[Reader-list] Michael Jackson, the bookworm (??)

[Taha Mehmood]

Dear All

A notion that most kings and queens are traditionally not well read is
well known but to read a perceptive about the book reading king of
pop, was somewhat interesting. Considering the kind of furor the
publication of one book has been able to make in India, it sure makes
one think about the power of ideas...

Please read the story for more... on MJ the book-reader :-)

Warm regards

Taha

http://articles.latimes.com/2009/jun/27/entertainment/et-jackson-books27

Michael Jackson, the bookworm
REMEMBERING MICHAEL JACKSON
Owners of local bookstores, including Dutton's, recall encountering
the late pop star perusing their shelves.

By Carolyn Kellogg
June 27, 2009

When news broke in early 2009 of Michael Jackson's return to Los
Angeles, it was not via reports of him being spotted dining at the Ivy
or dancing at the hottest new Hollywood club but book-shopping in
Santa Monica.

"He was a longtime and valued customer," a store representative of art
and architecture bookstore Hennessey + Ingalls said Thursday. "We'll
miss him."

If Jackson's bookstore appearance surprised his pop fans, it was
nothing new for booksellers. A few years ago, Doug Dutton, proprietor
of then-popular Dutton's Books in Brentwood, was at a dinner with
people from Book Soup, Skylight and other area bookstores.

"Someone mentioned that Michael Jackson had been in their store,"
Dutton said by phone Thursday, "And everybody said he'd shopped in
their store too."

It was the early 1980s when Dutton first saw Jackson, who came in
wearing "very large sunglasses." He had bodyguards with him, but he
was solitary and quiet. "There was no display of 'I'm Michael
Jackson,' " Dutton recalled. "I don't remember him actually saying
anything." Each time he shopped at Dutton's store, he'd buy four or
five books.

Brother Dave Dutton got a call in the late '80s or early '90s from an
assistant, who asked if he'd close his store early so Jackson could
shop there alone. "We did close early," he recalled by phone as his
wife Judy and son Dirk discussed Jackson's visits. "About a quarter to
9 he showed up in a big van," Dave Dutton said. "Once you got over the
initial caution because of those burly guys with him, he was very
nice."

In later years, Jackson would wear a surgical mask during his visits.
In an X17 online video of him on New Year's Eve 2008, in what appears
to be Hennessey + Ingalls, he browses for books under a black
umbrella, often held by an assistant.

"He loved the poetry section," Dave Dutton said as Dirk chimed in that
Ralph Waldo Emerson was Jackson's favorite. "I think you would find a
great deal of the transcendental, all-accepting philosophy in his
lyrics."

Largely an autodidact, Jackson was quite well read, according to
Jackson's longtime lawyer. "We talked about psychology, Freud and
Jung, Hawthorne, sociology, black history and sociology dealing with
race issues," Bob Sanger told the LA Weekly after the singer's death.
"But he was very well read in the classics of psychology and history
and literature . . . Freud and Jung -- go down the street and try and
find five people who can talk about Freud and Jung."

Hours after his death, Jackson's 1988 autobiography, "Moonwalk,"
despite being out of print, entered the Amazon bestseller list for
biography and memoir at No. 25.

"I've always wondered if there was a library in Neverland," Doug
Dutton mused. Indeed there was -- Sanger told LA Weekly that Jackson's
collection totaled 10,000 books.

And while the seven-bedroom Holmby Hills home that he leased this year
had a sunny pool and other luxuries the sunlight-wary Jackson might
not have taken advantage of, it also featured something he very well
might have: a wood-paneled library.

carolyn.kellogg at latimes.com