Author: apirkl1336

Alright, I am going to evaluate whether or not I would say White Noise by Don DeLillo is a Great American Novel. Personally, I did not really like the book very much for most of the time I was reading it, but there were some fascinating moments, conversations between characters, and themes explored. Whether or not I liked the novel does not have any real bearing on whether or not the novel was actually good however. My criteria for a Great American Novel is the same that I used for evaluating whether or not Joseph Heller’s Catch 22 was a Great American Novel, which I thought was. My criteria is as follows: the novel explores complex ideas and themes, is well written, and the story elements of the novel (plot, characters, setting) are strong. I’ll be mainly focusing on the first criterion and quickly stating whether or not the next two apply to White Noise.

Firstly, I believe that White Noise definitely explores complex themes, some of those being the absurdity of American Academia, the white noise of American Culture, sex, ownership, and revenge from a masculine point of view, and the fear of death. The primary structure White Noise uses to satirize American Academia is Jack Gladney’s Hitler studies program. One quotation from Murray during his last conversation with Jack Gladney specifically highlights how absurd it is to study or idolize a human figure to the point of having an entire college major based around them: “”Helpless and fearful people are drawn to magical figures, mythic figures, epic men who intimidate and darkly loom,” page 125. Murray is indirectly implying that the Hitler studies program is absurd and unintellectual by stating that helpless people are drawn to Hitler, and thereby the Hitler studies program. Also, the façade which Jack Gladney adopts in order to be more respected as the leader of the Hitler studies program is satirized by Heller in White Noise. It should not be necessary for an intellectual figure such as a college professor to adopt a persona, but stereotypes of American Academia and American culture in general incentivize such a meaningless front. The irony of Jack Gladney not knowing the German language also adds to the absurd portrayal of academia in White Noise.

American Culture and capitalism is also explored in White Noise, through the portrayed absurdity of all of Babette Gladney’s health food items and the semi-American idea of picking and choosing which capitalistic vices to indulge in. For example, when Denise confronts Babette about her excessive sugarless gum-chewing, which Denise deems damaging, Babette says that either she chews sugarless gum or gum that is harmful to rats, to which Denise asks her why she chews gum in the first place if it is a lose-lose situation. Babette then states that if she does not chew gum she will smoke, and if she does not smoke she will get fat, which brings up the inevitable question inside of the reader, why does Babette have to take part in these vices in the first place? The answer is that this is how American capitalism and consumerism has engineered common Americans throughout the entirety of their lives. This is the point that White Noise is making, American consumerism is omnipresent but undeservedly so, because it is truly white noise, meaningless. Another element in this theme that is frequently touched on throughout the novel is the colorful packaging of many essential goods displayed whenever the Gladneys go to a store.

White Noise also explore the theme of sex, ownership, and revenge from a masculine point of view. I mean one of the driving forces behind Jack Gladney’s mental decline towards the end of the novel and his eventual attempted murder of Willie Ming is his sexual passion for his wife Babette which drives feelings of ownership towards her. These feelings of sexual ownership by Jack change into a drive towards revenge once Jack is sexually slighted by Willie Ming. I think the point that Don DeLillo is trying to make with this theme is of how powerful this emotion is in men. Jack’s sexual passion and relationship with his wife drives him towards a fear of death which in turn drives him towards attempted murder and gives him a target. A very powerful force drives rational humans to pursue what Jack pursues.

The last idea that is explored well in White Noise is the fear of death. I think that the main message that DeLillo is trying to portray about the fear of death is that it is both rational and useless to fear death. I explore this further in my other long blog post. Scroll down to yesterday to find it.

Besides the exploration of complex themes, White Noise also is well written and has good characters and setting. I’d say the plot is a bit scattered, but this is not counter to the novel’s greatness, because the novel’s point is not to have an amazing plot. This is why I believe that White Noise is a Great American Novel even though I don’t personally like it.

“There’s a place in the world for the angry young man
With his working class ties and his radical plans
He refuses to bend, he refuses to crawl
He’s always at home with his back to the wall
And he’s proud of his scars and the battles he’s lost
And he struggles and bleeds as he hangs on the cross
And he likes to be known as the angry young man“

-Billy Joel Angry Young Man

I think these particular words apply well to the young male characters Heinrich from White Noise and Al from The Grapes of Wrath. This blog post will be a short comparison of the two characters.

Both boys seem to have a slight driving anger which pushes them to prove themselves through any sort of means. And both are around the same age, Heinrich being 14 and Al being 16. This is where I believe the similarities end.

Al is genuinely skilled with cars and usually kind, although sometimes he does get a bit ornery. Heinrich on the other hand is a nihilistic questioner who hangs out with a 19-year-old academic failure who is training to break the world record for amount of days spent in a cage with live venomous snakes. Heinrich frequently clashes with his father in meaningless conversation while living in pretty comfortable circumstances, while Al almost never questions his father even in the midst of growing up poor in the Great Depression. Al is quite popular with the ladies, Heinrich is not, or at least has not been shown to be.

I think each inhabit their respective novels for different reasons. Heinrich is more of a stereotype for the 80s nihilistic youth, while Al Joad is meant to just be a contributing member of a poor family. This is probably why Al is more likable and virtuous than Heinrich.

I’m not exactly sure if this will fit with the criteria for a long blog, but I think I have an interesting point to make. The end of Don DeLillo’s novel White Noise is focused on protagonist Jack Gladney’s fear of death, which culminates in Jack’s attempted murder of Willie Mink to become a “killer” rather than a “dier,” an idea detailing two types of people explored by Murray and Jack in conversation. The last real event of the novel is not this climax of murderous action, it is the misadventures of Jack’s three-year-old tricycle riding son Wilder, who leaves the sight of his parents only briefly, and stumbles into a major road, barely escaping with his life. I think this event, as the ending of the novel and the theme of fear of death, is particularly symbolic.

       Firstly, I initially read over this part of the novel with an intense feeling of fear and concern for Wilder. I knew something bad was going to happen to him as soon as I read, “This was the day Wilder got on his plastic tricycle,” given Wilder’s seemingly slow development highlighted by his preference to not speak, and his young age of course. I believe that DeLillo writes this event in a manner as to evoke huge concern in his readers. And it definitely worked on me. But where does this fear stem from? The answer is one of the novel’s main themes, the fear of death. The reader fears that Wilder will die as soon as he enters this dangerous position, crossing the major road, and this drives their concern. I think the whole purpose of this event is to be a final metaphor on the novel’s last major theme, the fear of death.

       Another important element of this passage in the book is the elderly women on the balcony who helplessly watch Wilder cross the dangerous street. They are symbolic of the control over death that is lost as one ages. It’s universally true that as people age past adulthood, they are exponentially more prone to death, and therefore much less in control of death. This is symbolized by the helpless cries shouted by the two old women on the balcony. They are too old and feeble and in a position too far away to save Wilder, just as how as one ages, they lose control over their life.

       Wilder is the opposite in age of these women, but mirrors their helplessness in his own control over death. The time that all people are least in control of their lives is directly after their birth and directly before their death. Babies, toddlers, and even children up to pubescence are naturally dependent on others for survival, just as the incredibly old are. Wilder and the old women are the two sides of the same vulnerable coin.

Babette and Jack Gladney, Wilder’s parents, play a role symbolically. They represent one’s relatives, who also have no real control over whether you live or die, as much as they might want to. Parents embody this trait especially well. They are the ones most concerned about the lives of their progeny, but just like all others, there are factors which they cannot control which truly determine the life or death state of their children.

       This event in the novel also highlights how ever-present and serious the threat of death is. It’s incredibly coincidental and ironic that the son of a man afraid of death has a near death experience after his father’s fear of death is exposed and analyzed. I think DeLillo is trying to do two things here. Firstly, he is legitimizing Babette and Jack’s fears of death, and by proxy any human on earth’s fears of death. This is done through how coincidental the event with Wilder is with his parents’ fears of death. But secondly DeLillo is also stating that, while legitimate, it is useless to fear death because it is out of our control. So many variables affect whether or not a person lives or dies and it is impossible for a person to keep track of them all and counter each one. This is highlighted in the novel when despite all of the danger surrounding him, Wilder escapes without injury. The factors which could not be accounted for, the great control drivers have over cars, the surprising alertness of drivers, and the heroics of bystanders, ended up saving the life of young Wilder, so they shouldn’t be accounted for in the beginning as factors that might lead to his death.

In summary, I believe DeLillo uses this end of novel event as a metaphor for and a reflection on Jack Gladney’s fear of death, but also makes two points about the fear of death, first that it is legitimate, but secondly that it is not practical to dwell on because it is out of our control.

One of the central plot lines in White Noise is Babette Gladney’s fear of death which eventually turns into Jack Gladney’s fear of death which is grounded and legitimized by his own scheduled mortality. This of course stems from Jack’s exposure to the major toxic event, which makes qualified doctors inform him that they believe he has about 30 years left to live. Anyways, when I read, I think about what I am reading. And the fear of death has been brought up a lot in White Noise, which has lead me to think about it frequently, and now I too am slightly afraid of my own death, just like the fictional characters in the novel. I could die at any time. Just because the average person of my general class, nationality, and income bracket lives into their 70s doesn’t mean that I will. Accidents happen frequently in cars, people frequently become furious whith each other to the point of physical violence, and the most dominant physical force on earth, gravity, seems to be out to get me every time I move. Even a death in my 70s would probably come from some painful or horrible disease like cancer or Parkinson’s. And every hour I live brings me closer to this end.

The only way I can get out of this manner of thinking is by distracting myself, and fortunately this happens a lot because even now, I remain pretty busy. But I wonder, if I only am not scared of death when I am distracted, is it my true nature to be obsessively afraid of death at all times?

Alright, it is time for me to finish this two part series. If you have not, please read part one

3. To Kill A Mockingbird- it’s just a classic. You’ve read it, he’s read it, your cousin has read it, your mom has read it, your neighbor’s dog has read it, the random person I Omegled at 11:13 PM today has read it, and your descendants will probably read it. The story itself is spectacular, and it is the majority of the reason that the book is great. The characters: the Finches, Tom Robinson, the Ewells, Boo Radley, Calpurnia, Dill, and many more service the story well and are each compelling and interesting. The way the novel addresses the racial injustices in the south in the 1930s is incredibly well done and moving. Harper Lee’s writing style as is incredibly engaging, I remember enjoying every page of this novel. It is all around just a solid piece of literature.

2. In Cold Blood – it’s incredible that such an interesting story is true. In Cold Blood revolves around the murder of the Clutter family in the small town of Holcomb, Kansas. This specific case was initially fascinating because their seemed to be no plausible motives for the killings and no prime suspects. The story follows the lives of the Clutters before they are killed, the investigation into the mystery of their deaths, and the lives of their murderers Dick Hickock and Perry Smith before and after their foul deed. The author, Truman Capote spent time with both Hickock and Smith when they were behind bars, and did much research on the investigation and the Clutter family in order to better understand the full story. Using his proficient writing manner and masterful grasp of the fascinating source material, Capote was able to write a truly engrossing piece of literature.

1. Station 11– which I read in Science Fiction Literature, but is great for other reasons than for its Science Fiction genre (honestly the novel is not really Science Fiction). Station 11 is about a virus called the Georgia Flu which wipes out a majority of humanity. It is never stated exactly how many people died, but I’d guess at least 99.9% of the total human population. Wow, a scary virus, how timely. Anyways, the novel follows many different characters at times before and after the Georgian Flu’s major outbreak. Similarly to in Catch 22, Station 11 is not written in a chronological fashion, but this is to the novel’s advantage. The author, Emily St. John Mandel is able to weave together many different events from all different times into a cohesive story with a huge revelations at the end. All of the characters who are followed in the novel are united by shared relationships with one character, the famous actor Arthur Leander. Station 11‘s characters are good and its plot is captivating. I had trouble putting this novel down when I was reading it last December, and I’d recommend it to anyone.

Thanks for the read.

I understand that this does not fit the usual parameters for a Great American Novels blogpost, but as I near the end of high school, I want to take the time and keyboard taps to chronicle the best novels I’ve been required to read in high school English or Literature classes. For reference, I was in the following classes each year: In freshman year I was in Honors English 9 with Mrs. Brew, in Sophomore year I was in Honors English 10, in junior year I was in AP Language and Composition (talk about a stupid class with one of the worst teachers I’ve ever had 😤), and in the first semester of my senior year I was in science fiction literature. Alright, now for the rankings.

Honorable Mention: Catch 22– I wanted to include a novel that I read in this class (Great American Novels) and the best one I read was Catch 22. Narratively, Catch 22 is scattered, there is no real linear plot, events in the story are not depicted in chronological order in the book. This aspect actually improves the quality of the book, as events that have already transpired can be used as big reveals even though events which have taken place afterwards have been portrayed already. The author Joseph Heller also makes the central character, Captain Yossarian, suprisingly likable in spite of his lazy, perverted, and “cowardly” nature, and makes characters whom he wants the reader to rightfully hate corrupt, cruel, and importantly unlikeable. The novel serves as a critique of war, specifically corrupt war leadership, callous war profiteering, and the pointlessness of waging war. For anyone who read Slaughterhouse-Five I’d compare Catch 22 to that, except better.

5. The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Nighttime – which I read in freshman year. Spoilers Ahead. The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Nighttime revolves around the experience of Christopher Boone, an autistic British 15-year-old who excels at maths (haha, I’m British now, what’s a toothbrush?) who discover’s his neighbor’s poodle Wellington dead, impaled by a pitchfork. Christopher decides to solve the mystery of who killed Wellington, which accidentally leads to major revelations about his father and thought to be diseased mother. The novel is written from Christopher’s perspective and is interesting due to a unique syntactical portrayal of Christopher’s autism. The reveals in this novel shock the reader, and it is incredibly moving to see how they rock Christopher’s world as well. I would give an example but I do not want to further spoil a book which I would definitely recommend reading.

4. Maus– read in Honors English 10. Maus’s premise was just plain interesting to start out with. It is a graphic novel depicting a Jew’s journey through the Holocaust, but via the illustrated nature of the story, the Jews are portrayed as mice, the Germans are cats, Polish non-Jews are pigs, and other nationalities are other animals. My older sister read Maus six years before I did, and I remember doing a fair amount of reading through the graphic novel when I was only in fourth grade. The novel definitely approaches and discusses adult themes, so I would not recommend that. I’d say Holocaust narratives are almost always interesting in general due to the immense tragedy depicted (morbid I know), which most people are not able to experience, thankfully. Maus’s quirks and style slightly elevate it above its fellows, such as Ellie Wiesel’s Night which I have also read. It feels wrong to rank Holocaust narratives so I’ll leave it at that.

Alright I’ve written a lot here, and it is getting late, so I am going to write a part two to discuss my top three novels. Thanks for reading.

Alright, so I’m 60 pages into White Noise by Don DeLillo, and unlike for other books I’ve read recently in literature classes, I have not done any outside research on this book. I have no idea what the main point of the book is and no idea where the plot is going. Anyways, I would like to make a conjecture as to why the novel is titled White Noise.

So far, White Noise has frequently chronicled the interactions of its main characters with all facets of American culture, from Babette’s excessive buying and wasting of health food and use of chewing gum to quit cigarettes, to the frequent television sounds referenced during scenes in the Gladney home. Murray’s character is even devoted to the study of American culture itself. I think that the title White Noise is meant to portray American culture as white noise. It surrounds us without us noticing and does not provide any real value to our lives. The absurd portrayal of the American environments department and its members also lends credibility to my interpretation. The novel seems like a critique on American culture in general.

These are just my guesses after 60 pages of reading. The current situation that the Gladneys find themselves in with a deadly accidental chemical spill near their home might change things.

“They’ll be bombing a tiny undefended village, reducing the whole community to rubble. I have it from Wintergreen – Wintergreen’s an ex-sergeant now, by the way -that the mission is entirely unnecessary. Its only purpose is to delay German reinforcements at a time when we aren’t even planning an offensive.”

Catch 22 gets dark later on in the novel. The above quote details the mission that Yossarian and the 256th squadron are assigned to do. Obviously, Yossarian, Major Dunbar, and others push against these orders but to no avail.

The mission from many different angles is a Catch-22- a situation where there is no positive outcome no matter what choices are made. It is a Cath-22 in multiple ways. Firstly, it is a Catch-22 from a military strategic dimension. Yossarian produces the idea of dropping leaflets to the Italian villagers ordering them to evacuate before the bombing. But Major Danby states that the Germans might find out and choose another road. There is no good option. From a moral perspective, the bombardiers, including Yossarian and Dunbar have the choice of either bombing the village and potentially killing innocent people, or disobeying command and facing the consequences. There is no good option.

Dunbar offers other ideas to the commanding officer, Colonel Korn, but is cruelly shot down every time.

“Dunbar turned crimson with embarrassment and replied in a voice that was suddenly defensive. ‘Why can’t we create the roadblock somewhere else? Couldn’t we bomb the slope of a mountain or the road itself?’

‘Would you rather go back to Bologna?’ [said Colonel Korn] The question, asked quietly, rang out like a shot and created a silence in the room that was awkward and menacing.”

For reference, Bologna is an active battlefront that none of the men wish to return to.

From earlier chapters, it can be inferred that the commanders of the 256th squadron care little for their men, but now with their gung-ho resolve to bomb the defenseless village, it seems as though they do value anyone’s life besides their own.

As explained in a previous blog post, Captain Yossarian’s main goal in his wartime life is just to survive. This may be hard for non-readers of Catch 22 to believe, as Yossarian is a captain in rank, but it was revealed in the novel that Yossarian was promoted to the rank of captain as basically a PR move. Yossarian was the cause of a disaster in the sky during a bombing run, and the colonels in charge of 256th Squadron (Yossarian’s squadron) decided to promote him to captain and award him with a medal in order to shift the focus away from the disaster and look good. Anyways, Yossarian has an interesting exchange with a much less disillusioned soldier named Clevinger around a third of the way through the novel, “

“Yossarian shot back. ‘Open your eyes, Clevinger. It doesn’t make a damned bit ofdifference who wins the war to someone who’s dead.’

Clevinger sat for a moment as though he’d been slapped. ‘Congratulations!’ he exclaimed bitterly, the thinnest milk-white line enclosing his lips tightly in a bloodless, squeezing ring. ‘I can’t think of another attitude that could be depended upon to give greater comfort to the enemy.’

‘The enemy,’ retorted Yossarian with weighted precision, ‘is anybody who’s going to get you killed, no matter which side he’s on, and that includes Colonel Cathcart. And don’t you forget that, because the longer you remember it, the longer you might live.'”

For clarity, Colonel Cathcart is the commanding officer of the 256th squadron, and also the Colonel who decided to give Yossarian his medal and promotion. Cathcart frequently volunteers the men of the 256th for dangerous missions in order to make himself look good.

Back to what Yossarian said at the end, though: “The enemy,’ retorted Yossarian with weighted precision, ‘is anybody who’s going to get you killed, no matter which side he’s on”.

This statement is philosophically fascinating. The Germans soldiers who try to kill Yossarian and his fellow soldiers have never met them and likely have never even met an American before. But the Colonels and Generals who send the soldiers of the 256th on their missions of war know who each of the soldiers are, are citizens of the same country, and share food and living space with them. They have had intimate experiences with the men that they are sending off to die.

Both parties (the Germans and the colonels) propel the men towards earlier deaths, but given each’s situation, which makes the more morally wrong decision?

I chose Joseph Heller’s Catch 22 as my Great American Choice Novel. I don’t know what a “Catch 22” is, so I decided to read Catch 22 to learn what a “Catch 22” is. Four “Catch 22s” two sentences, yeah that’s right. Anyways, the story is set during the second world war, and the main character of the novel seems to be a guy named Yossarian, who is a captain in the Air Force flying bombing runs in Italy. Yossarian, like many of the characters so far in Catch 22 is not eager to participate in the war. In fact, Yossarian prolongs a hospital stay by faking a liver condition (which at one point was real) and taking advantage of his naturally high body temperature. But more importantly, Yossarian is a hack. Yossarian enjoys messing with people. Take this interaction between Yossarian and fellow soldier Milo Minderbender for example:

“Let it trouble me [Yossarian]. You see, I don’t really have a liver condition. I’ve just got the symptoms. I have a Garnett-Fleischaker syndrome.’

‘I see,’ said Milo. ‘And what is a Garnett-Fleischaker syndrome?’

‘A liver condition.’

‘I see,’ said Milo, and began massaging his black eyebrows together wearily with an expression of interior pain, as though waiting for some stinging discomfort he was experiencing to go away. ‘In that case,’ he continued finally, ‘I suppose you do have to be very careful about what you eat, don’t you?.

‘Very careful indeed,’ Yossarian told him. ‘A good Garnett-Fleischaker syndrome isn’t easy to come by, and I don’t want to ruin mine. That’s why I never eat any fruit.’

‘Now I do see,’ said Milo. ‘Fruit is bad for your liver?’

‘No, fruit is good for my liver. That’s why I never eat any.’

‘Then what do you do with it?’ demanded Milo, plodding along doggedly through his mounting confusion to fling out the question burning on his lips. ‘Do you sell it?’

‘I give it away.’

‘To who?’ cried Milo, in a voice cracking with dismay.

‘To anyone who wants it,’ Yossarian shouted back.”

For clarification, Yossarian gets free fruit from the military in order to treat his “liver condition.” Instead, Yossarian uses the fruit for his own personal gain. Yossarian could’ve easily just explained his cheat to Minderbender, who also makes shady profits through the war, but instead he creates a befuddling train of logic about his liver health in order to bewilder Milo. This interaction, from what I know so far, encapsulates Yossarian. It seems as though Yossarian copes with the intensity and horror of the war by messing with his fellow soldiers. It’ll be interesting to see how this changes or affects other characters through the rest of the novel.