I understand how this is probably an essential step en route to Libra and Underworld but it's overlong and diffuse, a failed marriage novel among Americans in Athens that edges into a thriller (an obscure murder in the hills!), that devolves into some sort of shadowy CIA conspiracy, the narrator falling apart in a way along with his marriage and the novel itself, subsumed by interest in a language-obsessed death cult whose victims' initials match the initials of the crime's location, hippie-ish devouts who speak Aramaic and Sanskrit, a cult with the same name as the novel albeit in Greek, suggestive of the ninety-names of God, among other shadowy obscure diffuse associations of meaning, like the really poorly characterized characters who all speak the same sans dialogue tags so you have no idea most of the time who's speaking, although the dialogue isn't as honed and fun as in Players, for example. Generally, it seems like DeLillo with this one is trying to be more serious, take on international politics, heavy shit like the Middle East, Pakistan, death cults, the CIA, extending his ambition from Running Dog, his rushed, kinda crappy thriller attempt that retained some of the humor and zaniness of his earlier novels. These thrillers aren't in any way thrilling but they're serviceable as transitions to Libra and Underworld when DeLillo finds the right focus with the JFK conspiracies and hones his diffusion techniques (Underworld's mushroom cloud structure). This has its moments -- the writing really clarifies and is charged as the narrator attempts to seduce an American woman and then essentially forces himself on her; there are some solid parts relating the breakup of the narrator's marriage too -- but it also SWITCHES POV on page 276 (of 340), something that really almost had me quitting the novel, especially as the third-person story about Owen seemed overburdened by description of rural India and related vocabulary. Also, I felt like this one suffered from excessive religiosity, never really DD's strong suit. The language, too, wasn't as honed as in Americana or Ratner's Star or even Players. More "worked" than Running Dog but inconsistently individuated -- that is, when he's on, every single sentence is absolutely DeLillo-ean. The percentage of such sentences/passages in this is higher but at times the language felt more rushed, somewhat ironic in a novel so much about language itself. Anyway, glad I read it but also very glad it's over.

An intelligent and often quite complexing work from DeLillo, who I am a big fan. This is set mostly in Greece which centres on an American risk analyst staying in Athens who is slowly drawn to the workings of a mysterious 'language cult' who are obsessed with ancient alphabets and seem to be behind a number of unexplained murders. While described as an exotic thriller it's so much more than that, and tends to sway away from any conventional plot to focus more on deep and precise character studies where issues of politics, cultural differences, loyalty, mythology, history and religion are bought into question. The observation throughout is of a very high standard but this tends to be both it's strength and weakness as there are many long winded conversations rich in detail which seem to go on forever and can get slightly frustrating leaving a feeling of just where everything is going. There is an eerie menace hanging in the air at times which I give credit for and on the whole he creates a strangely perplexing work that is intriguing rather than exciting. It's not really a thriller per se, when you think of a thriller, but it's probably the closest you'll get from DeLillo's body of work.

L’ASSOLUTO MISTERIOSO



Anche se, forse, più che di misterioso, dovrei parlare di enigmatico.
A un certo punto (p.43) sembra che il ragionamento di Owen sia condiviso anche da Delillo. Owen racconta a James che ha cominciato a interessarsi di iscrizioni, lingue morte, pietre e tavolette per una questione di storia e filologia: le pietre parlavano, gli sembrava di conversare con i popoli antichi, era, in un certo senso, anche come risolvere un rebus: decifrare, scoprire segreti, tracciare la geografia del linguaggio. Se non che a un certo punto il suo interesse è piuttosto slittato nelle lettere in quanto tali, nei caratteri presi a blocchi, nella forma delle lettere, nell’alfabeto in sé.
Sembra quasi che a DeLillo prema soprattutto una bella parola, una buona frase, un concetto che rimanga: l’estetica dell’alfabeto, più che il senso di quello che può comporre.
Il compimento di una frase.



Enigmatico rimane l’io narrante, James, così come sua moglie Kathryn tuttologa prestata archeologa – nel senso che all’inizio la conosciamo impegnata in uno scavo archeologico su un’isoletta delle Cicladi, e poi apprendiamo che ha fatto tutto, nonostante sia a stento quarantenne, incluso insegnare a Stanford qualcosa legato alla scienza dei computer (la cosa giusta nel posto ideale nel momento perfetto). Ed enigmatico rimane il loro figlioletto di nove anni che sta già scrivendo un romanzo basato sui racconti-memorie di Owen, loro enigmatico amico.
Altrettanto enigmatici sono gli amici-colleghi, europei globe trotter ospiti di Atene impegnati in vari settori della finanza, dello spionaggio, della difesa internazionali.
In parecchie conversazioni mi sono perso – nel modo più tradizionale, e cioè: chi è che dice cosa. E fino all’ultimo mi è rimasta la domanda: è DeLillo che volutamente evita di andare a fondo, di completare il percorso di 360°, o i 360° ci sono tutti, ma io non li ho colti?



Incartato in un falso thriller – un misterioso (enigmatico?) omicidio sembrerebbe collegarsi ad altri, che dalle Cicladi porterebbe alla Giordania, forse dietro c’è una setta, un culto di qualche tipo, individui che Owen ha conosciuto mentre albergavano in una grotta dell’isoletta – reso ancora più misterioso dalla situazione geopolitica: gli ostaggi americani a Teheran stanno per essere liberati ma non lo sanno, la crisi energetica persiste, gli americani sono i bersagli preferiti di sequestratori e attentatori

Eppure è considerato uno dei romanzi migliori di DeLillo. E Karl Ove Knausgård lo mette al top insieme a Rumore bianco, l’opera successiva di DeLillo, e dice che a seguire l’americano non ha scritto nulla di buono.
Rumore bianco mi è piaciuto molto, l’ho letto due volte. Questo, invece, ho fatto molta fatica ad arrivare in fondo.



Nel nostro secolo, lo scrittore ha portato avanti una conversazione con la follia. Si potrebbe quasi dire, dello scrittore del ventesimo secolo, che aspiri alla follia. Alcuni ci sono riusciti, e occupano dei posti particolari nella nostra considerazione. Per uno scrittore la follia è come una distillazione ultima di se stesso, una revisione finale. È l’affogamento delle false voci.


Aldo Mondino e i suoi “Dervisci Konya”.

This is the first Delillo novel I've read that I think I've actually enjoyed. His obsessions with American history and American mythology can be so cornily portentous that a lot of the time it seems like the only thing he wants to convince you of is his how important his books are. But somehow this novel, which is set almost entirely in the eastern Mediterranean, in a world of early 1980's American expats idly wandering around pictaresque Greek islands and middle eastern desert ruins half-following rumors of some weird language cult, feels like a much more valid and vital use of his style than his more domestic novels.

As someone who has spent some time living in this part of the world, the weird mix of calm and creeping anxiety that not very far away are places stricken by intense political violence and socio/religious upheaval that Delillo evokes feels incredibly accurate and estranging without being cheaply orientalized. And he does an excellent job of showing (really, more implying) how those anxieties are inevitably intertwined with the long histories and the endless fields of rubble of the ancient world. This is a beautiful, weirdly haunted novel.

Είναι ειρωνικό ένα βιβλίο που αφηγείται δολοφονίες σχετιζόμενες με τη γλώσσα να δολοφονείται το ίδιο στη μετάφραση. Η μετάφραση είναι κακή, ένα ναρκοπέδιο για τον αναγνώστη. Θα περίμενε κανείς από έναν ιστορικό εκδοτικό οίκο (Εστία) καλύτερη μεταχείριση προς έναν συγγραφέα του μεγέθους του Delillo.
Τα τρία αστέρια μόνο από σεβασμό στον συγγραφέα• η ελληνική έκδοση θα έπρεπε να αποσυρθεί και να επανακυκλοφορήσει σε νέα μετάφραση και προσεκτικότερη επιμέλεια εν γένει. Δεν συμβαίνει, άλλωστε, συχνά συγγραφείς σαν τον Delillo να γράφουν για την Ελλάδα. Ως τότε καλύτερα να διαβάσει κανείς το πρωτότυπο.

Δυστυχώς το πρόβλημα των μεταφράσεων στα ελληνικά πρέπει να υπήρξε μεγάλο. Από τον Hemingway ως τον Bukowski, τον Henry Miller ως τον Salinger πολλοί σπουδαίοι συγγραφείς έχουν δεινοπαθήσει.

I am not qualified to talk art but Don DeLillo's writing strikes me as a form of pointilism. He uses no broad strokes, only an accumulation of tiny blips that eventually form a whole.

Sometimes this works great. I still think of White Noise as one of the best books I've ever read. But other times I think it's hard to get into his rhythm, so his endless fractured conversations and minimalist approach to details comes across as more a collection of aphorisms than a coherent novel.

Definitely the case this time. I never built up much momentum with this one and was putting it down for weeks at a time with no consequences. Very little seemed to be happening that I'd have to remember for future chapters anyway. I eventually petered out somewhere in the last third.

Still, as usual with DeLillo, there are some absolutely killer lines and passages. On tourism:

"Tourism is the march of stupidity. You're expected to be stupid. The entire mechanism of the host country is geared to travelers acting stupidly. You walk around dazed, squinting into fold-out maps. You don't know how to talk to people, how to get anywhere, what the money means, what time it is, what to eat or how to eat it. Being stupid is the pattern, the level and the norm. You can exist on this level for weeks and months without reprimand or dire consequence. Together with thousands, you are granted immunities and broad freedoms. You are an army of fools, wearing bright polyesters, riding camels, taking pictures of each other, haggard, dysenteric, thirsty. There is nothing to think about but the next shapeless event."

Don DeLillo is a great writer. However, having spent years in the Middle East and Athens, I felt his grasp of place and Fowlesesque vagueness with more emphasis on words were disappointing in this instance. (Yet, his allusion to Al-Qaeda types lurking about was uncanny.)

I prefer any given passage or page to the novel as a whole, more thought-provoking in the minutia than the sum of its parts. I've yet to find a Delillo novel which balances his eloquent and captivating prose with a plot and characters which are equally fascinating.

Поиски культа, который занимается убийствами по всему миру оказался таким скучным и безынтересным, как и тупые диалоги главного героя с друзьями/семьей. Поверхностные размышления хаотично прыгающие с темы на тему, дополняются идиотскими археологическими раскопками жены.
Диалоги совершенно неестественные, а персонажи скучные. Это в сочетании с блуждающим сюжетом, который был основан больше на передаче настроений и наблюдений, чем на повествовании.

DeLillo ruminates on language, meaning, murder, patterns, the apocalypse, and America's position as the world's myth-maker, influencing and manipulating countries on the other side of the globe to position themselves better, all told through an American businessman in Greece, with his life in serious disarray. There are so many eye-opening ideas, so many ways DeLillo's light fractures, comes together and illuminates the world we're living in. It's incredibly ambitious and it doesn't completely come together, but that's DeLillo for you, and the ending is a great one-two punch of shock and awe and deep, existential terror.

I wouldn't recommend it as your first DeLillo, as it's very intellectual and subtle, but it has a power like only the very best novels do. And, of course, as usual his prose cuts like a knife, bringing forth blood you're certain must mean something but unsure of what it actually does. DeLillo is a master of the understated and the unmentioned, as you're being pulled deeper and deeper into whatever he has on his mind. For me, this book added up to something more. It might not do for you, and I'd understand that, but I will remain haunted by this story, its characters and its meanings for quite some time.

The Names are Inscribed on Rocks and Walls...  
 
I think that Delillo's novels are the sort of novels that you either like or dislike. But then again i've read only two novels so far by him (and half a third novel), so it is still early to claim being right about this.
 
I liked The Names alright. I enjoyed it in the sense that it’s not a boring novel. It does not give you free information. One has to dig and decipher in order to understand what the narrator means by this or that. It makes one think and wonder about things that seemed to be mundane, but which can have a great impact on one’s life.
 
Yet I haven’t enjoyed The Names as much as Point Omega. While Point Omega was short and poignant, The Names is long and lacked focus and is somehow choppy toward the end. Don’t get me wrong, being choppy is partly what makes its charm, but it is not the sort of choppy that kept me on guard, and that helped me connect all details together at the end of the novel (this is why I said that Delillo’ s novels could be the sort of novels that you either like or dislike. Even when all the elements are there to like them, there could still be an ‘unnamed’ problem preventing one from enjoying them). To be fair, I don’t think it’s the novel’s fault as much as my inability to concentrate on reading lately. So I will need to reread it at some point, when I have the right mood for it in order to understand if the problem emanates from my lack of concentration or if the novel is just not for me.

Moments of brilliance but overall, pretty disappointing.

This is my third book by DeLillo after White Noise and The Body Artist and it’s my least favourite.

The book deals with a number of themes including language, and the impact it has on cultures and visa versa, lonely Americans working abroad, wandering from one place to the next without any fixed address or place they can call home, and finally a subplot involving a death cult.

As usual with DeLillo it’s very dialogue heavy, and many of the comedic conversations that the characters, none of which I really connected with, are mildly amusing and occasionally insightful.

My main issue is the way the story meanders aimlessly for long stretches, something I can see appeals to many but I just find boring.

The Names is supposedly a transitionary book in the author’s career, and he can be admired for experimenting and trying to find his feet. Even though I cannot really recommend it, I loved White Noise so I’m still looking forward to Libra, Mao II, and Underworld.

3/5