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The body artist is a strange book not only for being a rareness in DeLillo’s bibliography but also for the way the author deals with the book’s contents.
The book opens with a scene of the maincharacter and her husband having their morning ritual in a holiday apartment at the coast that they have rented for six months: pouring cereals, looking at her husband lighting his cigarette, making idlechat… Since the first moment, we are able to observe the importance that DeLillo gives to every little detail. He makes the description of each action, each incident, of everything. After the firstchapter, DeLillo includes a newspaper obituary informing us of the death of the body artist’s husband. He has committed suicide shooting himself at his first wife’s apartment just after the morningpreviously described. This happening is the focal point of the piece since it unleashes drastic changes in the main character’s life. She is, to some extent, left alone by her husband. She is unpreparedfor dealing with sorrow, with grief, as anyone who suddenly loses a loved one. So, she shapes a complex character. Through her DeLillo makes the reader wonder if one is the same person in thedifferent moments of life. When Lauren comes back to the summer house she discovers that a mysterious semi-autistic nameless childlike man has been living in the house since they arrived at the house. Thischaracter has the ability to replay Lauren and her husband’s conversations speaking in their voices. Lauren tries firmly to discover who is this man and uses him to remember Rey. She even feels Rey isstill with her through the boy. DeLillo presents us this odd character but he does not reveal his real identity. Along the story, we never know if he is real or is a product of Lauren’s (the bodyartist) imagination. He appears and disappears like a ghost. We can think that he is in Lauren’s mind because she has not accepted Rey’s loss and needs to think he is still alive. We also can interpret...