Madonna Overview

Being a cult figure is the essence of being 
a paradox in which someone 
has managed to get themselves linked

to the theoretically real while 
simultaneously getting themselves tied 
to conventional assumptions about being

this close to being a deity. They may, 
in that cryptic state, serve as both 
an extra without lines and the sole reason

center stage was invented. A cult figure 
can’t die, clearly a plus. Likewise, 
they get to be objects, playthings

of intellectual exchange between like minds 
and antagonists. That said, these icons  
are never merely after-the-fact abstractions.

No. Although anyone can hope 
to have a dahlia named after them—
wrongly assuming that nature will then

be forced to remember their name—
that path ignores the fact that nature 
is yet another meaningless conceit

over which people gush and go on and on 
about. “Using one’s imagination” 
is a far better way of gaining possession

of a new reality. One simply denies 
reality in favor of believing 
whatever one wants reality to be. It is this

that makes it possible to turn a ‘special girl’ 
into a cult figure—one that can be either 
a virgin, or, you know, “like a virgin.”