If a biography is judged solely by its length and detail, then Blake Gopnik’s 900-page doorstopper about Andy Warhol can be safely adjudged to be definitive. But while I have no doubt that the book covers the key facts of the artist’s life, there still seems to be something missing.
Time and again, Gopnik tells us about Warhol’s shyness and social awkwardness but it is not made sufficiently clear how he still evolved to become such a charismatic and influential figure. In other words, we never get to the root of the magnetism that drew such a devoted following, particularly among life’s misfits, mavericks and outsiders. Continue reading
