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Quote by Don DeLillo

Work

Americana

Americana is a thought-provoking collection that delves into the fabric of American society, offering a rich tapestry of narratives that reflect the country's diversity and the challenges it faces. more

Author

Don DeLillo
Don DeLillo

Don DeLillo is an American writer born on November 20, 1936. Known for his unique literary style and profound insights into modern society, his works often explore the impacts of technology, consumerism, and globalization. more

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“Sitting for a picture is morbid business. A portrait doesn't begin to mean anything until the subject is dead. This is the whole point. We're doing this to create a kind of sentimental past for people in decades to come. It's their past, their history we're inventing here. And it's not how I look now that matters. It's how I'll look in twenty-five years as clothing and faces change, as photographs change. The deeper I pass into death, the more powerful my picture becomes. Isn't this why picture-taking is so ceremonial? It's like a wake. And I'm the actor made up for the laying-out.”

“When the father dies, he writes, the son becomes his own father and his own son. He looks at is son and sees himself in the face of the boy. He imagines what the boy sees when he looks at him and finds himself becoming his own father. Inexplicably, he is moved by this. It is not just the sight of the boy that moves him, not even the thought of standing inside his father, but what he sees in the boy of his own vanished past. It is a nostalgia for his own life that he feels, perhaps, a memory of his own boyhood as a son to his father.”