White Noise is Don DeLillo’s novel of the post-modern era. It examines meaning and its relativity within a media-controlled consumer society. White Noise’s classic dystopia is about the reliance society has on media. White Noise portrays a dystopia, but not the classic dystopia. In White Noise, the character identity instability and hyperreality are created by the character’s inability to control their own actions.
Jack’s desire for a lasting legacy, which will stop him from dying, is evident in Jack White Noise. Jack’s malleable persona is heavily influenced and shaped by his social environment. Jack’s academic facade is created when a fellow colleague calls him “indistinct”. Jack, as a Hitler inventor, wanted to appear serious (16). He has to make his own identity. He adds the extra initials to his name. J, formerly. A. K. Gladney wears a new identity “like a rented suit” (17). Jack’s Hitler-inspired persona is a way to express his desire to leave a lasting legacy. Jack’s fear for death is relived when he associates with Hitler. Even though he realizes that he is a “false character” who follows Hitler’s name, he feels immortal when he associates with Hitler. Jack is engulfed in Hitler’s powerful, but gruesome image. The genocide that Hitler committed against millions of people renders Jack’s inevitable death insignificant. Murray refers to Hitler as being “larger-than-life,” expressing his legacy’s everlasting image. Jack is drawn to “Hitler”, his legacy and the idea of a lasting legacy. Jack wants to create his own identity. Jack hopes to become Hitler and be greater than death. Jack can’t tell the difference between his reality and the imagined version of himself, so the alter ego he creates is unavoidably ambiguous.
White Noise’s dystopia is hyper-realistic in its TV and Radio, which shows the power of media to filter or radically change an event. Jack isn’t alone in having trouble separating reality from the imaginary. SIMUVAC is a prominent example of this hyperreality. They are accustomed to practicing for disasters but they have no idea how to handle a real-life situation. They first “practiced”, which was an actual disaster, in a toxic airborne event. Jack asks, “A practice? Do you mean that you wanted to use the real situation to practice your simulation? DeLillo’s wit is displayed when the SIMUVAC workers say that, in a real disaster scenario, “we didn’t get our victims arranged where we wanted them if the simulation was actual.” This shows how simulations have taken over reality. Maybe these simulations were designed to give communities a sense that they had control. They can plan out every detail of a natural catastrophe, which is supposed to prepare them for the real thing. They are not prepared for a real catastrophe, as they only feel comfortable with their simulations. The media often confuses simulations with reality. Babette, who appears on television as a simulation of reality, is one example. They watched as their “mouths grew a deep and wary silence, like an animal growl.” “Confusion, fear and astonishment poured out of [their] face” (107). It is the first time the family has seen a member of their family projected on a simulation medium. Babette’s distorted pixels are difficult for them to recognize at first. They only recognize Babette when she appears on the screen. Jack and his wife watched Babette “shining on us. As the muscles in her mouth worked to smile and talk, the electronic dots swarmed”. The family is confused by the picture and sound distortion. This appearance on TV of Babette illustrates Jack’s hyperreality, as they are unable to tell the difference between reality or simulation. Wilder is the only one who does not believe that Babette appears to be someone else on TV. They see her as “some distant character from the past, such an ex-wife and absentee parent, or a walker amidst the dead” (104) Jack does not understand Babette as a simulation. She appears as a character unknown, an old figure. Wilder believes that Babette is actually the TV, because he’s never seen it before. Wilder tears up when the TV screen goes black, showing his confusion about whether the Babette on the screen is the “real thing” or the electronic dots.
White Noise’s lack of dystopian characters is what sets it apart from similar novels. Jack, with his fear of death as well as the fear of being exposed to the world and deemed an insignificant person, stands out. This shows the difference between him and a typical dystopian figure and the inevitable failing of media-driven societies. Jack’s paranoia about death is overwhelming. The discovery of Nyodene D. with its vague diagnosis has only exacerbated his fear. Jack can not control his fear of dying because the chemical is in his bloodstream for over 30 years. Jack, despite his Hitler studies that he established to examine the life-long death of a famous personality, still fears death. The protagonist is also afraid of being exposed as a bad teacher. He is not proficient in German even though his department is called Hitler. Jack created a persona that made him appear to be an intelligent man, but his masking of the truth does not reflect the actions of a real hero. Jack’s concerns about death are only exacerbated by his daily life. Jack chases Willie Mink in order to get Dylar. What kind of dystopian “heroes” would use a placebo drug as a mask to their fears? Jack’s actions do not change society nor expose the media-centered one to the people. This society, it appears, accepts false stories to cover up their fear of dying. This promising character accepts death as a fact of life, illustrating how media-driven societies are doomed to fail.
This dystopian society’s letdown is due to the character’s hyperrealism and instability. The dystopian nature of White Noise is evident, but the lack of a contemporary hero shows the hopelessness that a media-controlled society can bring. DeLillo’s fiction is not fiction. It is a grim warning about the future of our society. The failures of the White Noise Society raises serious questions about whether we need a modern-day hero who can save us from our own dystopia.
