Picked up a book today by a writer I should have read long ago. His name is Don DeLillo - and as happens sometimes, I found that he's been writing forever, so now I feel cheap that I didn't know this - but it happens. I assume his catalogue has just been given a re-release because there's a whole set of brand new Picador's on the shelf of the local store that certainly weren't there last week. They're damn good covers though (yeah - I judged the books by them. Wanna make something of it?). Even though they all sound like I should buy every single one them and bed down for the next month or so, I settled on a copy of Point Omega that looks like this:
It's not very long at all, but one of his other books - Underworld - is possibly one of the thickest books I've ever seen, and I've seen a few in my time. That looks like this:
Getting the picture now? They're all produced in a matt finish too which makes them even better - for design nerds like me, these have been designed by Noma Bar at the London agency Dutch Uncle. Gonna have to get the whole collection - I can feel it in my bones.
Anyway, while I was eyeballing his collection, I found some quotes from DeLillo who apparently doesn't do interviews too often. This one made me nod wisely to myself:
"I was called a cult writer in the 70s, when that meant that very few people were reading me."
I think that's still true now though isn't it? I really hope that being a cult writer doesn't horrifically mean that you're simply marketed as a cult writer to make sure people who like 'cult writers' will pick you up.
I like that he doesn't do interviews too much. That way, when he does speak, he says incredibly wise things like:
"I quit my job just to quit. I didn't quit my job to write fiction. I just didn't want to work anymore."
and;
"I've come to think of Europe as a hardcover book, America as the paperback version."
and, from Point Omega;
“If you reveal everything, bare every feeling, ask for understanding, you lose something crucial to your sense of yourself. You need to know things that others don't know. It's what no one knows about you that allows you to know yourself.”
Beautiful. So beautiful that I might have to make myself a peanut butter sandwich...