Don DeLillo
Don DeLillo
Donald Richard "Don" DeLillois an American novelist, playwright and essayist. His works have covered subjects as diverse as television, nuclear war, sports, the complexities of language, performance art, the Cold War, mathematics, the advent of the digital age, politics, economics, and global terrorism. Initially a well-regarded cult writer, the publication in 1985 of White Noise brought him widespread recognition. It was followed in 1988 by Libra, a bestseller. DeLillo has twice been a Pulitzer Prize for Fiction finalist), won the...
ProfessionNovelist
Date of Birth20 November 1936
CityBronx, NY
Words are not necessary to one's experience of the true life.
The modern meaning of life's end-when does it end? How does it end? How should it end? What is the value of life? How do we measure it?
The term itself--my life--is a desperate overstatement.
Some people are larger than life. Hitler is larger than death.
Ecology is boring for the same reason that destruction is fun.
The shock, the power of an ordinary life. It is a thing you could not invent with banks of computers in a dust-free room.
Some people fake their death, I'm faking my life.
The true life is not reducible to words spoken or written, not by anyone, ever.
The true life is not reducible to words spoken or written, not by anyone, ever. The true life takes place when we're alone, thinking, feeling, lost in memory, dreamingly self-aware, the submicroscopic moments.
Years ago I used to think it was possible for a novelist to alter the inner life of the culture. Now bomb-makers and gunman have taken that territory. They make raids on human consciousness. What writers used to do before we were all incorporated.
Don't you realize that as long as you have to sit down to pee, you'll never be a dominant force in the world? You'll never be a convincing technocrat or middle manager. Because people will know. She's in there sitting down.
People say great art is immortal. I say there's something mortal in it. It carries a glimpse of death.
The language of my books has shaped me as a man.
May the days be aimless. Do not advance action according to a plan.