The Review of Contemporary Fiction

UnderWords: Perspectives on Don DeLillo’s "Underworld," edited by Joseph Dewey, Steven G. Kellman, and Irving Malin
reviewed by Richard J. Murphy

Untitled document

Joseph Dewey, Steven G. Kellman, and Irving Malin, eds. UnderWords: Perspectives on Don DeLillo’s “Underworld.” Univ. of Delaware Press, 2002. 219 pp. $39.50.

The names of the editors suggest the background and experience that went into the compilation of this collection of critical essays and bibliographical information (reviews and articles to 2000 inclusive). Reflecting on the complexity of Underworld, Dewey notes that “the function of such a collection is to extend the round, to keep alive texts that promise to become defining works of their cultural moment.” The essays might be divided into three categories: examinations of DeLillo’s narrative methodology; the place of Underworld in relation to earlier masters, e.g., Eliot and Fitzgerald; and DeLillo’s place in relation to his contemporaries, especially, of course, Thomas Pynchon. David Yetter examines the filmic characteristics of point of view in its shifting location and focus, “a technique that allows the reader to detect the whispers of the individual while simultaneously absorbing the clamor of the crowd.” My own view, looking at the opening of this novel and of Mao II most notably, sees DeLillo as the Michael Cimino (The Deer Hunter, Heaven’s Gate) of prose fiction, a genius at crowd scenes. Several of the essays turn to DeLillo’s own commentary, “The Power of History,” as a foundation: in “Sin and Atonement” Robert McMinn uses it in developing his sense of “how the sacred shades into the profane,” one of both DeLillo and Pynchon’s major interests. Cold War history, a postmodern view of history itself, shows up in Kathleen Fitzpatrick’s use of J. H. Hexter’s 1968 essay “The Rhetoric of History.” Fitzpatrick notes, in regard to the novel, that “traces of the past . . . conceal as much as they reveal about the workings of history.” All in all, these help to make for an interesting and helpful elaboration of DeLillo’s text; whether necessary to “keep alive” this text, one doubts. Finally, while providing a valuable “Works Cited” section, this book, a scholarly collection, should have foot- or more specific endnotes.


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The Review of Contemporary Fiction UnderWords: Perspectives on Don DeLillo’s "Underworld," edited by Joseph Dewey, Steven G. Kellman, and Irving Malin reviewed by Richard J. Murphy Untitled document Joseph Dewey, Steven G. Kellman, and Irving Malin, eds. UnderWords: Perspectives on Don DeLillo’s “Underworld.” Univ. of Delaware Press, 2002. 219 pp. $39.50. The names of the editors suggest the background and experience that went into the compilation of this collection of critical essays and bibliographical information (reviews and articles to 2000 inclusive). Reflecting on the complexity of Underworld, Dewey notes that “the function of such a collection is to extend the round, to keep alive texts that promise to become defining works of their cultural moment.” The essays might be divided into three categories: examinations of DeLillo’s narrative methodology; the place of Underworld in relation to earlier masters, e.g., Eliot and Fitzgerald; and DeLillo’s place in relation to his contemporaries, especially, of course, Thomas Pynchon. David Yetter examines the filmic characteristics of point of view in its shifting location and focus, “a technique that allows the reader to detect the whispers of the individual while simultaneously absorbing the clamor of the crowd.” My own view, looking at the opening of this novel and of Mao II most notably, sees DeLillo as the Michael Cimino (The Deer Hunter, Heaven’s Gate) of prose fiction, a genius at crowd scenes. Several of the essays turn to DeLillo’s own commentary, “The Power of History,” as a foundation: in “Sin and Atonement” Robert McMinn uses it in developing his sense of “how the sacred shades into the profane,” one of both DeLillo and Pynchon’s major interests. Cold War history, a postmodern view of history itself, shows up in Kathleen Fitzpatrick’s use of J. H. Hexter’s 1968 essay “The Rhetoric of History.” Fitzpatrick notes, in regard to the novel, that “traces of the past . . . conceal as much as they reveal about the workings of history.” All in all, these help to make for an interesting and helpful elaboration of DeLillo’s text; whether necessary to “keep alive” this text, one doubts. Finally, while providing a valuable “Works Cited” section, this book, a scholarly collection, should have foot- or more specific endnotes.

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