Read a good book lately?
Seen a good movie? Listened to a
compelling song? Did you feel the need
to research the author, the actor, the musician? Most of us do.
We human beings are curious creatures. We will endlessly inquire about the
biographies and lives of celebrities while knowing relatively little about
those close acquaintances, friends or family we meet on a daily basis. Why do we find the lives of the rich, famous
and powerful so fascinating? Why do we
feel compelled to investigate the background of total strangers?
It is true that biography has value sometimes in helping us
understand certain aspects of our history and the development of human traits,
foibles, and achievements. But are the
endless number of biographies and Wikipedia entries, with all their infinite
detail, in any way necessary for a deeper understanding of the world? Is it curiosity, sincere admiration,
intellectual rigor, or is it simply a shared voyeurism that causes us to read
hundreds of pages about some historic figure or a rock star?
Is it not enough to enjoy the artistic output of a singer, a
musician, an actor or an artist? Does it
really add anything to our enjoyment to know about their childhood, their
marriages, their divorces, their political beliefs?
Are we eager to put people on pedestals, or is it that we
are hoping to find some tragic character flaw, some whiff of scandal that will
make our own ordinary lives not such a damning indictment? Or perhaps in some cases we are hoping to
deepen our relationship and feel somehow closer to a cherished artist or leader.
Perhaps it is the mystery and the allure of celebrity that
spurs us on. Do we hope to obtain a tiny
taste of this exalted status by reliving in detail the ascendancy of some
famous personage?
Think of the many ways we worship at the altar of
celebrity. We are thrilled to find a famous
person at the same restaurant or on the same airplane and desperate to relate
the story of our encounter to others.
We have developed name-dropping into an art form and shamelessly exploit
the tiniest association with anyone rich or famous in conversation with others
who no doubt are either rolling their eyes or frantically searching their own
internal rolodexes for a counter-name-drop.
Perhaps it is fitting that we become such sycophants to the
famous, for it creates a wonderfully ironic living hell for them as they are
forced to hide themselves from the public and endure endless incursions into
their privacy. It evens things out a
bit, doesn’t it? Poetic justice!
