The subtly entrapping nature of celebrity has been a common theme of
Don DeLillo's work since his third novel, Great Jones Street (1973),
narrated by a twenty-six-year-old rock star, Bucky Wunderlick, who tires
of fame in the middle of a national tour and goes to ground in a seedy New
York bedsitter. This theme, however, finds its fullest expression in
DeLillo's 1991 novel Mao II, where it is linked to a specific concern which
may be closer to home for him – the paradoxical fascination with
author–recluses in American celebrity culture. DeLillo, who came to
reluctant terms with major league celebrity from the mid-1980s onwards
after a long period of respectful reviews and polite notices, has praised
reclusive authors for “refusing to become part of the all-incorporating
treadmill of consumption and disposal,” in spite of the “automatic
mechanism” of the media which tries “to absorb certain such reluctant
entities into the weave.” Mao II is about what happens when this
absorption takes place, and whether or not this wholly devalues the
author's own tactics of silence and renunciation.
Don DeLillo’s Mapping of the City