Which book is Netflix's White Noise based on? Don DeLillo's acclaimed novel explored

Netflix's White Noise is a highly absorbing absurdist comedy-drama movie that made its debut exclusively on the popular streaming platform Netflix on Friday, December 30, 2022. The riveting movie is based on renowned American novelist Don DeLillo's celebrated novel of the same name.

Noah Baumbach has served as the screenplay writer and director of the brand-new movie. David Heyman, Noah Baumbach, and Uri Singer are the producers for the absurdist 136-minute-long flick. The official synopsis for the Netflix film reads:

"At once hilarious and horrifying, lyrical and absurd, ordinary and apocalyptic, White Noise dramatizes a contemporary American family's attempts to deal with the mundane conflicts of everyday life while grappling with the universal mysteries of love, death, and the possibility of happiness in an uncertain world."

The highly promising cast list for the comedy-drama film includes Greta Gerwig as Babette Gladney, Adam Driver as Prof. Jack Gladney, Raffey Cassidy as Denise, Jodie Turner-Smith as Winnie Richards, André Benjamin as Elliot Lasher, Don Cheadle as Prof. Murray Siskind, Lars Eidinger as Arlo Shell and several others.

Since the movie's arrival on Netflix, the audience has become quite curious about the novel on which it is based. Without further ado, let's dig deep to find out all about the book White Noise.

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The novel White Noise by Don DeLillo

A still of Don DeLillo [Image Via Wikipedia]

The critically acclaimed novel was published on January 21, 1985, by Viking Press. It is the 8th novel by DeLillo.

It is considered one of the most ground-breaking novels in the world of postmodern literature, and DeLillo garnered a lot of positive attention from readers and critics alike in the aftermath of its publication.

The novel went on to receive the prestigious U.S. National Book Award for Fiction. The book was also included in the list of "Best English-language Novels from 1923 to 2005" by Time.

The work chronicles the story of a man named Jack Gladney, who is the creator of Hitler studies at the College-on-the-Hill. Jack has been married a total of five times to four different women and has children and stepchildren, including Heinrich, Steffie and Denise. He also has a son named Wilder with his current wife, called Babette.

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The story follows this man's absurd life, which goes smoothly until an unexpected incident turns it upside down. When a chemical leak from a rail car results in an 'Airborne Toxic Event,' Jack is compelled to come face-to-face with the deep-seated fear of his own mortality.

White Noise is considered an unmistakable composition of metaphysical dilemma and dark social satire that uncovers human beings' unhindered consumerism, originality, intellectualism, and media saturation.

Without a shred of doubt, the book captures the strange terror that an imminent fear of death brings into perspective, all amid a complicated family life.

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In 1987, during an interview with The New York Times, Don DeLillo said while talking about the novel:

"I began to notice something on television which I hadn’t noticed before... This was the daily toxic spill—there was the news, the weather, and the toxic spill. This was a phenomenon no one even mentioned. It was simply a television reality. It’s only the people who were themselves involved in these terrible events who seemed to be affected by them. No one even talked about them. This was one of the motivating forces behind White Noise." [Via The Ringer]

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Viewers can watch the 2022 movie White Noise currently streaming on Netflix.