With a novel as complex and ambitious as Underworld, possible topics for discussion are as numerous as DeLillo's cast of characters. The questions below are intended to serve as starting points for more detailed exploration of just a few of the novel's many issues.

1. As Capote's book In Cold Blood (1965) and many of Tom Wolfe's novels— The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test(1968), The Right Stuff (1979), to name two—have done, Underworld relenders historical events in fictional form. But even more so than these novels do, Underworld frequently and obviously mingles "fact" with "fiction." Fictional Klara Sax attends Truman Capote's Black-andWhite Ball, which was an actual event.

What are the effects of DeLillo's melding of fact and fiction? Should there be a clearer line between the two? Why do you suppose the novel allows this line to remain blurry?

2. Explore the implications of Underworld's non-linear narrative...