''A Massive Swelling: Celebrity Reexamined as a Grotesque, Crippling Disease and Other Cultural Revelations'' is the first book written by
Cintra Wilson
Cintra Wilson (born 1967) is an American writer, performer and cultural critic. Dubbed "the Dorothy Parker of the cyber age", she is best known for her commentary on popular culture which is often humorous and irreverent in tone. She contributed t ...
. The book consists of a collection of essays which focus on America's obsession with
celebrity culture and how, according to Wilson, celebrity status and the desire to attain it, is a "grotesque crippling disease" that affects nearly every American who participates in and reacts to the
mass media.
Celebrities from
Celine Dion to English
post-punk front man from
The Fall,
Mark E. Smith, are examined as victims of a larger, imaginary machine that uses artists for a period of time, and then discards them once they become unprofitable. In her book, Wilson focuses a good deal of attention to the influence that
New York City and
Los Angeles play on people and their appetite for fame as well as the media's ability to manipulate consumers into believing that celebrities are somehow more physically equipped for success and that what is aggressively sought after and the envy of so many people is nothing more than a facade.
{{DEFAULTSORT:Massive Swelling
Essay collections
2000 non-fiction books
Viking Press books