First published 2007
Pulitzer Prize winner Margo Jefferson dissects Michael Jackson as a cultural phenomenon rather than simply a pop star. She connects Jackson to P. T. Barnum's circus spectacles, Peter Pan's eternal childhood, and Edgar Allan Poe's Gothic sensibilities. Jefferson traces how Jackson's Victorian-style upbringing and early years performing on the chitlin circuit shaped his fractured identity. She examines the troubling parallels between Jackson's celebrity and nineteenth century minstrel shows, questioning why audiences find child stars so compelling and what costs that fascination extracts. Jefferson analyzes Jackson's transformation into what she calls "Alone of All His Race, Alone of All Her Sex," exploring his neo-Gothic persona and innovative music videos. The book confronts the unsettling aspects of Jackson's perceived monstrosity and asks how American society itself created and consumed this enigmatic figure. Jefferson delivers a cultural reckoning that implicates readers in the spectacle they witnessed.
Genres: biography, 20th-century, african-american, music, 21st-century, cultural-studies
Vibes: dark, intimate, thought-provoking
Tropes: cultural-reckoning
Period: Victorian, 19th-century, Chitlin Circuit
146 pages · Paperback · Vintage
Content warnings: racism