braxwall's review
4.0
DeLillo väver på ett skickligt sätt en konspiratorisk väv kring mordet på Kennedy. Vi får dels följa Oswalds liv och dels konspiratörerna genom ett antal olika personer. Bäst är porträttet av Oswald och DeLillo har en fantastiskt berättarteknik som låter blanda fragment av händelser, känslor och perspektiv som gör det till en ytterst njutbar ström av ord.
ishevlin's review
5.0
Normally not drawn to historical fiction, I was happily coerced into reading this fictional account of the life of Lee Harvey Oswald. While a lot of the looping facts and speculations are hard to keep track of unless you're fairly well-versed in the JFK assassination mythology, the novel itself is a faithful exploration of the intricate, often contradictory and marvelously coincidental nature of causation, the profound impact of the most subtle influence of one human on another, and the shockingly organized disarray of tormented minds. As usual, DeLillo's most potent genius is in his details: Oswald sees a dime on the floor of the book repository, picks it up and wipes it off before pulling his trigger, demonstrating the mindless humanness of an ordinary moment right before a catastrophe.
As he did in White Noise's "Most photographed barn in America" and in Underworld's meditation on the American obsession with baseball, DeLillo explores the peculiar tenor of group experience in the crowd scenes at Dealey Plaza: "A contagion had brought them here, some mystery of common impulse...They were here to be an event, a consciousness..."
And while the story follows many individual and collective voices, the most haunting is that of Marguerite Oswald, Lee's mother, weaving in and out of the narrative, grasping to piece together the larger story of her son's life-gone-wrong. A woman with limited education, reasoning, and self-awareness asking "Who arranged the life of Lee Harvey Oswald?" A question that points both to a sense of conspiracy and a more pervasive sense of helplessness and chaos.
On the subject of conspiracy, DeLillo offers this: "If we are on the outside, we assume a conpsiracy is the perfect working of a scheme... Conspirators have a logic and a daring beyond our reach." What he presents in Libra isn't an outline of a conspiracy or an argument for chaos, but an illustration of how easily the scales can be tipped in one direction or the other.
As he did in White Noise's "Most photographed barn in America" and in Underworld's meditation on the American obsession with baseball, DeLillo explores the peculiar tenor of group experience in the crowd scenes at Dealey Plaza: "A contagion had brought them here, some mystery of common impulse...They were here to be an event, a consciousness..."
And while the story follows many individual and collective voices, the most haunting is that of Marguerite Oswald, Lee's mother, weaving in and out of the narrative, grasping to piece together the larger story of her son's life-gone-wrong. A woman with limited education, reasoning, and self-awareness asking "Who arranged the life of Lee Harvey Oswald?" A question that points both to a sense of conspiracy and a more pervasive sense of helplessness and chaos.
On the subject of conspiracy, DeLillo offers this: "If we are on the outside, we assume a conpsiracy is the perfect working of a scheme... Conspirators have a logic and a daring beyond our reach." What he presents in Libra isn't an outline of a conspiracy or an argument for chaos, but an illustration of how easily the scales can be tipped in one direction or the other.
heathcliff_burton's review
challenging
dark
emotional
informative
mysterious
reflective
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.25
snoopythedog's review
dark
emotional
funny
informative
mysterious
sad
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.5
ianwalk's review
5.0
An epic tale of American hubris, dissolution, and disillusion. Delillo freshly reimagines what has been broken down, parsed and combed through a hundred thousand times: the JFK assassination. He takes a dozen historical figures and fills in the interstices between the facts of their lives with possible (and highly plausible) reflections, conversations and internal struggles with such dexterity that the reader feels fully trapped in the long, slow, immense pull of history. He proffers no single conspiracy as to how that day came about, but rather shows us that everything, in the end, is part of a series of (oft-bungled) unrelated conspiracies and that everyone, in some way, is gunning for one another. A masterpiece.
andrewmerritt00's review against another edition
5.0
“Lee Harvey Oswald. Saying it like a secret they'd keep forever. […] Lee Harvey Oswald. No matter what happened, how hard they schemed against her, this was the one thing they could not take away--the true and lasting power of his name. It belonged to her now, and to history.”
Probably my favorite DeLillo so far
Probably my favorite DeLillo so far
lbykes's review
between this and oliver stone's jfk i feel like i have a pretty good understand of the jfk assassination
annabella82's review against another edition
4.0
What a great speculative account of the events that shaped the assassination of JFK. DeLillo did a great job of mixing historical fact with fiction and intertwining real-life characters with those he made-up.
If I would have had the time, I would have read this book in less time then I did.
If I would have had the time, I would have read this book in less time then I did.
itsaintmess's review against another edition
reflective
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
3.75
dgronny's review
challenging
dark
funny
informative
mysterious
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.5