Jennifer McKee
ENG 10
October 2nd, 2015
Ms. Walker
Allusion
The text that I am reading is “Lose Yourself” by Eminem and I have found a number of allusions within this text, which have helped me to access deeper meaning through both characterization and plot. Eminem uses allusion quite frequently in his works in order to relate to his readers and expose different parts of his life. It is a personal touch that I find informative and intriguing. His work revolves around a difficult period of his life when he was struggling to succeed as an artist and escape the bounds of his socio-economic circumstance. I will be focusing on three different stanzas of his work which contain four different allusions that I have identified.
The soul's escaping, through this hole that is gaping
This world is mine for the taking
Make me king, as we move toward a new world order
A normal life is boring, but superstardom's close to post mortem
It only grows harder, homie grows hotter
Coast to coast shows, he's known as the Globetrotter
Lonely roads, God only knows
He's grown farther from home, he's no father
He goes home and barely knows his own daughter
But hold your nose 'cause here goes the cold water
But I kept rhyming and stepped right into the next cypher
Best believe somebody's paying the pied piper
All the pain inside amplified by the
Fact that I can't get by with my 9 to 5
And I can't provide the right type of life for my family
Cause man, these goddamn food stamps don't buy diapers
And it's no movie, there's no Mekhi Phifer, this is my life
And these times are so hard, and it's getting even harder
Trying to feed and water my seed,
Baby mama drama's screaming on her
Too much for me to wanna
Stay in one spot, another day of monotony's gotten me
To the point, I'm like a snail
I've got to formulate a plot or I end up in jail or shot
Success is my only option, failure's not
Mom, I love you, but this trailer's got to go
I cannot grow old in Salem's lot
So here I go it's my shot.
Feet, fail me not
This may be the only opportunity that I got
(Eminem, Lose Yourself)
In the first stanza Eminem alludes to the Globetrotters in the sixth line: “Coast to coast shows, he's known as the Globetrotter/Lonely roads”. The Globetrotters are a Harlem based basketball team who are known for their playful skills with a basketball. They travel all over the world in order to play games, but also to entertain. I remember when the Globetrotters visited Halifax and a lot of kids attended; it was quite an event. Eminem makes use of this allusion to the Globetrotters because he wants to convey how stardom can appear glamorous, but is also incredibly isolating and lonely. He wishes to address the reality of fame and its potential harmful effects on himself and those that admire him. Without this allusion his readers/ listeners would not immediately connect to this message and might think it is cliché.
In the second stanza that I have selected there are two allusions. One is to the tale of the “pied piper” and the other to Mekhi Phifer. The pied piper is a well-known German tale about a town that hired a piper to drive away its infestation of rats. He was successful in doing this, but was not paid and therefore used his piping song to lure the children away from the town. Eminem states that you “Best believe somebody's paying the pied piper/All the pain inside amplified by the/Fact that I can't get by with my 9 to 5”. This implies that he is struggling with being paid properly for his talents; just like the pied piper. He can’t take care of his children in the manner that he desires. Therefore he is “no Mekhi Phifer”. Mekhi Phifer is a successful Hollywood actor who happens to also star in the movie that they made of Eminem’s life, which he also starred in. His life story is no movie and did not save him from struggling with money and his ability to take care of his family. Being a rapper is often not enough to support a family and the people around him are sucked into the world of drugs.
Finally in the last stanza he alludes to Stephen King’s “Salem’s Lot”. He refuses to “grow old in Salem's lot/ So here I go it's my shot.” Salem’s Lot is a novel written by Stephen King about a small town in America which is literally sucked dry by a vampire who moves into one of the old houses. The vampire systematically turns the townspeople on each other and the hero of the story is unable to save the town. It turns into the proverbial ghost town and is left forgotten and destroyed. Eminem refuses to have this be his fate. He wishes to break free from his trailer park life and not be left in a town which will forget him and suck his family dry.
These series of allusions helped me enter the psyche of Eminem and be able to fully wrap my mind around his desire to transform his lifestyle through his talents, but to also not compromise his values or glorify a lifestyle that is not all it seems. It is this two sided coin of characterization that pulls people in. He is a multi-dimensional writer who relates to many different people because he came from a life that many people share. His desire to do better is also a common desire of his audience and it is through the allusions that he built into his work that he makes these details vivid and believable.