Various problems of communication form the core of the narrative of White Noise. The most dramatic problem is that the whole community is menaced by a cloud of undetermined origin — perhaps poisonous, or carcinogenic, but certainly a pollutant — which triggers a massive evacuation.
Clearly there is neither a comprehensive nor a coherent evacuation plan for the community, and so random movement becomes the self-defeating norm.
Within this context, the difficult relationships among the members of the family of the narrator — a remarried father whose second wife also has several children from a previous marriage — become more and more problematic. The narrator begins with a strong affirmation of continuity and with some confidence in the ability of the usual arrangements to sustain order. He describes the arrival of his students —.....
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