Americana (novel)

Americana
Author Don DeLillo
Country United States
Language English
Genre Novel
Publisher Houghton Mifflin
Publication date
1971
Media type Print (Hardback)
Pages 388 pp (HB 1st edition)
ISBN ISBN 0-395-12094-2
OCLC 137561
813/.5/4
LC Class PZ4.D346 Am PS3554.E4425
Followed by End Zone

Americana (1971) is celebrated American novelist Don DeLillo's first book. In 1989, DeLillo revised the text, excising several pages from the original.

Content

The book is narrated by David Bell, a former television executive turned avant-garde filmmaker. Beginning with an exploration of the malaise of the modern corporate man, the novel turns into an interrogation of film's power to misrepresent reality as Bell creates an autobiographical road-movie. The story addresses roots of American pathology and introduces themes DeLillo expanded upon in The Names (1982), White Noise (1985), and Libra (1988). The first half of the novel can be viewed as a critique of the corporate world while the second half articulates the fears and dilemmas of contemporary American life.