by punctuating the scenes with disembodied electronic voices and lists of brand names. Simultaneously attesting to the novel's highly textured realism and violating it by reminding us of the author's controlling presence, these mysterious, often acerbic insertions are one reason the novel has been called "postmodern." is preoccupied with consumerism and with the values inherent in a consumer society. DeLillo's treatment of these ubiquitous features of contemporary life is surprisingly balanced: although he satirizes the family's addictions, he gives many of the best lines to Jack's colleague Murray Jay Siskind, who enthusiastically celebrates television and shopping as contemporary religious rituals. DeLillo dramatizes the omnipresence of TV and consumerism by punctuating the scenes with disembodied electronic voices and lists of brand names. Simultaneously attesting to the novel's highly textured realism and violating it by reminding us of the author's controlling presence, these mysterious, often acerbic insertions are one reason the novel has been called "postmodern."

Another reason is that White Noise White Noise flouts the conventions it seems to invoke, imitating a number of different genres, but ultimately fitting none of them. For example, the relatively plotless part 1 presents itself as a hyperintelligent TV sitcom, complete with brainy children, zany friends, and ba.n.a.l conflicts. Even here, however, DeLillo alludes to deeper disturbances: Jack and Babette debate about who will die first; Wilder ululates at length for no apparent reason. Things turn much darker when, in part 2, the family is forced to flee a toxic leak; the book begins to resemble a disaster thriller, except that DeLillo is less interested in providing graphic descriptions of poisoning than in tracing its subtler, long-term effects, especially on Jack, who is exposed to the toxic substance and hence "tentatively scheduled to die" (202). No longer comforted by hunkering in Hitler's penumbra, and bereft of strong ties to religion, community, or family, Jack becomes desperately obsessed with his mortality. The novel seems to veer into a midlife crisis tale. But Jack doesn't take up skydiving or learn to box. Instead, after learning that Babette has been involved in a secret experiment involving Dylar, a drug designed to dispel the fear of death, he schemes to get some at any cost. Jack's less attractive qualities-self-absorption, hypocrisy, rage-emerge, prompting him to devise an implausible plot that itself seems to come from a TV movie. Yet Jack's alternately ludicrous and pathetic confrontation with his nemesis neither solves his problem nor resolves the plot, which does not, after all, "move death-ward" (26). With this enigmatic, postmodernist conclusion, the novel moves beyond all the formulae it has employed. flouts the conventions it seems to invoke, imitating a number of different genres, but ultimately fitting none of them. For example, the relatively plotless part 1 presents itself as a hyperintelligent TV sitcom, complete with brainy children, zany friends, and ba.n.a.l conflicts. Even here, however, DeLillo alludes to deeper disturbances: Jack and Babette debate about who will die first; Wilder ululates at length for no apparent reason. Things turn much darker when, in part 2, the family is forced to flee a toxic leak; the book begins to resemble a disaster thriller, except that DeLillo is less interested in providing graphic descriptions of poisoning than in tracing its subtler, long-term effects, especially on Jack, who is exposed to the toxic substance and hence "tentatively scheduled to die" (202). No longer comforted by hunkering in Hitler's penumbra, and bereft of strong ties to religion, community, or family, Jack becomes desperately obsessed with his mortality. The novel seems to veer into a midlife crisis tale. But Jack doesn't take up skydiving or learn to box. Instead, after learning that Babette has been involved in a secret experiment involving Dylar, a drug designed to dispel the fear of death, he schemes to get some at any cost. Jack's less attractive qualities-self-absorption, hypocrisy, rage-emerge, prompting him to devise an implausible plot that itself seems to come from a TV movie. Yet Jack's alternately ludicrous and pathetic confrontation with his nemesis neither solves his problem nor resolves the plot, which does not, after all, "move death-ward" (26). With this enigmatic, postmodernist conclusion, the novel moves beyond all the formulae it has employed.

Even those who cherish the novel's comedy cannot ignore its deeply ominous undercurrent, for White Noise White Noise is most of all a profound study of the American way of death: one of DeLillo's working t.i.tles was "The American Book of the Dead." It gains much of its remarkable resonance from its unflinching depiction of the nameless fear pervading postmodern society. Like Murray Siskind, DeLillo is particularly interested in "American magic and dread," and his novel dramatizes how our obsessions with exercise and disease, our millennialist religions, our tabloid stories of resurrection and celebrity wors.h.i.+p, and our compulsive consumerism offer charms to counteract the terror of oblivion. is most of all a profound study of the American way of death: one of DeLillo's working t.i.tles was "The American Book of the Dead." It gains much of its remarkable resonance from its unflinching depiction of the nameless fear pervading postmodern society. Like Murray Siskind, DeLillo is particularly interested in "American magic and dread," and his novel dramatizes how our obsessions with exercise and disease, our millennialist religions, our tabloid stories of resurrection and celebrity wors.h.i.+p, and our compulsive consumerism offer charms to counteract the terror of oblivion.

White Noise is thus also a novel about religion-or, perhaps more accurately, about belief. Like DeLillo's later novel, is thus also a novel about religion-or, perhaps more accurately, about belief. Like DeLillo's later novel, Mao II Mao II (1991), it asks, "When the old G.o.d leaves the world, what happens to all the unexpended faith?" (1991), it asks, "When the old G.o.d leaves the world, what happens to all the unexpended faith?" (Mao II, (Mao II, 7). DeLillo has long been attracted to books that "open out onto some larger mystery" (LeClair 1982, 26); 7). DeLillo has long been attracted to books that "open out onto some larger mystery" (LeClair 1982, 26); White Noise White Noise is such a book, one that alludes constantly to what lies just beyond our hearing, to the mysterious, the untellable, the numinous-to what DeLillo calls the "radiance in dailiness" (see page 330 of this volume). The novel defamiliarizes our familiar world by listening to the sounds and listing the products and places-television, supermarkets, and shopping centers, as well as "The Airport Marriott, the Downtown Travelodge, the Sheraton Inn and Conference Center" is such a book, one that alludes constantly to what lies just beyond our hearing, to the mysterious, the untellable, the numinous-to what DeLillo calls the "radiance in dailiness" (see page 330 of this volume). The novel defamiliarizes our familiar world by listening to the sounds and listing the products and places-television, supermarkets, and shopping centers, as well as "The Airport Marriott, the Downtown Travelodge, the Sheraton Inn and Conference Center" (White Noise, (White Noise, 15)-that channel the spiritual yearnings of contemporary Americans. In 15)-that channel the spiritual yearnings of contemporary Americans. In White Noise White Noise we revisit those temples where Americans seek "[p]eace of mind in a profit-oriented context" (87). we revisit those temples where Americans seek "[p]eace of mind in a profit-oriented context" (87).

Despite its undeniable originality, White Noise White Noise also reprises the themes and strategies of DeLillo's earlier works. Like his first three novels, it features a first-person narrator who maintains an uneasy relations.h.i.+p with ma.s.s culture. David Bell, the protagonist of DeLillo's first novel, also reprises the themes and strategies of DeLillo's earlier works. Like his first three novels, it features a first-person narrator who maintains an uneasy relations.h.i.+p with ma.s.s culture. David Bell, the protagonist of DeLillo's first novel, Americana Americana (1971), drops out of his job at a television network to make an autobiographical film scrutinizing Americans' wors.h.i.+p of televised and advertised images. In one scene (reprinted here on page 335), a character in Bell 's film calls television "an electronic form of packaging," a phrase that (1971), drops out of his job at a television network to make an autobiographical film scrutinizing Americans' wors.h.i.+p of televised and advertised images. In one scene (reprinted here on page 335), a character in Bell 's film calls television "an electronic form of packaging," a phrase that White Noise White Noise retransmits in its recurrent litanies of brand names and broadcast voices. retransmits in its recurrent litanies of brand names and broadcast voices.

The glut of images and glamour of celebrity displayed in White Noise's White Noise's tabloids take center stage in tabloids take center stage in Great Jones Street Great Jones Street (1973) and (1973) and Mao II. Mao II. Like Gladney, both Bucky Wunderlick, the earlier novel's rock-star protagonist, and Like Gladney, both Bucky Wunderlick, the earlier novel's rock-star protagonist, and Mao II Mao II's novelist Bill Gray seek what Wunderlick calls a "moral form to master commerce"-a means of discovering authenticity in a world crowded with images and commodities (Great Jones Street, (Great Jones Street, 70). Like Bell, these characters withdraw into coc.o.o.ns where they script private narratives or pursue semisacred quests, only to find their efforts transformed into just another spectacle or consumer item. 70). Like Bell, these characters withdraw into coc.o.o.ns where they script private narratives or pursue semisacred quests, only to find their efforts transformed into just another spectacle or consumer item.

Another theme that White Noise White Noise shares with DeLillo's earlier novels is the social impact of technology, particularly its most devastating products-atomic weapons and poisonous waste. Gary Harkness, the narrator of shares with DeLillo's earlier novels is the social impact of technology, particularly its most devastating products-atomic weapons and poisonous waste. Gary Harkness, the narrator of End Zone End Zone (1972), discovers a disturbing fascination with the language and "theology" of nuclear war. (1972), discovers a disturbing fascination with the language and "theology" of nuclear war. End Zone End Zone foreshadows foreshadows White Noise White Noise both in its parody of disaster novels and in its protagonist's ambivalence about technology and its consequences. Similarly, both in its parody of disaster novels and in its protagonist's ambivalence about technology and its consequences. Similarly, Ratner's Star Ratner's Star (1976) blends mathematics and Menippean satire to mount a scathing critique of scientific authority, exposing it as an elaborate form of magic that neither consoles nor contains the fear of mortality it conceals. In these earlier novels, as in (1976) blends mathematics and Menippean satire to mount a scathing critique of scientific authority, exposing it as an elaborate form of magic that neither consoles nor contains the fear of mortality it conceals. In these earlier novels, as in White Noise, White Noise, science engenders a deep and dangerous alienation from nature. DeLillo has returned to these themes in his most recent novel, science engenders a deep and dangerous alienation from nature. DeLillo has returned to these themes in his most recent novel, Underworld Underworld (1997), which meditates on the intertwined relations.h.i.+p between waste and weapons. (1997), which meditates on the intertwined relations.h.i.+p between waste and weapons.

DeLillo's next three novels, Players Players (1977), (1977), Running Dog Running Dog (1978), and (1978), and The Names The Names (1982), offer variations on the terrorist thriller, in which bewildered protagonists seek solace in cathartic violence. (1982), offer variations on the terrorist thriller, in which bewildered protagonists seek solace in cathartic violence. Players Players adumbrates adumbrates White Noise White Noise not only in its superbly rendered dialogue and its depiction of the sedative effects of television (see the excerpt reprinted on pages 342-43), but also in its sharp portrayal of contemporary marriage. Like Jack Gladney, Lyle and Pammy Wynant, the bored protagonists of not only in its superbly rendered dialogue and its depiction of the sedative effects of television (see the excerpt reprinted on pages 342-43), but also in its sharp portrayal of contemporary marriage. Like Jack Gladney, Lyle and Pammy Wynant, the bored protagonists of Players, Players, are at once tranquilized and terrorized by the inst.i.tutions with which they are inextricably involved. The swift, cinematic are at once tranquilized and terrorized by the inst.i.tutions with which they are inextricably involved. The swift, cinematic Running Dog Running Dog marks DeLillo's first a.n.a.lysis of what Gladney calls the "continuing ma.s.s appeal of fascist tyranny" (25). Much of that appeal, according to marks DeLillo's first a.n.a.lysis of what Gladney calls the "continuing ma.s.s appeal of fascist tyranny" (25). Much of that appeal, according to Running Dog, Running Dog, issues from the insinuation of filmed images into every crevice of our lives. If in issues from the insinuation of filmed images into every crevice of our lives. If in White Noise White Noise television is a ubiquitous voice droning at the edges of consciousness, in television is a ubiquitous voice droning at the edges of consciousness, in Running Dog Running Dog the omnipresence of cameras transforms all behavior into acting, disabling characters from discriminating between real things and images. the omnipresence of cameras transforms all behavior into acting, disabling characters from discriminating between real things and images. The Names, The Names, the novel about American expatriates that immediately precedes the novel about American expatriates that immediately precedes White Noise, White Noise, explicitly investigated for the first time what had always been DeLillo's implicit subject: the nature and value of language itself. Although the plot outline resembles those of DeLillo's earlier novels, explicitly investigated for the first time what had always been DeLillo's implicit subject: the nature and value of language itself. Although the plot outline resembles those of DeLillo's earlier novels, The Names The Names leaves us with DeLillo's first hopeful denouement, as narrator James Axton recognizes in his son's exhilaratingly mangled prose a source of redemption that, prefigures Jack Gladney's discovery of "splendid transcendence" in the utterances of his children (155). leaves us with DeLillo's first hopeful denouement, as narrator James Axton recognizes in his son's exhilaratingly mangled prose a source of redemption that, prefigures Jack Gladney's discovery of "splendid transcendence" in the utterances of his children (155).

The works that followed White Noise White Noise have shown DeLillo continuing to experiment with form and subject. In 1986, have shown DeLillo continuing to experiment with form and subject. In 1986, The Day Room, The Day Room, a play, was first produced. It meditates on the relations.h.i.+p between madness and inspiration and features a straitjacketed actor playing a television set (which, as in a play, was first produced. It meditates on the relations.h.i.+p between madness and inspiration and features a straitjacketed actor playing a television set (which, as in White Noise, White Noise, provides absurdly apposite comments). DeLillo's subsequent novels have equalled the critical and commercial triumph of provides absurdly apposite comments). DeLillo's subsequent novels have equalled the critical and commercial triumph of White Noise. Libra White Noise. Libra (1988), brilliantly synthesizing a fictional biography of Lee Harvey Oswald with a plausible account of a conspiracy to kill President John Kennedy, earned nearly as many critical plaudits and even more commercial success than (1988), brilliantly synthesizing a fictional biography of Lee Harvey Oswald with a plausible account of a conspiracy to kill President John Kennedy, earned nearly as many critical plaudits and even more commercial success than White Noise. White Noise. Although distinct in both theme and structure, it shares with Although distinct in both theme and structure, it shares with White Noise White Noise a self-reflexive consideration of our need for plots. a self-reflexive consideration of our need for plots. Mao II, Mao II, like like Libra, Libra, won a major national award and for the first time directly addressed DeLillo's understanding of the writer's place in society. won a major national award and for the first time directly addressed DeLillo's understanding of the writer's place in society.

Underworld, a monumental chronicle of America since 1951, unfolding mostly in reverse, is DeLillo's most universally acclaimed and best-selling work so far. While most of DeLillo's works have been compact, even terse, a monumental chronicle of America since 1951, unfolding mostly in reverse, is DeLillo's most universally acclaimed and best-selling work so far. While most of DeLillo's works have been compact, even terse, Underworld Underworld covers a vast canvas with dozens of characters. One of its protagonists, the haunted "waste a.n.a.lyst" Nick Shay, recalls Gladney in his obsession with the detritus of consumer culture and his attraction to violence and the demonic. Although covers a vast canvas with dozens of characters. One of its protagonists, the haunted "waste a.n.a.lyst" Nick Shay, recalls Gladney in his obsession with the detritus of consumer culture and his attraction to violence and the demonic. Although Underworld Underworld is at once broader and more personal than DeLillo's earlier novels-drawing for the first time upon his background as an Italian American reared in the Bronx-it expands again on the relations.h.i.+p between "American magic and dread," a.n.a.lyzing the myriad theologies through which Americans seek to reclaim transcendence in a world of fearsome technologies and fulsome messages. is at once broader and more personal than DeLillo's earlier novels-drawing for the first time upon his background as an Italian American reared in the Bronx-it expands again on the relations.h.i.+p between "American magic and dread," a.n.a.lyzing the myriad theologies through which Americans seek to reclaim transcendence in a world of fearsome technologies and fulsome messages.

White Noise thus brings together many of DeLillo's obsessions: the deleterious effects of capitalism, the power of electronic images, the tyrannical authority and dangerous byproducts of science, the unholy alliance of consumerism and violence, and the quest for sacredness in a secularized world. Like all of his fiction, it displays his virtuoso command of language and, particularly, his ventriloquistic capacity to mimic the argots of various cultural forms. In it he amplifies the noises around us and permits us to hear again how these sounds shape our own voices and beliefs. thus brings together many of DeLillo's obsessions: the deleterious effects of capitalism, the power of electronic images, the tyrannical authority and dangerous byproducts of science, the unholy alliance of consumerism and violence, and the quest for sacredness in a secularized world. Like all of his fiction, it displays his virtuoso command of language and, particularly, his ventriloquistic capacity to mimic the argots of various cultural forms. In it he amplifies the noises around us and permits us to hear again how these sounds shape our own voices and beliefs.

The first critical a.n.a.lysis of White Noise White Noise appeared only two years after its publication, in Tom LeClair's influential book, appeared only two years after its publication, in Tom LeClair's influential book, In the Loop: Don DeLillo and the Systems Novel. In the Loop: Don DeLillo and the Systems Novel. LeClair places DeLillo in the canon of other American "systems novelists" (such as Thomas Pynchon), who a.n.a.lyze the effects of inst.i.tutions on the individual. LeClair's chapter on LeClair places DeLillo in the canon of other American "systems novelists" (such as Thomas Pynchon), who a.n.a.lyze the effects of inst.i.tutions on the individual. LeClair's chapter on White Noise White Noise (reprinted here on pages 387-411) presents the Gladneys' trash compactor as a self-reflexive image of both the novel itself and of postmodern America; he goes on to argue that DeLillo finds in that rubbish a source of transcendence that enables Jack to glean a more satisfactory relations.h.i.+p with nature, his body, and death. (reprinted here on pages 387-411) presents the Gladneys' trash compactor as a self-reflexive image of both the novel itself and of postmodern America; he goes on to argue that DeLillo finds in that rubbish a source of transcendence that enables Jack to glean a more satisfactory relations.h.i.+p with nature, his body, and death.

Frank Lentricchia's 1989 essay in Raritan Raritan (see page 412), together with the two essay collections he subsequently edited, helped attract academic attention to DeLillo's work. Lentricchia discusses the "most photographed barn in America " as one of DeLillo's-and our own- "primal scenes," finding in it a perfect instance of how images have supplanted events in contemporary America. (see page 412), together with the two essay collections he subsequently edited, helped attract academic attention to DeLillo's work. Lentricchia discusses the "most photographed barn in America " as one of DeLillo's-and our own- "primal scenes," finding in it a perfect instance of how images have supplanted events in contemporary America.

Both LeClair and Lentricchia discuss DeLillo's language, but they emphasize most his authority as a cultural critic. Their emphasis has been shared by many critics, as White Noise White Noise has gone on to become one of the most frequently taught and a.n.a.lyzed contemporary novels. With the rise of cultural studies in the academy, many literary critics diverted their attention to the very arenas-TV, advertising, pop culture-depicted in has gone on to become one of the most frequently taught and a.n.a.lyzed contemporary novels. With the rise of cultural studies in the academy, many literary critics diverted their attention to the very arenas-TV, advertising, pop culture-depicted in White Noise, White Noise, applying theories such as those propounded by French cultural theorist Jean Baudrillard. In his highly influential book applying theories such as those propounded by French cultural theorist Jean Baudrillard. In his highly influential book Simulations, Simulations, Baudrillard argues that original ideas and events have now been replaced by simulacra-an infinite regress of reproductions without origins; in turn, the "real" has given way to what he calls the "hyperreal" (Baudrillard 1988, 166). John Frow was the first to elucidate the connection between Baudrillard argues that original ideas and events have now been replaced by simulacra-an infinite regress of reproductions without origins; in turn, the "real" has given way to what he calls the "hyperreal" (Baudrillard 1988, 166). John Frow was the first to elucidate the connection between White Noise White Noise and Baudrillardian simulacra, arguing that the replacement of originals by simulations has worked both to pervert and preserve American myths of origins and authenticity. One of the main forces behind this s.h.i.+ft, Frow argues, is television, which, along with the consumer capitalism it serves, reduces all phenomena to mere information. and Baudrillardian simulacra, arguing that the replacement of originals by simulations has worked both to pervert and preserve American myths of origins and authenticity. One of the main forces behind this s.h.i.+ft, Frow argues, is television, which, along with the consumer capitalism it serves, reduces all phenomena to mere information.

Although other critics, most notably Leonard Wilc.o.x, have also interpreted the novel through Baudrillardian paradigms, perhaps the most extreme statement of this viewpoint is that of John Duvall, who argues in the essay reprinted on pages 432-455 that White Noise White Noise is "an extended gloss... on Baudrillard's notion of consumer society." Duvall makes the radical claim that consumer society, which pretends to foster free choice, actually inhibits it and thereby promotes a "protofascist" system that recapitulates the abuses of n.a.z.i Germany. Like Frow, Duvall concentrates on television, which inverts the relations.h.i.+p between mediated and immediate experiences, so that only what is broadcast by the media seems real. Other critics, such as Ferraro, have offered more moderate versions of Duvall's arguments. Still, Duvall's piece is exemplary in its treatment of Murray Siskind as the novel's Mephistophelean spokesman for what, Duvall argues, DeLillo finds most dangerous. is "an extended gloss... on Baudrillard's notion of consumer society." Duvall makes the radical claim that consumer society, which pretends to foster free choice, actually inhibits it and thereby promotes a "protofascist" system that recapitulates the abuses of n.a.z.i Germany. Like Frow, Duvall concentrates on television, which inverts the relations.h.i.+p between mediated and immediate experiences, so that only what is broadcast by the media seems real. Other critics, such as Ferraro, have offered more moderate versions of Duvall's arguments. Still, Duvall's piece is exemplary in its treatment of Murray Siskind as the novel's Mephistophelean spokesman for what, Duvall argues, DeLillo finds most dangerous.

Cornel Bonca opposes critics like Duvall and their inferences about DeLillo's Baudrillardian views (see page 456 of this volume). Drawing evidence from both White Noise White Noise and and The Names, The Names, Bonca distinguishes between two kinds of "white noise": one issuing from capitalism and commodities, the other deriving from a deeper source in human consciousness. This latter may, he argues, counteract our mortal dread. Bonca isolates three scenes-Wilder's wailing in chapter 16, Steffie's chanting of "Toyota Celica" during the airborne toxic event, and the German nun's words about belief near the end of the novel-to expose the way that DeLillo discovers a "purer speech" beneath and within the novel's babble of voices. Bonca distinguishes between two kinds of "white noise": one issuing from capitalism and commodities, the other deriving from a deeper source in human consciousness. This latter may, he argues, counteract our mortal dread. Bonca isolates three scenes-Wilder's wailing in chapter 16, Steffie's chanting of "Toyota Celica" during the airborne toxic event, and the German nun's words about belief near the end of the novel-to expose the way that DeLillo discovers a "purer speech" beneath and within the novel's babble of voices.

Arthur M. Saltzman also scrutinizes DeLillo's language; unlike Bonca, however, who reads white noise as symbol for the denial or fear of death, Saltzman hears as it as a monotonous, narcotizing sound (see page 480 of this volume). The toxicity of our world resides, for Saltzman, as much in our saturation by formulaic language as in black, billowing clouds; the antidote for this aural poison lies in the incisive originality of DeLillo's metaphorical language. Like Bonca, Saltzman finds the novel groping for something luminous within the quotidian, that "radiance in dailiness" cited earlier.

Saltzman and Bonca suggest a new slant in DeLillo criticism. Both LeClair and Lentricchia noted how DeLillo's work leaves a place for "the poetry of mystery, awe, and commitment" (Lentricchia, New Essays, 7), and recent criticism has swerved more decidedly toward reading DeLillo in religious or mystical terms. Paul Maltby sees in DeLillo's faith in the redemptive power of language a reaffirmation of the visionary metaphysics of Romantics such as Wordsworth (see page 498 of this volume). Against postmodernist readings of DeLillo, Maltby describes a humanist seeker of the sublime; thus, although Maltby again focuses on Steffie's chanting of "Toyota Celica," he finds in it not Saltzman's "synthetic and deadly" consumer drug, but a potential for sublimity within ba.n.a.lity that nonetheless exposes the emptiness and superficiality of contemporary culture.

Clearly White Noise White Noise is rich enough to provoke contradictory responses, and it will continue to intrigue us because it eludes full explanation. Its conclusion is particularly noteworthy in this regard. How should we interpret Wilder's tricycle ride across the interstate? Is he divinely protected or just lucky? What does it imply about Jack's faith in the wisdom and innocence of children? What is Jack's-and DeLillo's att.i.tude toward those "postmodern sunsets" to which the residents of Blacksmith flock? And what is the tone of Jack's final description of the supermarket, with its tabloids offering "Everything that is not food or love" (326)? Is he voicing a dazed acceptance? Issuing a sardonic warning? Declaring a numbed neutrality? The author neither judges, spells out his message, nor provides a tidy conclusion. is rich enough to provoke contradictory responses, and it will continue to intrigue us because it eludes full explanation. Its conclusion is particularly noteworthy in this regard. How should we interpret Wilder's tricycle ride across the interstate? Is he divinely protected or just lucky? What does it imply about Jack's faith in the wisdom and innocence of children? What is Jack's-and DeLillo's att.i.tude toward those "postmodern sunsets" to which the residents of Blacksmith flock? And what is the tone of Jack's final description of the supermarket, with its tabloids offering "Everything that is not food or love" (326)? Is he voicing a dazed acceptance? Issuing a sardonic warning? Declaring a numbed neutrality? The author neither judges, spells out his message, nor provides a tidy conclusion.

This final pa.s.sage exemplifies how DeLillo operates from the inside of the cultural inst.i.tutions that he is a.s.sessing to instigate a dialogue with postmodern culture that takes place in the very language we speak, albeit one more beautifully rendered and ironically gauged, one that borrows familiar formulae but maintains a measured opposition. Masking its critique in celebration, White Noise White Noise inhabits the very heart of postmodern culture to weigh its menaces against its marvels, alerting us to its wonder as well as its waste. inhabits the very heart of postmodern culture to weigh its menaces against its marvels, alerting us to its wonder as well as its waste.

Mark Osteen

WORKS CITED.

Baudrillard, Jean. Selected Writings. Selected Writings. Edited by Mark Poster. Stanford, Calif.: Stanford University Press, 1988. Edited by Mark Poster. Stanford, Calif.: Stanford University Press, 1988.

DeLillo, Don. Americana Americana . . Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1971. Reprint, New York: Penguin, 1989. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1971. Reprint, New York: Penguin, 1989.

Great Jones Street. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1973. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1973.

"An Interview with Don DeLillo." By Tom LeClair. Contemporary Literature Contemporary Literature 23 (1982): 19-31. 23 (1982): 19-31.

Mao II. New York; Viking, 1991. New York; Viking, 1991.

"An Outsider in This Society." Interview by Anthony DeCurtis.

In Introducing Don DeLillo, Introducing Don DeLillo, edited by Frank Lentricchia. Durham, N.C.: Duke University Press, 1991. edited by Frank Lentricchia. Durham, N.C.: Duke University Press, 1991.

Ferraro, Thomas J. "Whole Families Shopping at Night!" In New Essays on Essays on White Noise, edited by Frank Lentricchia. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1991. White Noise, edited by Frank Lentricchia. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1991.

Lentricchia, Frank. Introduction to New Essays on Essays on White Noise. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1991. White Noise. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1991.

Wilc.o.x, Leonard. "Baudrillard, DeLillo's White Noise, White Noise, and the End of Heroic Narrative." and the End of Heroic Narrative." Contemporary Literature Contemporary Literature 32 (1991): 346-65. 32 (1991): 346-65.

White Noise To Sue Buck and to Lois Wallace

I Waves and Radiation

1.

The station wagons arrived at noon, a long s.h.i.+ning line that coursed through the west campus. In single file they eased around the orange I-beam sculpture and moved toward the dormitories. The roofs of the station wagons were loaded down with carefully secured suitcases full of light and heavy clothing; with boxes of blankets, boots and shoes, stationery and books, sheets, pillows, quilts; with rolled-up rugs and sleeping bags; with bicycles, skis, rucksacks, English and Western saddles, inflated rafts. As cars slowed to a crawl and stopped, students sprang out and raced to the rear doors to begin removing the objects inside; the stereo sets, radios, personal computers; small refrigerators and table ranges; the cartons of phonograph records and ca.s.settes; the hairdryers and styling irons; the tennis rackets, soccer b.a.l.l.s, hockey and lacrosse sticks, bows and arrows; the controlled substances, the birth control pills and devices; the jurik food still in shopping bags-onion-and-garlic chips, nacho thins, peanut creme patties, Waffelos and Kabooms, fruit chews and toffee popcorn; the Dum-Dum pops, the Mystic mints.

I've witnessed this spectacle every September for twenty-one years. It is a brilliant event, invariably. The students greet each other with comic cries and gestures of sodden collapse. Their summer has been bloated with criminal pleasures, as always. The parents stand sun-dazed near their automobiles, seeing images of themselves in every direction. The conscientious suntans. The well-made faces and wry looks. They feel a sense of renewal, of communal recognition. The women crisp and alert, in diet trim, knowing people's names. Their husbands content to measure out the time, distant but ungrudging, accomplished in parenthood, something about them suggesting ma.s.sive insurance coverage. This a.s.sembly of station wagons, as much as anything they might do in the course of the year, more than formal liturgies or laws, tells the parents they are a collection of the like-minded and the spiritually akin, a people, a nation.

I left my office and walked down the hill and into town. There are houses in town with turrets and two-story porches where people sit in the shade of ancient maples. There are Greek revival and Gothic churches. There is an insane asylum with an elongated portico, ornamented dormers and a steeply pitched roof topped by a pineapple finial. Babette and I and our children by previous marriages live at the end of a quiet street in what was once a wooded area with deep ravines. There is an expressway beyond the backyard now, well below us, and at night as we settle into our bra.s.s bed the spa.r.s.e traffic washes past, a remote and steady murmur around our sleep, as of dead souls babbling at the edge of a dream.

I am chairman of the department of Hitler studies at the College-on-the-Hill. I invented Hitler studies in North America in March of 1968. It was a cold bright day with intermittent winds out of the east. When I suggested to the chancellor that we might build a whole department around Hitler's life and work, he was quick to see the possibilities. It was an immediate and electrifying success. The chancellor went on to serve as adviser to Nixon, Ford and Carter before his death on a ski lift in Austria.

At Fourth and Elm, cars turn left for the supermarket. A policewoman crouched inside a boxlike vehicle patrols the area looking for cars parked illegally, for meter violations, lapsed inspection stickers. On telephone poles all over town there are homemade signs concerning lost dogs and cats, sometimes in the handwriting of a child.

2.

Babette is tall and fairly ample; there is a girth and heft to her. Her hair is a fanatical blond mop, a particular tawny hue that used to be called dirty blond. If she were a pet.i.te woman, the hair would be too cute, too mischievous and contrived. Size gives her tousled aspect a certain seriousness. Ample women do not plan such things. They lack the guile for conspiracies of the body.

"You should have been there," I said to her.

"Where?"

"It's the day of the station wagons."

"Did I miss it again? You're supposed to remind me."

"They stretched all the way down past the music library and onto the interstate. Blue, green, burgundy, brown. They gleamed in the sun like a desert caravan."

"You know I need reminding, Jack."

Babette, disheveled, has the careless dignity of someone too preoccupied with serious matters to know or care what she looks like. Not that she is a gift-bearer of great things as the world generally reckons them. She gathers and tends the children, teaches a course in an adult education program, belongs to a group of volunteers who read to the blind. Once a week she reads to an elderly man named Treadwell who lives on the edge of town. He is known as Old Man Treadwell, as if he were a landmark, a rock formation or brooding swamp. She reads to him from the National Enquirer, National Enquirer, the the National Examiner, National Examiner, the the National Express, National Express, the the Globe, Globe, the the World, World, the the Star. Star. The old fellow demands his weekly dose of cult mysteries. Why deny him? The point is that Babette, whatever she is doing, makes me feel sweetly rewarded, bound up with a full-souled woman, a lover of daylight and dense life, the miscellaneous swarming air of families. I watch her all the time doing things in measured sequence, skillfully, with seeming ease, unlike my former wives, who had a tendency to feel estranged from the objective world-a self-absorbed and high-strung bunch, with ties to the intelligence community. The old fellow demands his weekly dose of cult mysteries. Why deny him? The point is that Babette, whatever she is doing, makes me feel sweetly rewarded, bound up with a full-souled woman, a lover of daylight and dense life, the miscellaneous swarming air of families. I watch her all the time doing things in measured sequence, skillfully, with seeming ease, unlike my former wives, who had a tendency to feel estranged from the objective world-a self-absorbed and high-strung bunch, with ties to the intelligence community.

"It's not the station wagons I wanted to see. What are the people like? Do the women wear plaid skirts, cable-knit sweaters? Are the men in hacking jackets? What's a hacking jacket?"

"They've grown comfortable with their money," I said. "They genuinely believe they're ent.i.tled to it. This conviction gives them a kind of rude health. They glow a little."

"I have trouble imagining death at that income level," she said.

"Maybe there is no death as we know it. Just doc.u.ments changing hands."

"Not that we don't have a station wagon ourselves."

"It's small, it's metallic gray, it has one whole rusted door."

"Where is Wilder?" she said, routinely panic-stricken, calling out to the child, one of hers, sitting motionless on his tricycle in the backyard.

Babette and I do our talking in the kitchen. The kitchen and the bedroom are the major chambers around here, the power haunts, the sources. She and I are alike in this, that we regard the rest of the house as storage s.p.a.ce for furniture, toys, all the unused objects of earlier marriages and different sets of children, the gifts of lost in-laws, the hand-me-downs and rummages. Things, boxes. Why do these possessions carry such sorrowful weight? There is a darkness attached to them, a foreboding. They make me wary not of personal failure and defeat but of something more general, something large in scope and content.

She came in with Wilder and seated him on the kitchen counter. Denise and Steffie came downstairs and we talked about the school supplies they would need. Soon it was time for lunch. We entered a period of chaos and noise. We milled about, bickered a little, dropped utensils. Finally we were all satisfied with what we'd been able to s.n.a.t.c.h from the cupboards and refrigerator or swipe from each other and we began quietly plastering mustard or mayonnaise on our brightly colored food. The mood was one of deadly serious antic.i.p.ation, a reward hard-won. The table was crowded and Babette and Denise elbowed each other twice, although neither spoke. Wilder was still seated on the counter surrounded by open cartons, crumpled tinfoil, s.h.i.+ny bags of potato chips, bowls of pasty substances covered with plastic wrap, flip-top rings and twist ties, individually wrapped slices of orange cheese. Heinrich came in, studied the scene carefully, my only son, then walked out the back door and disappeared.

"This isn't the lunch I'd planned for myself," Babette said. "I was seriously thinking yogurt and wheat germ."

"Where have we heard that before?" Denise said.

"Probably right here," Steffie said.

"She keeps buying that stuff."

"But she never eats it," Steffie said.

"Because she thinks if she keeps buying it, she'll have to eat it just to get rid of it. It's like she's trying to trick herself."

"It takes up half the kitchen."

"But she throws it away before she eats it because it goes bad," Denise said. "So then she starts the whole thing all over again."

"Wherever you look," Steffie said, "there it is."

"She feels guilty if she doesn't buy it, she feels guilty if she buys it and doesn't eat it, she feels guilty when she sees it in the fridge, she feels guilty when she throws it away."

"It's like she smokes but she doesn't," Steffie said.

Denise was eleven, a hard-nosed kid. She led a more or less daily protest against those of her mother's habits that struck her as wasteful or dangerous. I defended Babette. I told her I was the one who needed to show discipline in matters of diet. I reminded her how much I liked the way she looked. I suggested there was an honesty inherent in bulkiness if it is just the right amount. People trust a certain amount of bulk in others.

But she was not happy with her hips and thighs, walked at a rapid clip, ran up the stadium steps at the neocla.s.sical high school.

She said I made virtues of her flaws because it was my nature to shelter loved ones from the truth. Something lurked inside the truth, she said.

The smoke alarm went off in the hallway upstairs, either to 'et us know the battery had just died or because the house was on fire. We finished our lunch in silence.

3.

Department heads wear academic robes at the College-on-the-Hill. Not grand sweeping full-length affairs but sleeveless tunics puckered at the shoulders. I like the idea. I like clearing my arm from the folds of the garment to look at my watch. The simple act of checking the time is transformed by this flourish. Decorative gestures add romance to a life. Idling students may see time itself as a complex embellishment, a romance of human consciousness, as they witness the chairman walking across campus, crook'd arm emerging from his medieval robe, the digital watch blinking in late summer dusk. The robe is black, of course, and goes with almost anything.

There is no Hitler building as such. We are quartered in Centenary Hall, a dark brick structure we share with the popular culture department, known officially as American environments. A curious group. The teaching staff is composed almost solely of New York emigres, smart, thuggish, movie-mad, trivia-crazed. They are here to decipher the natural language of the culture, to make a formal method of the s.h.i.+ny pleasures they'd known in their Europe-shadowed childhoods-an Aristotelianism of bubble gum wrappers and detergent jingles. The department head is Alfonse (Fast Food) Stompanato, a broad-chested glowering man whose collection of prewar soda pop bottles is on permanent display in an alcove. All his teachers are male, wear rumpled clothes, need haircuts, cough into their armpits. Together they look like teamster officials a.s.sembled to identify the body of a mutilated colleague. The impression is one of pervasive bitterness, suspicion and intrigue.

An exception to some of the above is Murray Jay Siskind, an ex-sportswriter who asked me to have lunch with him in the dining room, where the inst.i.tutional odor of vaguely defined food aroused in me an obscure and gloomy memory. Murray was new to the Hill, a stoop-shouldered man with little round gla.s.ses and an Amish beard. He was a visiting lecturer on living icons and seemed embarra.s.sed by what he'd gleaned so far from his colleagues in popular culture.

"I understand the music, I understand the movies, I even see how comic books can tell us things. But there are full professors in this place who read nothing but cereal boxes."

"It's the only avant-garde we've got."