Don DeLillo’s Libra: A Critique of Capitalist Ideology

Abstract

This thesis, with the thorough analysis of Libra by Don DeLillo, tries to come up with the view that capitalist ideological imposition itself is the cause of its own destruction. Two contradictory parallel structures in the novel – on the one hand, characters are shown to be following the huge American capitalist system and on the other hand, they are supplying the numerous instances that undercut the capitalist ideology – show that American capitalism cannot save its own ideal slogans like democracy, security, equality economic success, and so on. Lee Harvey Oswald, for example, joins American schools and security forces and as the story progresses he quits them. Similarly, the President John F. Kennedy operates his capitalistic ideology with the help of the elite group under CIA called Leader-4. But with the extensive imposition of capitalist ideology leads the members of the Leader-4 to assassin the President.