Has There Been A Great 9/11 Work Of Art? Ctd

by Zoë Pollock

In light of the anniversary, many are recalling Don DeLillo's prescience. In Mao II, published in 1991, he theorized that "terrorists and bomb-makers had replaced writers and artists as the myth-makers of our age":

[Their work] involves mid-air explosions and crumbled buildings. This is the new tragic narrative … Terror makes the new future possible.

Michiko Kakutani argues 9/11 didn't provoke a seismic change in the arts, or in daily life:

9/11 works feel like blips on the cultural landscape — they neither represent a new paradigm nor suggest that the attacks were a cultural watershed.

Scott Esposito differs:

I think that Kakutani is right that no single great work of art came out of 9/11 (the day itself) in the way that monumental books and movies were set during the Vietnam War, I think she’s absolutely wrong that literature of the era has not been written in the 10 years since. I also don’t know where in the world she gets the misguided notion that “9/11 did not really change daily life for much of the country,” seeing as it has been used to justify everything from war to torture to tax cuts to surveillance.

Byran Appleyard's thoughts here.