The Role Of Jack's Fear Of Death In White Noise

In the novel White Noise, the protagonist Jack Gladney copes with his fear of death very often, and frequently through power. The power Jack seeks is not completely obvious to his friends and family or in his personality, but revolves more around power over his own death and his fear of it. Jack finds the idea of being remembered after death takes away from you actually dying, and believed that this is what Hitler did. Delillos use of Jack's first person point of view also helps to understand and analyse how Jack is truly feeling in many situations. Jack uses power as a tactic to distance himself and forget his fear of death. He gains this power by leading himself to create a ‘stronger’ persona for himself, creating negative relationships with family, being violent, and through consumerism.

Jacks profession, and Hitler in general, makes him feel powerful and pushes him to become more powerful. Teaching about such a powerful person guides him to try and present himself as a powerful man, too. He wears a black cape, dark glasses, and is even encouraged to change his name and body by the chancellor: “...the chancellor advised me…to do something about my name and

appearance if I wanted to be taken seriously as a Hitler innovator.” (16) Jack ends up adding extra initials to his name and considers. Through Jack's point of view, it is shown that he is unsure about all the changes he is encouraged to go through with, but continues to do so for the power. He becomes dependent on this presentation at work and never teaches without it, even as it affects his health. He has a conversation about this with Babette: “ “Chakravarty [his doctor] thinks I ought to see an eye man” “Is it the colored spots again?” “Yes.” “Stop wearing those dark glasses.” “I can’t teach Hitler without them.” “ (221). Jack may believe that if he is not fully immersed into the role he plays to teach about Hitler, he will lose the power he gains from it. By being able to correspond with Hitler, Jack is able to create a protective barrier from death.
Furthermore, by dismissing his children instead of praising their intelligence, Jack demonstrates dominance and superiority among his family for the sake of power, especially at the topic of death. For instance, his oldest son Heinrich, was discussing how technology in their daily lives was slowly killing them, not toxic spills and other disasters, and Jack's first person view shows how he truly feels about his son's statements, “The girls looked at him admiringly. I wanted to argue with him.” (175) This is not the first time any of Jack's children mentioned something on this topic, but what his son mentioned was very perceptive and would require some level of self awareness. The children also never mention these topics with fear in mind, just the facts. Jack, instead of acknowledging this analysis made by his son, instantly gets defensive out of spite of his own selfish fear. Jack does not want to believe what Heinrich said, because he does not want to think about how close death really is. Through fighting and disagreeing, he would be able to reassure himself and make his children's statements invalid, making himself appear more intelligent in comparison and in result, more powerful. Even though he did not fight with Heinrich about this, having this mindset comes up over and over again throughout the novel. It causes him to look at his children and what they understand as negative and wrong, all because he is too afraid to even think about those things himself.

Moreover, through shooting Willie Mink (Mr. Gray), Jack felt powerful and farther from death, even as he almost caused it. Before this incident, Jack's friend Murray tells him about the concept of killers and diers: “In theory, violence is a form of rebirth. The dier passively succumbs. The killer lives on..” (290). Jack kind of takes this theory to heart, and sees it as more encouragement to face Mr. Gray, as he had already been contemplating finding him after finding out what happened with his wife, Babette, between the two. Jack eventually goes through with shooting Mink, and even looking through his point of view, he does not express feeling much guilt at all: “I tried to see myself from Minks viewpoint. Looming, dominant, gaining life power, storing up life credit...I was pleased to see how well it was going” (312). His point of view shows how even from a dying person's perspective, he believes he is powerful. He finds comfort in the fact that being able to shoot Mink supposedly helped him distance himself from death, shown when saying “...gaining life power, storing up life credit” (312). Jack expresses feeling very little guilt whilst shooting Mink. He feels powerful behind the gun, he feels powerful being in control of the situation.

An additional way Jack makes himself feel powerful is through consumerism.

Jack visits the mall with his family and becomes entranced by the activity, “The more money I spent, the less important it seemed. I was bigger than these sums… I felt expansive, inclined to be sweepingly generous” (84). Through his purchases, he was able to feel powerful from the fact that he was able to control everything he bought, for himself and his family. Buying things for his family also helped him feel like the leader, and again, more authoritative. He is able to forget about his fear for a little, and even feel like he is distant from it because he has so much power. Jack does not openly express how these daily activities make him feel, so his point of view is beneficial in seeing what he is thinking and

feeling.

Through seeking authority, Jack is able to temporarily overlook his fear of decease. Many of his attempts include ‘dressing up’ for his job, bushing off his children's statements, attacking someone with a deadly weapon, and by making purchases. His search for this power throughout the novel often leads to negative actions and outcomes that only give momentary relief.