Wozzeck

I´ve published a book on Elvis. A novel of sorts. It´s got a pink cover - Cadillac pink - and the fotograf on the back shows DJ and bluessinger, Rufus Thomas dressed op as a choktaw chief, wearing feathers and buckskin, while next to him, Elvis Presley is laughing his head off. The picture was taken i december 1956 when Elvis went to see a radioshow at the socalled Mother Station of The Negroes in Memphis. Here Ray Charles, B.B.King and The Happyland Blind Boys where performing - more or less dressed up as indigenuos natives. I had actually decided on the title of my book - The Great White Friend of The Indians - before I read about the episode. So it was too good to be true. And then I found the picture, just in time for publication.
The style of my book is slightly inspired by the fate of the play, Woyzeck by Georg Büchner (1813-37). The young german playwright died aged 23, before publication of his last work. And then it was lying around until the turn of the century, when the ekspressionists rediscovered him and published it. That is, they published a bundle of scenes, as far as they could read them. The titel they made out as, Wozzeck! So that became the title of the Alban Berg opera. But later on, the draft has been scrutinized by dedicated scholars, and republished with the scenes in a different order and a new title. However, it didn´t really matter. Wozzeck or Woyzeck, it´s like shuffling cards, you can read it one way and another. A slightly different succession of scenes only ads to the imaginative force of the play, and in a way leaves it open and very stimulating.
Well! So in my little book on good old Elvis, I try mixing shorts stories, faction and quotations. In order for the book not to be conclusive. Not making the different entries work in a deliberate direction.
There are stories on James Brown, Che Guevara and the Presley mother. And entries on the different etnicities who all try to connect themselves to Elvis: the angolans of North America, the turks, the jews, the cherokees, the irish and the scotsmen. There is quotations from people who hated him and people who, like Bob Dylan, would claim: "Hearing Elvis´ voice for the first time, was like busting out of jail."