Justin Vivian Bond
In the new essay collection Icon (edited Amy Scholder; published by the Feminist Press), writers discuss their relationships with public figures they’ve idolized, obsessed over, worried about, and been inspired by. Contributors include Mary Gaitskill (who pays homage to Linda Lovelace), Johanna Fateman (on Andrea Dworkin), and Kate Zambreno (on Kathy Acker), among others. The pieces vividly blend biography and autobiography, moving from tribute to confessional and back again. In the essay excerpted here, Justin Vivian Bond writes about Estee Lauder model Karen Graham’s serene and reassuring appearance. The “state of grace” it suggested helped Bond “escape into an image