A Massive Swelling: Celebrity Re-Examined As a Grotesque, Crippling Disease and Other Cultural Revelations. Cintra Wilson

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      A

      MASSIVE SWELLING

      CELEBRITY RE-EXAMINED AS

      A GROTESQUE, CRIPPLING DISEASE

      AND OTHER CULTURAL REVELATIONS

      BY

      Cintra Wilson

      Copyright 2016 Cintra Wilson,

      All rights reserved.

      Published in eBook format by Wilberforce Codex

      Converted by http://www.eBookIt.com

      ISBN-13: 978-0-9905-7432-3

      No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means including information storage and retrieval systems, without permission in writing from the author. The only exception is by a reviewer, who may quote short excerpts in a review.

      Praise for A Massive Swelling

      “In writing about fame in these United States, Cintra Wilson is incisive, inflammatory, offensive, astute, vulgar, mean, wildly funny, compassionate, and sweeping. Her dull moments are few.” – The Boston Globe

      “A Massive Swelling is a you-tell-it-girl delight, one of those books that ought to be read by a lot of people, and not just those who appreciate informed rant, crackling prose and hilarious, adjective-rippling commentary… a proactive, Pop-Rocks-for-the-brain book.” – The San Diego Union-Tribune

      “You don’t have to be a particularly deep thinker to come to the conclusion that fame is a big con. Fortunately, Salon.com columnist Wilson also happens to a brilliant writer with a deliciously warped and blistering wiseass take.” – Entertainment Weekly

      “Wilson should watch out. If she keeps being so funny and brutal, she’ll end up famous herself.” – USA Today

      “A flamboyantly profane lambasting of the ‘perverse deformity’ of fame…. Rhinestone-studded prose…. With a backbone of rectitude that gives it substance.” – Kirkus Reviews

      “These sixteen rabid, breakneck essays that take no prisoners, producing both gasps and laughter… Startling, witty and unerring. Wilson both entertains and deserves attention.” – Publishers Weekly

      “Warning” do not read this book at a wake, on a precipice, or with a full bladder… Wilson’s turbo, heat-seeking essays about fam, the bane of our commodified culture, will induce bent-double, breathless laughter.” – Booklist

      “Today, fame–not a good job or a first home–is the American Dream. It’s another psychological epidemic in need of a cure; A Massive Swelling might be an effective vaccination for the as of yet unafflicted.” – Gambit Weekly

      “”[Cintra Wilson] wields one of the sharpest pens in the business… Her essays storm the cheesy walls of popular culture like a band of punk-chick Visigoths, ravage the sequin-clad icons within and leave Celine Dion on her ass in a puddle.” – Time Out New York

      “By A Massive Swelling’s end, Wilson has built a formidable case for the toxicity of fame. She has us convinced.” – Playboy

      “[Cintra Wilson’s] relentless, justifiably sarcastic gaze is unwavering… refreshingly gutsy and scorchingly accurate.” – Seattle Weekly

      Success went fizzily to Bernard’s head, and in the process completely reconciled him (as any good intoxicant should do) to a world which, up to then, he had found very unsatisfactory In so far as it recognized him as important, the order of things was good. But, reconciled by his success, he yet refused to forgo the privilege of criticizing this order. For the act of criticizing heightened his sense of importance, made him feel larger. Moreover, he did genuinely believe there were things to criticize. (At the same time, he genuinely liked being a success and having all the girls he wanted.) – Aldous Huxley, Brave New World

      Of course, what made the whole thing smell was that many of the rich and famous were dumb cunts and bastards. They had simply fallen into a big pay-off somewhere. Or they were enriched by the stupidity of the general public. They were usually talentless, eyeless, soulless, they were walking pieces of dung, but to the public they were god-like, beautiful, and revered. Bad taste creates many more millionaires than good taste. It finally boiled down to the matter of who got the most votes. In the land of the moles, a mole was king. So, who deserved anything? Nobody deserved anything . . . – Charles Bukowski, Hollywood

      OTHER BOOKS BY CINTRA WILSON:

      Caligula For President:

      Better American Living Through Tyranny

      Colors Insulting to Nature

      Fear and Clothing:

      Unbuckling American Style

      www.CintraWilson.com

      Twitter: @xintra

      #AMassiveSwelling

      A New Introduction for The 2016 e-Edition, by THE AUTHOR

      A Massive Swelling was first published by Viking/Penguin in 2000.

      The internet was just beginning to lose its baby teeth. There was no Gawker, no TMZ, no Perez Hilton, no Kardashians. The American Dream of home ownership was still intact; as was the dream of being suddenly discovered in your local 7-Eleven or live bait shop, and whisked off to an ecstatic new world of Hollywood superstardom.

      In the context of today’s media climate, this sounds impossible — but when “A Massive Swelling” came out in 2000, it was actually considered to be controversial — or at least unforgivably rude. In some LA and New York circles it was tantamount to blasphemy; I was regarded with roughly the same distaste as someone who had just thrown up in the open coffin of a decorated war hero.

      I am quite surprised that my shrill purple hyperbole on the subject of celebrity would more or less pass for reasonable entertainment industry reportage less than twenty years later.

      Hollywood, as the propaganda arm of the American republic, has always (by accident or design) been a lopsided reflection of the larger political/economic context -- which, for the last 3 decades, has been a wholesale race to hit rock bottom financially, ethically, spiritually, and intellectually (on the brighter side, the unbearable tensions of this Fall of Rome-esque climate have produced a new Golden Age of television!).

      There have been many notable ruptures in the culture of celebrity since 2000, and a particular few that I feel deserve mentioning.

      I believe a seismic shift occurred in the landscape of fame-perception following the attacks of 9/11/2001. For some reason, the execution-style murder of the World Trade Center created СКАЧАТЬ