On Michael Jackson
Jan 2006 · Sold by Vintage
4.2star
35 reviews
Ebook
144
Pages
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About this ebook
The renowned Pulitzer Prize–winning cultural critic brilliantly unravels the complexities of one of the most enigmatic figures of our time in this passionate, incisive, and bracing work of cultural analysis.
Who is Michael Jackson and what does it mean to call him a “What Is It”? What do P. T. Barnum, Peter Pan, and Edgar Allan Poe have to do with our fascination with Jackson? How did his curious Victorian upbringing and his tenure as a child prodigy on the “chitlin’ circuit” inform his character and multiplicity of selves? How is Michael Jackson’s celebrity related to the outrageous popularity of nineteenth-century minstrelsy? What is the perverse appeal of child stars for grown-ups and what is the price of such stardom for these children and for us? What uncanniness provoked Michael Jackson to become “Alone of All His Race, Alone of All Her Sex,” while establishing himself as an undeniably great performer with neo-Gothic, dandy proclivities and a producer of visionary music videos? What do we find so unnerving about Michael Jackson’s presumed monstrosity? In short, how are we all of us implicated?
In this stunning book, Margo Jefferson gives us the incontrovertible lowdown on call-him-what-you-wish; she offers a powerful reckoning with a quintessential, richly allusive signifier of American society and popular culture.
Who is Michael Jackson and what does it mean to call him a “What Is It”? What do P. T. Barnum, Peter Pan, and Edgar Allan Poe have to do with our fascination with Jackson? How did his curious Victorian upbringing and his tenure as a child prodigy on the “chitlin’ circuit” inform his character and multiplicity of selves? How is Michael Jackson’s celebrity related to the outrageous popularity of nineteenth-century minstrelsy? What is the perverse appeal of child stars for grown-ups and what is the price of such stardom for these children and for us? What uncanniness provoked Michael Jackson to become “Alone of All His Race, Alone of All Her Sex,” while establishing himself as an undeniably great performer with neo-Gothic, dandy proclivities and a producer of visionary music videos? What do we find so unnerving about Michael Jackson’s presumed monstrosity? In short, how are we all of us implicated?
In this stunning book, Margo Jefferson gives us the incontrovertible lowdown on call-him-what-you-wish; she offers a powerful reckoning with a quintessential, richly allusive signifier of American society and popular culture.
Ratings and reviews
4.2
35 reviews
ann landers
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July 3, 2016
If this is the book I think it is people it is just another book basically trashing Michael Jackson. The fact that she would call him a "freak" is enough for me to be totally disgusted and her credibility is GONE. Michael Jackson was not a freak. He was an untouchable talent with a heart full of love for all people. He wanted to entertain us and make us happy and he wanted to give back in time and money which he did to the day he died. He wanted to be loved. He wanted to raise his three children away from the glare of the spotlight. He wanted the media to leave him alone. Do not read books like this. Focus only on books written by people who knew Michael or people who really did the research in a fair and just way. No talk of "freaks".
9 people found this review helpful
Dave Byrne
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October 21, 2013
I liked mj as a kid then when i grew up i had my doubts him, and this book shows me that Jackson was sexually interested in little boys, disgusting man
Joumana Nasser
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August 31, 2019
This is so bad. Tarnish the image of Michael Jackson is the worst thing ever.
4 people found this review helpful
About the author
The winner of a Pulitzer Prize for criticism, Margo Jefferson previously served as book and arts critic for Newsweek and the New York Times. Her writing has appeared in, among other publications, Vogue, New York Magazine, The Nation, and Guernica. Her memoir, Negroland, received the National Book Critics Circle Award for Autobiography. She is also the author of On Michael Jackson and is a professor of writing at Columbia University School of the Arts.
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