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Role Models
320 pages
A gleefully subversive self-portrait painted through intimate, amusing, and happily horrifying profiles of eccentric inspirations.
What it feels like
Reading this book feels like sitting at the scariest bar in town with a brilliantly eccentric friend who is eager to tell you about everyone they admire. The pace is brisk and lively, carrying you through a gallery of unconventional figures, from playwrights and timeless singers to atheist leaders and insane martyrs. The tone is delightfully subversive, aiming to amuse, enrich, and happily horrify in equal measure. It creates an atmosphere of neurotic happiness, where the boundaries of traditional inspiration are gleefully dismantled. The prose is intimate and sharp, functioning less as a standard biography and more as a refracted self-portrait. It is a perfect read for those who find joy in the bizarre and seek out the subversive forces that shape artistic minds.
- Mood
- eccentric
- gleefully horrifying
- neurotically happy
- Tone
- subversive
- amusing
- intimate
- irreverent
- Pace
- brisk
- Themes
- subversive inspiration · artistic influence · unconventional role models · refracted self-portraiture
- The writing
- Intimate, sharp, and unapologetically eccentric, blending biographical observation with subversive personal reflection.
- The arc
- Transitions from an eager introduction of bizarre inspirations to a joyful, intimate embrace of neurotic happiness.
- Who it's for
- Readers who delight in the bizarre and crave an irreverent, unconventional approach to artistic inspiration and memoir.
Content notes
- subversive themes
- eccentric behavior
- mild shock elements
About the book
Here, from the incomparable John Waters, is a paean to the power of subversive inspiration that will delight, amuse, enrich--and happily horrify readers everywhere. This book is, in fact, a self-portrait told through intimate profiles of favorite personalities--some famous, some unknown, some surprisingly middle-of-the-road. From Esther Martin, the owner of the scariest bar in Baltimore, to playwright Tennessee Williams; from atheist leader Madalyn Murray O'Hair to insane martyr Saint Catherine of Siena; from English novelist Denton Welch to timeless singer Johnny Mathis, these are the figures that helped the author form his own brand of neurotic happiness.--From publisher description.
Description from Open Library.
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