Jeannette Cooperman goes to Graceland in search of the last mystery train

Jeannette Cooperman at The Common Reader:

Graceland. I am here, for the first time, for the forty-fifth anniversary of Elvis Presley’s death. The name does not feel apt. Surrounded by sweaty, mutton-chopped worshippers in shiny polyester jumpsuits, women with wrinkly tattoos, and little boys in capes, I gulp down hot, syrupy banana glopped with peanut butter on smashed Bunny Bread to condition myself, then set out to meet the fans who keep a dead man alive as an engine of consumerism, a weird religion, and an inexplicable (to me) lifelong obsession.

They surprise me.

Flo Shaw, who comes every year from Manchester, England, wears a sundress printed with black-and-white Elvis portraits and has his profile on her forearm. She lights up brighter than her raspberry hair as she describes loving Elvis for sixty-seven years (far longer than her marriage). A character, I think happily. Yet as she fields my questions, I sense a toughness and acumen in her worship. She thinks the critics are wrong: “So what if he didn’t write his own songs? The range is incredible—from hillbilly to ballads.”

More here.

Enjoying the content on 3QD? Help keep us going by donating now.