Initial reactions to Libra

Libra reminded me a lot about Ragtime when first reading it. Both authors, while using actual historical characters, create their own worlds around these characters as they see fit. While Doctorow plays around with the characters of J.P. Morgan and Harry Houdini, Delillo plays around solely with Lee Harvey Oswald. Each author uses actual events within these character’s lives, but fills in the dialogue and emotions as they feel necessary. While what these characters say may not be entirely true, who can actually prove that Lee said such and such to someone at a certain time?

One thing I found particularly interesting when reading was how Delillo points out America’s obsession over Cuba. While many Americans think of it as an “idea”, deep down, it is simply their own economic investment in order to “free the country” from Communism (exploiting their labor and resources to make a profit). Cuba can also be seen as America’s need to control everything because once the Cuban Missile Crisis explodes, we not only have to worry for our economic interests, but also our security. It’s not that I haven’t learned about America’s economic interests in Cuba, but I always forget just how significant a factor it is in American relations with Cuba in 1960s.

I’ve been digressing a bit. The whole novel revolves around Lee Harvey Oswald, who Delillo portrays in an interesting light. According to the Warren Commission, Lee acted alone in the assassination of President Kennedy, but with new evidence coming up about the assassination, it is all possible that Lee was part of a larger conspiracy. Delillo uses this idea in order to tell his own version of the story: how the assassination attempt is plotted by former CIA operatives, and is intentionally going to fail in order to force the government to start a war against Cuba. As mentioned before, considering the Bay of Pigs and Cuban Missile Crisis, even if there isn’t solid evidence to prove that this kind of conspiracy didn’t happen, Delillo portrays it as a real one.

I would be lying to myself if I said that this novel is a brisk read. The prose and dialogue is quite dense, and there are so many plot lines and characters in the novel, mapping them out is quite the challenge (As mentioned in class, it’s almost like the scene in Slaughterhouse-Five where the anti-war novel’s plot is mapped out on the back of a huge sheet of paper with crayons. It’s all jumbled, and colors are flying everywhere, but it fits together in the end). That certainly doesn’t mean that the novel doesn’t capture my attention. I know that my points have been all over the place, so I’ll try to summarize everything up nicely. Delillo, from my initial reactions, does a nice job of portraying a potential conspiracy in the Kennedy assassination. While he does add in his own ideas, he still sticks within the boundaries of historical fact. Describing Lee’s childhood and upbringing, it certainly does remind us that Lee, even if he was the assassin, was still a human being.