Az Eszterházy Károly Tanárképző Főiskola Tudományos Közleményei. 2002. Vol. 8. Eger Journal of American Studies.(Acta Academiae Paedagogicae Agriensis : Nova series ; Tom. 28)

Studies - Judit Ágnes Kádár: 'Kleenex-View' and Cultural Devaluation: Merchandise as Ontology in Don DeLillo's White Noise (1985)

dose of cult mystery and escape: in her simplifying mind there always must be either-or choices, for instance to take or not to take a chewing gum or a cigarette; either she dies first or Jack... Her reactions again remind us of Albee's Martha when she says: "I'm not a criminal,... All I want to do is chew a pathetic little tasteless chunk of gum now and then (WN 42)." Martha behaves similarly in tense situations. I think such seemingly irrelevant questions as the fuss about whether to chew or not to chew gum is given some relevance. Through Babette's reactions one can learn about the psychology of this culture and its impact on the individual. Babette is like a perfectly programmed robot, a product of consumer society being absolutely dependent on her environment, one who has lost her own will-power and is on the way of losing self-control, too: "Look, either I chew gum or I smoke. If you want me to start smoking again, take away my chewing gum and my Mentho-Lyptus (42)." Others always instruct her what to do and what not to do. She reads the warnings on the chewing gum or cigarette packet; she waits for the media to tell her whether there is danger of a toxic cloud or not; Mink gets her to take Dylar and what not... She is a robot in the sense that she mechanically does routine activities, for example "transcribing names and phone numbers from an old book to a new one (45);" shopping, teaching motion-patterns, getting the family to watch TV always at the same time and reading to an elderly man just as she reads bedtime pornographic stories as a substitute for a real sexual relationship with Jack). Her figure seems to be similar to "a race of people with a seven-bit analog consciousness (41)." Facelessness is also emphasized at the end of this chapter: Jack checks his balance (!) at the bank, his account is OK, so the system has "blessed his life (46)," approved his existence. In other words, if others say so, then he exists. A similar ironical identifying relevance is given to the 'automated banking card' at the end of Chapter 37: "REMEMBER. You cannot access your account unless your code is entered properly. Know your code. Reveal your code to no one. Only your code allows you to enter the system (295)." In the course of shifting the narration from a family scene with Babette to another one with Heinrich, Jack disappears. He is present only as a medium of narration, he transfers and radiates his view to the reader. The episodes with Heinrich reveal epistemological questions. 196