Amazons (novel)

Last updated
Amazons
Amazonscover.jpeg
Author Don DeLillo as Cleo Birdwell
LanguageEnglish
Publisher Holt, Rinehart and Winston
Publication date
1980
Publication placeUnited States
Media typePrint (hardback & paperback)
Pages390 (hardback first edition)
ISBN 0-03-055426-8
OCLC 6597950
813/.54
LC Class PS3552.I753 A8 1980

Amazons is a novel co-written by Don DeLillo, published under the pseudonym Cleo Birdwell in 1980. [1] The subtitle is An Intimate Memoir by the First Woman to Play in the National Hockey League. The book was a collaboration with a former co-worker of DeLillo's, Sue Buck, and represents a commercial, light-hearted effort between his novels Running Dog and The Names . While the book is widely known to have been written by DeLillo, and is technically his seventh novel, it has never been reprinted and he has only once officially acknowledged writing it. Additionally, when Viking was compiling an official bibliography for the Viking Critical Library edition of White Noise, DeLillo asked the publishers that the book be expunged from the list.

Contents

Plot summary

The novel is a fictitious autobiography narrated by Birdwell centering on her experiences as the first woman to play professional hockey in the NHL. It is in some ways similar to DeLillo's second novel, the football-themed End Zone, though more humorous and smaller in scale, replete with social satire and comedy. The story follows Birdwell and her teammates on the New York Rangers, as they travel around North American cities playing games and engaging in sexual adventures.

The prose is distinctly and obviously DeLillo's, but as further proof of his authorship, readers cite the appearance of the character Murray Jay Siskind, a sportswriter in the novel, who later appears as the eccentric former sportswriter-turned-"visiting lecturer on American icons" in DeLillo's novel White Noise.

Aftermath

In 2014, Salon stated that DeLillo "doesn't want his name attached to [Amazons]", "has never officially acknowledged writing it", and "won’t grant permission" for it to be reprinted. [2] In a 2020 interview with The New York Times , DeLillo finally acknowledged writing the novel. [3]

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Don DeLillo</span> American novelist, playwright, and essayist (born 1936)

Donald Richard DeLillo is an American novelist, short story writer, playwright, screenwriter, and essayist. His works have covered subjects as diverse as consumerism, nuclear war, the complexities of language, art, television, the advent of the Digital Age, mathematics, politics, economics, and sports.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Natalie Clifford Barney</span> American playwright, poet and novelist (1876–1972)

Natalie Clifford Barney was an American writer who hosted a literary salon at her home in Paris that brought together French and international writers. She influenced other authors through her salon and also with her poetry, plays, and epigrams, often thematically tied to her lesbianism and feminism.

<i>Underworld</i> (novel) 1997 novel by Don DeLillo

Underworld is a 1997 novel by American writer Don DeLillo. The novel is centered on the efforts of Nick Shay, a waste management executive who grew up in the Bronx, to trace the history of the baseball that won the New York Giants the pennant in 1951, and encompasses numerous subplots drawn from American history in the second half of the twentieth century. Described as both postmodernist and a reaction to postmodernism, it examines themes of nuclear proliferation, waste, and the contribution of individual lives to the course of history.

<i>Libra</i> (novel) 1988 novel by Don DeLillo

Libra is a 1988 novel by Don DeLillo that describes the life of Lee Harvey Oswald and his participation in a fictional CIA conspiracy to assassinate President John F. Kennedy. The novel blends historical fact with fictional supposition.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Rick Moody</span> American novelist

Hiram Frederick Moody III is an American novelist and short story writer best known for the 1994 novel The Ice Storm, a chronicle of the dissolution of two suburban Connecticut families over Thanksgiving weekend in 1973, which brought him widespread acclaim, became a bestseller, and was made into the film The Ice Storm. Many of his works have been praised by fellow writers and critics alike.

<i>White Noise</i> (novel) 1985 novel by Don DeLillo

White Noise is the eighth novel by Don DeLillo, published by Viking Press in 1985. It won the U.S. National Book Award for Fiction.

<i>Mao II</i> 1991 novel by Don DeLillo

Mao II, published in 1991, is Don DeLillo's tenth novel. The book tells the story of a novelist, struggling to finish a novel, who travels to Lebanon to assist a writer being held hostage. The title is derived from a series of Andy Warhol silkscreen prints depicting Mao Zedong. DeLillo dedicated the book to his friend Gordon Lish. Major themes of the book include crowds and the effects of political terrorism. Mao II received positive reviews from critics and won the PEN/Faulkner Award in 1992.

White noise is primarily a signal or sound with a flat frequency spectrum.

<i>End Zone</i> Novel by Don DeLillo

End Zone is Don DeLillo's second novel, published in 1972.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Joyce Johnson (author)</span> American novelist

Joyce Johnson is an American author of fiction and nonfiction, whose writing has been closely associated with the Beat Generation. She was also a child actress and appeared in the Broadway production of I Remember Mama, which she went on to write about in her 2004 memoir Missing Men.

<i>Cosmopolis</i> (novel) 2003 novel by Don DeLillo

Cosmopolis is a novel by American writer Don DeLillo. His thirteenth novel, it was published by Scribner on April 14, 2003.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Frank Deford</span> American sportswriter (1938–2017)

Benjamin Franklin Deford III was an American sportswriter and novelist. From 1980 until his death in 2017, he was a regular sports commentator on NPR's Morning Edition radio program.

<i>The Names</i> (novel) 1982 novel by Don DeLillo

The Names (1982) is the seventh novel of American novelist Don DeLillo. The work, set mostly in Greece, is primarily a series of character studies, interwoven with a plot about a mysterious "language cult" that is behind a number of unexplained murders. Among the many themes explored throughout the work is the intersection of language and culture, the perception of American culture from both within and outside its borders, and the impact that narration has on the facts of a story.

<i>Game 6</i> 2005 American film

Game 6 is a 2005 American comedy drama film directed by Michael Hoffman. It stars Michael Keaton, Robert Downey Jr., Bebe Neuwirth, Griffin Dunne, and Catherine O'Hara. The plot follows fictional playwright Nicky Rogan, who has a new stage play opening on the same day of the sixth game of the 1986 World Series. The screenplay, written in 1991, is Don DeLillo's first script to be made into a film. The soundtrack is written and performed by Yo La Tengo. The film premiered at the Sundance Film Festival and was given a limited theatrical release on March 10, 2006.

<i>Falling Man</i> (novel) 2007 novel by Don DeLillo

Falling Man is a novel by American writer Don DeLillo, published May 15, 2007. An excerpt from the novel appeared in short story form as "Still Life" in the April 9, 2007, issue of The New Yorker magazine.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Bruno Maddox</span> British novelist and journalist

Bruno P. Maddox is a British literary novelist and journalist who is best known for his novel My Little Blue Dress (2001) and for his satirical magazine essays.

<i>Point Omega</i> Novel by Don DeLillo

Point Omega is a short novel by the American author Don DeLillo that was published in hardcover by Scribner's on February 2, 2010. It is DeLillo's fifteenth novel published under his own name and his first published work of fiction since his 2007 novel Falling Man.

<i>White Noise</i> (2022 film) Film by Noah Baumbach

White Noise is a 2022 absurdist comedy drama film written and directed by Noah Baumbach, adapted from the 1985 novel by Don DeLillo. It is Baumbach's first directed feature not to be based on an original story of his own. The film stars Adam Driver, Greta Gerwig, and Don Cheadle. Set in the 1980s, the story follows the life of a niche academic and his family as they go through trials and tribulations, beginning with an environmental disaster near their home.

<i>The Silence</i> (novel) 2020 novel by Don DeLillo

The Silence is a short novel by Don DeLillo. It was published by Scribner on October 20, 2020. An audiobook version was released the same day, narrated by Laurie Anderson, Jeremy Bobb, Marin Ireland, Robin Miles, Jay O. Sanders and Michael Stuhlbarg.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">What Is the Best Work of American Fiction of the Last 25 Years?</span> 2006 poll of writers

"What Is the Best Work of American Fiction of the Last 25 Years?" is an informal opinion poll conducted in 2006 by the New York Times Book Review (NYTBR) to determine "the single best work of American fiction published in the last 25 years." Eligible works were those written by an American author and published during the quarter-century period from 1980 through 2005. The poll was conducted by NYTBR editor Sam Tanenhaus, who sent letters to literary figures requesting their participation and received 124 responses. The results were published on May 21, 2006, in the Sunday edition of the New York Times. An essay by A. O. Scott, titled "In Search of the Best", reflected on the results and the premise of the "Great American Novel".

References

  1. Cowart, David (2012). Don DeLillo: The Physics of Language. University of Georgia Press. p. 244. ISBN   9780820342269.
  2. Don DeLillo's forgotten "memoir", by Victoria Patterson, in Salon , published January 11, 2014; retrieved April 5, 2020
  3. Marchese, David (2020-10-12). "We All Live in Don DeLillo's World. He's Confused by It Too". The New York Times. ISSN   0362-4331 . Retrieved 2020-10-12.