People are intrigued by the thought and sight of a disaster occurring in the world around them. The more horrible images people see and stories they hear, the more legitimized they feel as human beings. In Don DeLillo’s novel White Noise, characters are often mentally drawn towards events and thoughts of disaster. I myself have witnessed and experienced disastrous events that have shaped my gratitude toward life. When reflecting on the calamities that I have been apart of, I feel grateful to be alive. Since life can be predictable and often boring, disaster makes one feel alive because it validates our existence by allowing us to imagine our destruction and then rejoice in our reality.
On a cool Sunday morning in October 2012, the …show more content…
For example, the Gladneys are forced to leave the town due to an airborne toxic event. As the family is fleeing town, they witness a “scene of injured people, medics, smoking steel” and people suffering from the toxic air (DeLillo 119). Their response to this calamity is to feel “curiously reverent, even uplifted” because they were safe and uninjured (DeLillo 119). Delillo conveys that life threatening events bring satisfaction to his characters. As the Gladney’s flee town due to the airborne toxic event, they witness “heaped cars and fallen people” on the sides of the road (DeLillo 119). Heinrich is unfazed by the gruesome sights that he views as “brilliantly stimulating” (DeLillo 120). He is “steeped happily” and feeling “practically giddy” by the townspeople’s chaos and fear (DeLillo 120). Heinrich embraces the calamitous event as an opportunity to be an expert on the event and relishes in the excitement despite the danger to him and his family. The plane crash-landing is another example of a disastrous event that allows people to feel fear and relief. As the “silver gleaming death machine” is plummeting toward earth, the captain fearfully announces that people will “find our bodies in some smoking field” (DeLillo 90). Thankfully the plane regains all power and the flight crash-lands safely on the ground. The “ richness of sensation” the survivors felt following the crash-landing is the immediate effect of believing that death is imminent (DeLillo 91). Through his narrative, DeLillo conveys that the experience from a disastrous event allows a person to strengthen their validation of existence and feel grateful to be
On a cool Sunday morning in October 2012, the …show more content…
For example, the Gladneys are forced to leave the town due to an airborne toxic event. As the family is fleeing town, they witness a “scene of injured people, medics, smoking steel” and people suffering from the toxic air (DeLillo 119). Their response to this calamity is to feel “curiously reverent, even uplifted” because they were safe and uninjured (DeLillo 119). Delillo conveys that life threatening events bring satisfaction to his characters. As the Gladney’s flee town due to the airborne toxic event, they witness “heaped cars and fallen people” on the sides of the road (DeLillo 119). Heinrich is unfazed by the gruesome sights that he views as “brilliantly stimulating” (DeLillo 120). He is “steeped happily” and feeling “practically giddy” by the townspeople’s chaos and fear (DeLillo 120). Heinrich embraces the calamitous event as an opportunity to be an expert on the event and relishes in the excitement despite the danger to him and his family. The plane crash-landing is another example of a disastrous event that allows people to feel fear and relief. As the “silver gleaming death machine” is plummeting toward earth, the captain fearfully announces that people will “find our bodies in some smoking field” (DeLillo 90). Thankfully the plane regains all power and the flight crash-lands safely on the ground. The “ richness of sensation” the survivors felt following the crash-landing is the immediate effect of believing that death is imminent (DeLillo 91). Through his narrative, DeLillo conveys that the experience from a disastrous event allows a person to strengthen their validation of existence and feel grateful to be