Big structures of history and luminous private lives, nuclear fear and baseball … Don DeLillo’s 1997 novel captures the US in the second half of the 20th century. The author of The Flamethrowers hails it as a masterpiece
These are things I don’t forget: a secretary in a Mondrian dress. A 60s sexy secretary. And advertising. And Mondrian. A man who grabs an oil drum with a fire burning inside it, drags the drum toward baseball fans, fathers and sons lined up on a cold night to buy World Series tickets. This scene is in the early 50s and the man is black, the fans white … The hot metal sears his hand when he drags the oil drum. He pretends it does not. His burned hand scars the reader’s memory, her emotions pressed on by this subtle scene.
A Jesuit priest who asks his student, Nick Shay, to name the parts of a shoe, and Nick Shay cannot, and neither can you.
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