I thoroughly enjoyed Underworld by DeLillo. I was a bit scared of it for years, but after having successfully tackled two other post-modern über-works Infinite Jest and Gravity's Rainbow, I decidedly it was time (admittedly, I have not been able to bring myself to attempt The Recognitions by Gaddis yet). I enjoyed the writing style and loved the story. The background of the postwar 50s and 60s was interesting and I loved the image of the open art exposition in the desert (no spoilers). It was my first book by DeLillo and after now having read 7 others (Players, Falling Man, Libra, White Noise, Mao II, and Zero K), I have to day it is my favorite so far (White Noise and Libra being runner's up and Zero K being my least favorite by far - Ratner's Star is on my shortlist before the end of the year and perhaps I'll try Great Jones Street as well). I thought that the sweeping prose style was more efficient and worked better in this particular story than in the other aforementioned DeLillos. In fact, Underworld may be the only one - besides White Noise- that I will return to in years to come. Honestly, I prefer Pynchon - particularly Mason&Dixon and Against the Day - to DeLillo but of his work, this one was for me the most fun.

Since originally writing this review, I have trudged through (and reviewed on GR) The Recognitions and have to say that I preferred Underworld, GR, AtD, M&D, and IJ. Of those four, it would be hard for me to pick a favorite. I think that DeLillo took less chances than Pynchon or DFW, but the narrative is still captivating and entertaining.

Pagine e coriandoli di vita di centinaia di cittadini USA di varia provenienza nell’arco degli anni 50-90 compongono questo libro: si potrebbe dire che è una storia degli USA vista dal basso, ma forse è meglio parlare di quadro di insieme. Nel libro ce ne sono diversi: un’opera fatta da decine di aerei militari dismessi collocati nel deserto e dipinti a formare una composizione astratta da guardare dal cielo, due quadri fiamminghi, Il trionfo della morte e I giochi di bambini, popolati da moltissime figurine deformate e intente nelle loro attività. Nel caso di Underworld sullo sfondo c’è il paesaggio urbano, desertico, montano e morale degli Stati Uniti: il baseball, il serial killer, il video dell’omicidio del presidente Kennedy, Cuba, il timore della bomba atomica e la realtà degli esperimenti atomici nel deserto, le discariche sorvolate dai gabbiani, il mondo distorto visto attraverso i vapori tremolanti del metano che esce dalle discariche. I personaggi che mi sembrano più veri sono i due fratelli Nick e Matt, coi loro faticosi tentativi di diventare adulti nel Bronx e gli interrogativi sul destino del padre scomparso, posti molte volte e da molti punti di vista, come succede per ogni rovello interiore. E’ molto onesta la rappresentazione di Matt che fa un viaggio nel deserto con la donna, non sapendo bene cosa lo spinge: il motivo è che non ha il coraggio di lasciare il centro di sperimentazioni atomiche e vorrebbe che lei gli chiedesse di sposarla e andar via da un’altra parte, per cominciare una nuova vita: ma lo capisce solo quando lei glielo spiega. Il libro è percorso talvolta da ripetizioni di frasi che suggeriscono la necessità umana di riformulare i pensieri per mettere a fuoco meglio il proprio punto di vista, una specie di ritratto dell’evoluzione di un’idea. Io trovo che Underworld sia molto riuscito. Non è LA storia degli ultimi decenni, è un collage di istantanee che nel loro insieme restituiscono un mondo a 4 dimensioni, 3 spaziali e una temporale. Lo trovo molto avvincente e scorrevole: data la mole l’ho letto in vacanza e direi che ne è valsa la pena. Alla fine di un’opera che va così a fondo nella rappresentazione della natura umana mi è sembrato molto stonato il panegirico alla parola PACE vagheggiata in tutte le lingue; potrebbe però essere l’ultimo omaggio alla verità sulla natura umana che spesso dopo una vita vissuta in modo più o meno cinico, in vecchiaia cerca di farsi accogliere nel grembo di un dio su misura.

I was under-awed this time, the first reading 20-plus years ago. I've held tight with other books holding the same estimation after many years' remove. In "Underworld" there's overreach, to me. The expected synergy never, in my estimation, overwhelmed the many to produce a whole greater than sum. The characters were not up to the task of carrying that 800-plus load in spite of dexterity in setting and moving all the separate but converging storylines. The zeitgeist was there without the manpower to play it. Cut cut cut, shoud have, tighten and develop certain characters/epoch (it bleed on too far into an entirely new and/or different story altogether in epilogue). It would have been a better book at 500 pgs. Just my take right now after finis.

I love reading James Wood on the novel. For me he’s up there with Virginia Woolf as a critic who genuinely enriches the experience of reading the novel. Even though he often denigrates authors I love. Don Delillo for example. Underworld for Wood was gratuitously obsessed with paranoia as if this was a concern peculiar to only Delillo. But one could say paranoia was a state of mind invented by America. Did it even exist in the 19th century? The Cold War saw the invention of paranoia as a mass media tool for manipulating public opinion. Delillo’s fascination with it was not only entirely legitimate but incredibly eye-opening in tracing the changing psyche of post 1950 America. I don’t have Wood’s book with me here but to my recollection he wrote brilliantly about Underworld without getting it.

Underworld doesn’t have much in the way of plot. It’s like the literary equivalent of a musician jamming on a theme. As if DeLillo has submitted wholly to the tides of inspiration and allowed himself to be taken wherever they lead him. It reminded me, in form, of a web page full of hyperlinks. DeLillo is fascinated by the ghost paths of connections and the panoramic grids they form; the secret lives of objects and the far reaching stories they tell.

He wanted an object that would provide a surreptitious link to fifty years of American history and chose the baseball that won the 1951 World Series, during which – here’s one of the hyperlinks - the Russians tested their first atomic bomb. The ball is initially pocketed by a young black kid who has jumped the turnstile without paying. From the game itself, seen through the eyes of various celebrities, we enter the life of an impoverished black family in Harlem. The first intimately observed narrative begins.

There’s so much in this novel it’s inevitable some “storylines” will appeal more than others. Ultimately, it’s the clairvoyant power and beautiful urban lyricism of the prose which makes this a masterpiece in my eyes. DeLillo is like a soothsayer of the technological consumerist age. (“Bemoan technology all you want. It expands your self-esteem and connects you in your well-pressed suit to the things that slip through the world otherwise unperceived.”) He takes you behind the glossy surfaces of contemporary life, excavates for deeper meaning in the newsreel footage. The novel’s central character is employed by the waste industry which perhaps epitomises perfectly the buried volatile poisoning underworld of our culture.

It's evident DeLillo has been observing everything around him: for how long, sixty-one at the point of Underworld's publication; take off another 10-15 from it and you've got the number 45-50; thus the book spanning five decades, fifties to nineties, throughout the cold-war. As frolicky Underworld & White Noise was, most of it expects some sort of reverence from the reader, to an extent all characters were Delillo to me until the 300-paged mark (black Delillo, white Delillo, Highway killer Delillo). If not, White Noise would've read like a Chuck Palahniuk, perhaps this has something to do with him being thirty-five at the time of his first book's publication, late-bloomer for a writer like him. To be honest I like this more than Infinite Jest (or I need a reread). Underworld is just as much global America is, but inherently, quintessentially American. Rarely you would want a remake of the book, I mean, is this even an idea? By the end of the book, all I wanted was more Underworlds. Russian, Indian, Chinese, you name it, and I'd take it with the prose half as good as DeLillo's.

Things I liked:
—Lenny Bruce chapters
—Sister Edgar chapters
—That chapter where Marvin tours eastern Europe and has bowel movements proportional to communism in the country
—Ismael's graffiti chapters
—Eisenstein movie viewings
—Hippie chapters (though they were more of fillers)
—The last part with Nick's teenage years
—George the smackhead
—Garbage
—Condomology chapter
— Infedility chapters

It’s not an easy synopsis to write but i’ll give it a go. Underworld opens with a 60 page prologue centered around a famous baseball game in 1951 with a home-run dubbed ‘the shot heard around the world’. In the crowd there’s the likes of J Edgar Hoover, a couple of over zealous commentators and a young boy who ends up with the winning baseball. We then jump forward in time to 1992 and are introduced to the two characters that feature most prominently in the proceeding chapters: Nick Shay and Klara Sax. There are many many others, with a cast of characters to rival a Malazan book but these two are at the crux of the story. After 1992 we are taken on a journey back through time via the 80’s, 70’s, 60’s and finally right back to where we started – 1951. In each decade we are given a glimpse into a significant event of that era with the Cuban Missile Crisis, Vietnam and the Texas Highway Killer to name a few.

This was my first Don DeLillo outing so it took me the long prologue and part of chapter one to adjust to his writing style but once i did the rewards were endless. As soon as i was settled i knew i was reading something unique, genius and worthy of all the critical acclaim it received at time of release. There isn’t a main plot or story line in Underworld. It’s about the passing of time and where we end up compared to where we started. Most of all it’s about ordinary life. You may think that 827 dense pages is a slog, especially as there’s no definitive plot and admittedly starting was an intimidating prospect but the writing, the prose and the dialogue is absolutely top draw.

Underworld won’t be for everyone. If you crave a book fueled by a whodunnit plot or an international terrorist incident you’ll probably last 200 pages before you give up. Underworld is like nothing you’ll ever read and deserves a patient mind that appreciates good writing.

It’s difficult to sum up the overall feeling of the novel but the one word that comes to mind now is ‘poignant’. A wide range of lifes issues are covered including adultery, death, birth, illness, shame, regret and in general all things sombre, with little room left over for happiness; but i’m glad. It’s the books miserable tone that makes it a such a compelling piece of literary art.

Voltaire is best known today for a novella and being a bit of a prick (in an enlightening way), but he also wrote a number of epic poems, including the first (?) epic poem in French, the Henriade. This was reprinted dozens of times during his life. The epic was the great literary genre of the eighteenth century, in theory. Now, of course, nobody gives a shit, because that stuff is utterly unreadable. Our 'epics' are long novels, and, like the Henriade, they get laurels aplenty, despite being all too often unreadable. Authors continue to churn them out, because critics adore a behemoth.

Sometimes, it's best to just admit defeat. There are a few things worth critically adoring in Underworld:

i) The fact that DeLillo was ballsy enough to tell the story backwards.
ii) Any scene with the nuns and priests in it.
iii) A few patented DeLillo symbol-objects, here, the painted planes in the desert and the giant ship carrying garbage/heroin/nuclear waste/who knows what.

These are undermined, though, by, e.g.,

ia) The fact that he doesn't have any story to tell, so telling it backwards adds nothing.
iia) There are too few scenes with the nuns, and too many with the very boring Nick Shay. How many men who've blown off another man's head with a shotgun (accidentally, but still), and had an affair with a super-hot modern artist who attracts disciples like black clothes attract dog hair, could be *this* boring? Only one, Nick Shay, and Delillo writes about him for hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of pages.
iiia) Those symbol-objects can carry books the length of, say, White Noise. This book is 827 pages long. Not even the painted planes in the desert can carry a book for that long.

So we're breaking even (I'm being generous). How about the ideas?

By far the most intelligent, and humorous, scene in the book comes in chapter 3 of part 4. We get to watch people watch an apocryphal Eisenstein film, called 'Underworld.' Some characters' reactions:

a) "The plot was hard to follow. There was no plot. Just loneliness."
b) Esther said, "I want to be rewarded for this ordeal."
c) "Admit it, you're bored."
d) "It was remote and fragmentary and made on the cheap, supposedly personal, and it had a kind of suspense even as it crawled along. How and when would it reveal itself?"
e) "What about the politics? She thought this film might be a protest against socialist realism... what was this murky film, this strange dark draggy set of images if not a statement of outrage and independence?"
f) "Do we have to stay for the rest of it?" "I want to see what happens." "What could happen?"
g) "The camp elements of the program... now tended to resemble sneak attacks on the dominant culture."
h) "All Eisenstein wants you to see, in the end, are the contradictions of being."

This is transparently about the novel, *Underworld*. There is no plot, it is an ordeal, it is boring, it is remote and fragmentary, you do kind of want to know if/when it will reveal itself or something will happen, it could easily be nothing more than a statement about the supposed 'contradictions of being'. And you can, if you like, read all of that as a giant protest against realism.

So, given that our author is aware of the book's flaws (you can protest against realism and be entertaining, by the way),how can we justify its existence? In its intellectual content? That content is ambiguous, in a good way: DeLillo asks us to consider the relationship between nostalgia (for, e.g., baseball) and history (i.e., things that will matter to mentally sound people who didn't live through them). It would be nice to think that this book treats reverence for baseball and various other, even more cheesy, mass cultural ways of extracting money from people ironically: of course it's fun to go watch baseball, but it's not particularly important.

I fear, however, there is no irony, and that Underworld is just a depressing, postmodern affirmation of 'everyday life,' that looks back with longing (somewhat paradoxically, given the aforementioned pomoness) to the Cold War, back when the Giants and Dodgers were still New York teams. I fear that Underworld's main point is to show how Capital-H History disposes of all the glorious little knick-knacks we nostalgize about, like, say, baseballs, and how we have to hang onto them and make sure we get to stay individuals and live authentically even though The Man doesn't want us to. Consider that the most memorable scene in the book, according to the internet I read, is when the priest tells Nick 'Boring' Shay that he's tired of educating teenagers in "abstract ideas" and would be better off educating them as to the names of particular concrete things like, e.g., the names of shoe-parts, which he then proceeds to name for a few pages. How poetic it is that he knows what to call the cuff, counter and vamp. What a lesson in "the depth and reach of the commonplace".

If a book is going to argue for the depth and reach and importance of the quotidian, and eschew any attempt to connect its various chunks, those chunks had better be glorious. That is not the case here. I just don't care about the moments that DeLillo chooses not to connect to each other.

Now, of course, that wouldn't matter too much if the writing was good, but, as other reviewers have cataloged, it is not. Who let the following phrase slop into existence? Because it couldn't have been Don DeLillo: "Matt drove west, deeper into the white parts of the map, where he would try to find a clue to his future." I'd love to say I've made it look worse, but the preceding clause involves the phrase 'soft dawn.'

Underworld is not funny, as some DeLillo books are. It is not as well written as many of them are. It is not intellectually interesting as a couple of them are. It neither asks, nor answers, important questions, as DeLillo is capable of doing. It is, however, long; it is ambitious; and it was published before everything in the U.S.A. went to poop thanks to financial speculation, war and incompetence. So people call it a Great American Novel, and pine for the time before Osama, Bush and the Great Recession, just like they pine for the good ol' days in the ballpark.

It is the Henriade of a very talented man, not his Candide.

Pura epica
Un’opera mastodontica nel suo intento di raccontare l’America del secondo Novecento attraverso le vite di personaggi ordinari e straordinari.
È un viaggio nel tempo e nello spazio, dai deserti industriali al cuore delle città, dai campi di baseball ai cumuli infiniti di rifiuti, materiali ed emotivi.

La narrazione si apre con il celebre fuoricampo di Bobby Thomson del 1951, un momento glorioso che diventa simbolo ricorrente di un’epoca, ma anche del tentativo disperato di trovare ordine nel caos.
Al centro del romanzo c'è Nick Shay, dirigente del settore dei rifiuti, figura che si muove attraverso varie epoche e che seguiamo costantemente come un faro per orientarci. Attorno a lui ruotano personaggi come Klara Sax, artista visionaria che trasforma vecchi aerei militari in opere d'arte, e Marvin Lundy, collezionista ossessionato dalla palla del celebre fuoricampo.
Le loro storie si intrecciano a correnti sotterranee di storia, guerra fredda, consumismo e arte, componendo un mosaico vasto e denso, quasi travolgente.

Di fatto il romanzo consta in una meditazione potente sulla civiltà moderna, rappresentata dal simbolo estremo del Fresh Kills landfill, un’immensa discarica che diventa monumento inquietante agli eccessi del consumismo. DeLillo ci spinge a confrontarci con ciò che accumuliamo e scartiamo, sia come società che come individui.

Lo stile di DeLillo qui raggiunge il suo apice: dettagli che sfiorano il sublime e il banale hanno la stessa intensità.
Dall'altro lato la narrazione frammentata e non lineare rappresenta una sfida, si fatica a tenere il filo. Ciò che però potrebbe apparire come un groviglio confuso diventa alla fine un’opera che pulsa di vita e significato.

In conclusione Underworld è una lettura pesante, non tanto per la difficoltà stilistica, ma per la mole di informazioni, eventi e riflessioni che mette in campo.
È un’opera che richiede impegno e pazienza, ma che restituisce una visione epica della condizione umana e del tempo in cui viviamo.
Ti lascia stremato ma anche grato, come dopo una pesante escursione in montagna.

Going through my biggest reading slump in years, this probably was not the best moment to listen to a sprawling and challenging 31 hour audiobook. I appreciated the skillful writing and the ambitious scope, but I struggled to get emotionally invested in any of the multiple protagonists and had to force my way through a narrative that lacked cohesion and asked me as a reader to carry more weight than I wanted.

Εντάξει, ίσως, ίσως 3,5

Να το πω; Θα το πω. Το τράβηξε πολύ, το γύρισε ολούθε και ενώ θα μπορούσε να είναι αριστούργημα, είναι απλώς ένα καλό βιβλίο με δυνατές στιγμές και τμήματα που μοιάζουν με υπερβολική φλυαρία.

Ζωντανοί μεν χαρακτήρες, αλλά που στο τέλος του βιβλίου δε νιώθεις ότι τους έχεις γνωρίσει πραγματικά. Βλέπουμε να ξετυλίγονται μπορστά μας οι σκέψεις τους, αλλά χωρίς να οδηγούν απαραίτητα πουθενά.

Ενδιαφέρουσα ιστορία όπως ξεκινάει, αλλά στην πορεία μπλέκεται υπερβολικά χωρίς λόγο και ατονεί το ενδιαφέρον του αναγνώστη. ΟΚ, postomodern αμερικανική γραφή θα πει κανείς, αλλά θα πω κι εγώ "ε, εμένα ΔΕ μου αρέσει".

Ο δολοφόνος του αυτοκινητόδρομου, ειλικρινά, ΓΙΑΤΙ ΥΠΑΡΧΕΙ ΣΤΟ ΒΙΒΛΙΟ;;;

Η ιστορία ξεκινάει με μια βολή στο μπέιζμπολ, που κρίνει πρωτάθλημα και η μπάλα καταλήγει στα χέρια ενός πιτσιρικά που έχει μπει χωρίς εισιτήριο και έχει πιάσει φιλίες με τον διπλανό του στην κερκίδα, τη μέρα ακριβώς που η Σοβιετική Ένωση κάνει την πρώτη της πρώτη πυρηνική δοκιμή. Στο κάδρο μπαίνουν χάρη στη δημοκρατικότητα ενός σταδίου που χωρά προύχοντες και πληβείους αντάμα, προσωπικότητες της εποχής όπως ο Σινάτρα και ο Χούβερ, των οποίων την πορεία ακολουθεί για λίγο το νήμα της αφήγησης, αλλά προς μεγάλη απογοήτευση του αναγνώστη, ο Ντελίλο αρχίζει τα πέρα δώθε στο χρόνο για να χωρέσει όση περισσότερη Αμερική των μέσο-προς-τα-κάτω στρωμάτων μπορεί, στον υπόγειο (μόνο κατ' επίφαση) κόσμο της Νέας Υόρκης και της αμερικανικής κοινωνίας.

Το έργο, θα μπορούσε να χαρακτηριστεί σαν μια (εκτεταμένη) μελέτη χαρακτήρων, που όμως, αφενός δεν οδηγεί σε συμπεράσματα, αφετέρου η αποσπασματικότητα της αφήγησης, δείχνει να κάνει τάκλιν στον ίδιο της τον εαυτό.

Να το πω; Θα το πω. Δείχνει σα να ξεκίνησε με προοπτική να γίνει ένα πολύ μικρότερο βιβλίο (ίσως λιγότερο από το μισό του τελικού αποτελέσματος, μην πω το 1/3) κι ύστερα (στην προοπτική του "κύκνειου άσματος";) άρχισε να "φορτώνει" σελίδες θυσιάζοντας την ποσότητα για χάρη της ποιότητας. Προς επίρρωσιν αυτού που μόλις είπα, τα δυνατά σημεία του βιβλίου που δείχνουν να πνίγονται ανάμεσα σε σελίδες σχετικής φλυαρίας και πλημμελώς αναπτυγμένων πλοκών-παραφυάδων.

Υπάρχει και μια παράνοια γύρω από τον αριθμό 13, που είτε υπεραναπτύσσεται, είτε "θάβεται", ανάλογα με το πώς θα την αντιμετωπίσει κανείς ως στοιχείο του βιβλίου. Αν είναι κυρίαρχη τάση, έπρεπε να προβληθεί περισσότερο, γιατί κάπου ξεχνιέται (χωρίς προφανή αιτία), αν πάλι δεν είναι στο id του βιβλίου, ίσως έπρεπε να θαφτεί λιγάκι και να ξεπετάγεται λιγότερο.

Θα το θεωρούσα πολύ πιο τίμιο να χωριστεί σε 3-4 επιμέρους βιβλία και το καθένα να λάβει το διαφορετικό "φωτισμό" που δικαιούται (κάτι αντίστοιχο με το 2666 του Μπολάνιο, που δεν ολοκληρώθηκε ποτέ).

Ich musste nach gut einem Viertel abbrechen, weil ich merkte, dass mein innere Abneigung so stark gewachsen war, dass das Buch keine faire Chance bei mir gehabt hätte. Es beginnt eigentlich noch ganz interessant mit einem der wichtigsten Baseballspiele der Geschichte aus dem 1951. Ein rasanter Drohnenflug zwischen einzelnen bekannten und unbekannten Zuschauern bis hin zu den Spielern auf dem Feld. Diese Fahrt dauert immerhin 80 Seiten. Im Folgenden bekommt man aber einen Erzählstil geboten, bei dem man mitten in das Geschehen als Leser ohne Einführung hineingeworfen wird. Man liest die Gedankenströme der entsprechenden Personen und ist aufgrund der fehlenden Bezüge allein gelassen. Wen man er mit er, wer ist er überhaupt und was mit dem Geschehen gemeint, dass immer als es bezeichnet wird? Das war mir zu anstrengend. Nachdem die Unterhaltungen dann fast schon godotische Verhältnisse annahmen und seitenweise über das Muttermal Gorbatschows und dessen Ähnlichkeit mit der Landesfläche von Litauen doziert wurde (wobei man die Landkarte herumdrehen muss), war für mich der Zeitpunkt gekommen, um von der Unterwelt wieder ans Tageslicht der verständlichen Literatur hinaufzusteigen. Not my cup of tea.

Iridescent. If there's one word I could use to describe this book, it's "iridescent." It roams from one setting to another, from one blasted landscape to the next, held together by leitmotif. It's reminiscent of Philip Roth's American Pastoral... they both traipse along the canyon that separates the old America and the new America. While Underworld doesn't have the satisfying punch that American Pastoral had, it remains an unsettling, deeply moving book.