"wie es eigentlich gewesen"

Pg 12- “ 'We’re not here to capture an image, we’re here to maintain one. Every photograph reinforces the aura. Can you feel it, Jack? An accumulation of nameless energies.' ” DeLillo is making a point that throughout history, American culture has focused more upon their subjective viewpoints of history rather than take things as they really are. For example, the appeal of the Most Photographed Barn is that it holds that title, and we as Americans follow in allowing such an item to gain its fame. It seems that there does not even have to be anything particularly significant about these copies, other than its fame alone. People are not seeing the barn, but rather the picture of the barn, and moreso, THEIR picture of the barn. So no one cares about what it really is. To describe America's relationship with historiography in this instance, it is not always essential what historical [fill in the blank] exists, but rather how our culture perceives it.

Pg 24- “Man’s guilt in history and in the tides of his own blood has been complicated by technology, the daily seeping falsehearted death...'Can you prove here and now, that this stuff is rain? How do I know that what you call rain is really rain? What is rain anyway?' ” I love this quote because it is so revealing of the skepticism of "truth". It is difficult for anybody to view reality entirely objectively because what we as humans have defined as reality is entirely made up. Things are the way that they are because we have made them to be so. The debate about whether it is actually raining proves that there are so many more things to question in order to see how things actually are.

Pg 45- “ 'He would select more carefully, kill one famous person, get noticed, make it stick.' 'He now knows he won’t go down in history.’ ‘Neither will I.’ ‘But you’ve got Hitler.’ ‘Yes, I have, haven’t I?' " This passage brings me back to the Loughner study because as discussed, our culture has framed assassinators of famous people as historical figures. This conversation also relates to that theme of making a name for yourself only if you have the balls to kill someone famous. This is a twisted yet evident theme through our history.

Jack Gladney understands that history is something that we must strive to know on a more Rankian level, I believe. He makes points such as those found on page 12 that show how many instances provide our culture to view things with little skepticism. In the debate about whether it was raining, he delved right into that concept and tried to convey the message that things that are not often as questioned as they ought to be. It is vital to know how history actually was, not just take into our subjective accounts based solely upon personal histories. Gladney seems to be conveying a strong argument that humans ought to consider history “wie es eigentlich gewesen”.