Michael Jackson released the best-selling album of all time, but his life was not the best of all time, it was full of scandals and incessant criticism. Realism was a literary movement that began in the 1840s and was able to influence singers like Michael Jackson a century after its inception. This essay will demonstrate that Michael Jackson was a great musician and a realist writer. To do this, Michael Jackson's career will be examined to find out how he became a great musician. Then realism will be defined, then its definition can be used to prove that Michael was a realist writer. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on "Why Violent Video Games Shouldn't Be Banned"? Get an original essay Michael Jackson was born on August 29, 1958 in Gary, Indiana, to Joe and Katherine Jackson (Rolling Stone 3). He died on June 25, 2009 of cardiac arrest (Rolling Stone 2). He was such a good artist that the press had to acknowledge the fact that a young black man could become the biggest pop star in the world (Rolling Stone 1). Michael Jackson grew up listening to a lot of music. His parents constantly influenced him musically. His father, Joe, played in a band and his mother, Katherine, sang with her children and taught them a lot about music (Rolling Stone 5). After some time, Joe began working with his children in an ensemble. He made Jermaine, Michael's older brother, the lead singer. One day Katherine saw Michael singing and dancing with James Brown, she was shocked by his talent and potential (Rolling Stone 6). Michael loved to dance and sing (Rolling Stone 7). Joe Jackson began training his sons when he knew they wanted to become entertainers. The better they got, the more fun they had. In Moonwalk, Michael says he got hit when he made a mistake (rolling Stone 8). Michael's father probably expected perfection, so he hit Michael to ensure that he didn't make the same mistakes again and that he ended up being the better artist in the end. It was around 1964 that Joe started having his children participate in talent shows. they won most of them. When one of their singles, "Big Boy," achieved local success, Joe realized how professional his sons were. In 1966 he began enrolling his children in nightclubs (Rolling Stone 9). After some time, they began touring the “Chitlin Circuit,” a network of black venues in the United States. While touring the Chitlin' circuit they opened for many R&B artists, including the Temptations, Sam and Dave and Jackie Wilson (Rolling Stone12). The most famous venue was the Apollo in New York, where they won an Amateur Night Show. While at Apollo, Joe had the opportunity to meet Gladys Knight. Gladys and Bobby Taylor, both Motown stars, encouraged Joe to have his sons audition for Motown, one of America's top black pop labels. Michael said, "we auditioned and they loved it, and Diana Ross came up to us special after the concert we did for them and kissed us all and said we were wonderful and said she wanted to have special role in our career and that's how it started” (Pidgeon 14). They had so much talent and potential that the Motown stars wanted to help them achieve the success they were capable of achieving Angeles from Motown, Berry Gordy, the owner of Motown, began working with them. According to Michael, Gordy told him that their first three singles would be number one (Rolling Stone 13 Michael and his brothers became known as). the Jackson 5. The Jackson 5's first four songs were number ones, just like he hadpromised Gordy (Rolling Stones 15). Michael was the true star of the Jackson 5. His voice worked beyond typical male soul singers and beyond gender norms (Rolling Stones 16). However, they did not write their own music. They asked their producer if they could write their own music, but he said no. The restriction on writing their own music would have prevented the Jackson 5 from growing and Michael from launching a successful solo career (Rolling Stone 18). In 1975, Joe Jackson negotiated a new contract for his sons with Epic Records, for a 500% increase in royalty rate (Rolling Stone 18). “A royalty is the payment made for the use of an intellectual property right” Collins. The contract also included solo albums for all of the Jackson 5, except Jermaine, who remained at Motown because he married Gordy's daughter. Motown did their best to prevent that contract from being made, but the only thing they could do was prevent the group from using the name Jackson 5, now the group was called the Jacksons (Rolling Stone 19). Epic Records moved them to Philadelphia, with Kenny Gamble and Leon Huff, their new producers. It was in 1978, with the album Destiny, that the Jacksons finally took control of their music (Rolling Stone 20). Soon after, Michael felt he needed to make some changes to have a successful solo career. His first move was to fire his father as manager and find a new one. He hired Quincy Jones, who was a very respected producer. Michael liked Jones' talent for mixing hard, complex rhythms with soft layers. Michael later said, "It was the first time I had fully written and produced my own songs... I was looking for someone who would give me that freedom, as well as someone who was musically unlimited." Michael also said that he wanted his solo album to sound different from the band's album (Rolling Stone 21). Together they made the album Off the Wall, which proved that Michael was a mature artist. By 1985, the album had sold more than 5 million copies in the United States alone (Rolling Stone 22). Michael expected Off the Wall to win Record of the Year and Album of the Year in the 1980 Grammy Awards. But it only won the Best Male R&B Vocal Award. After that, Michael felt saddened, but encouraged to make an album that everyone would recognize (Rolling Stone 23). Then Michael wanted to make the best album ever. He released Thriller in November 1982. Michael wanted Thriller to be a collection of great songs, each song designed for a different audience (Rolling Stone 24). The songs were crafted authentically and describe Michael's inner life. Those songs dealt with Michael's fears and experiences, the album was full of personal revelations. Thriller was a mass market masterpiece. It was an achievement that will likely never be surpassed (Rolling Stone 25). A few months later, the Jacksons performed their greatest hits for Motown's 25th anniversary. After his brothers left the stage, Michael broke into "Billie Jeans." It was Michael's first public performance outside of the Jacksons as a band. It was one of the best performances ever (Rolling Stone 26). Seven songs from Thriller made it to the Billboard Top 10, and the album became the best-selling album in history, having sold around 50 million copies to date, probably selling more. In the 1984 Grammy Award, he received eight awards. Then he did a world tour with the Jacksons (Rolling Stone 29). He was at the peak of his career. He was the greatest musician of the time. Everything slowly began to fall apart when Michael became the victim of racist backlash. He was accused of changing his skin color to please his white audience andachieve higher sales figures (Rolling Stone 31). According to Randy Taraborrelli, author of Michael Jackson: The Magic and the Madness, Michael didn't really like his body (Rolling Stone 32). He later admitted to having had plastic surgery to change his nose and chin, but denied changing his skin color (Rolling Stone 33). Michael's body continued to change over time, people began to believe he wanted to be white and others thought he was an androgynous, someone with both masculine and feminine traits (Rolling Stone 34). Michael wanted his next album to be better than Thriller, but that wasn't the case. practically impossible. He also wanted to defend himself from all the criticism he received, because he felt disrespected. He wasn't criticized for his music, but for the things he did, like; his devotion to his animals as if they were his friends, his ongoing facial reconstruction, and accusations of sleeping in a hyperbaric oxygen chamber to maintain his youth (Rolling Stone 35). In 1987 he released Bad, which was good, but not as good as Thriller and Off the Wall (Rolling Stone 36). In 1988 he did not win any Grammy Awards, and came first in Rolling Stone's readers' poll of "worsts of the year" (Rolling Stone 39). Michael then moved to Los Angeles where he built a house known as Neverland. In 1993, a story broke that Michael had molested a 13-year-old boy (Rolling Stone 40). He settled the matter with money out of court, because he wanted to leave it all behind (Rolling Stone 41). That episode made him even more infamous, so much so that it pushed him to use drugs, which he continued to use until his death. In the same year he unexpectedly married Lisa Marie Presley, the daughter of Elvis Presley, their marriage was highly criticized, they divorced 18 months later. (Rolling Stone 42). Michael's musical drive waned and his music was not as successful as before. His new music usually served to justify himself and respond to critics (Rolling Stone 44). While he had some good moments, his music was less popular in the '90s. His 2001 album Invincible finally adapted to the cultural and stylistic changes brought about by hip-hop and other urban music styles. Michael was no longer known for his music, but for his mistakes (Rolling Stone 46). In a 2003 interview with Martin Bashir, he spoke about sharing his bed with children who were not his in his home in Neverland. This caused a lot of criticism and controversy. According to reports, he was so devastated that he attempted an overdose of morphine to kill himself (Rolling Stone 47). Later, another child molestation controversy appeared and Michael was shaken by it (Rolling Stone 49). The largest star in the world had fallen. He left the United States for Bahrain. In early 2009 when he announced a series of 50 concerts, known as “Final Curtain” (Rolling Stone 50). Those concerts probably served to restore his name. On June 24, Rolling Stones reported that everything went well during its rehearsals, and it seemed like it was back in the day (Rolling Stone 51). He died the next day of a drug overdose. His doctor was later charged with manslaughter because he gave the drugs to Michael (Rolling Stone 52). Moving on to Realism, it is a type of literature that deals with the interpretation of reality as it is (Washington State University 1). Realism appeared in the 1840s and dominated the Western lifestyle until the 1890s. It began in France and then spread to other countries (McKay 744). Realist writers believed that literature should reflect life as it was, they simply saw things happen and then wrote them down. The main realist writers dothey focused on observing everyday life, then creating narrative based on their observations (McKay 744). George Eliot, a Victorian writer who improved the method of psychological analysis of modern fiction (Haight), defined realism as “the doctrine that all truth and beauty must be attained through humble and faithful study of nature, and not by substituting vague forms, generated by the imagination in the mists of feeling, in place of a definite and substantial reality” (Mullan 1). Realists wrote about topics that weren't really talked about, such as alcoholism, strikes, and violence. We don't talk about these topics because they are everyday things that people see and have stopped caring because they are used to them. Those subjects became normal everyday things, which made it harder for people to oppose them. Many critics argued that there is no real difference between Realism and Naturalism. Realism is difficult to define, because it has different contexts, European and American (Washington State University 2). In American literature, realism deals with the post-Civil War period. The article states that “Increasing rates of democracy and literacy, rapid growth of industrialism and urbanization, an expanding population base due to immigration, and a relative increase in middle-class affluence have provided a fertile literary environment for readers interested in understanding these rapid changes in culture. ). The fact that realists wrote about current events in the United States back then helped people understand what was happening in their country. It also made them appreciate the realism, because it was through it that they knew what was happening. Michael Jackson was a realist writer, despite not living in the 1840s. Five songs were used to showcase his realist writing style; in songs like "Bad", "Smooth Criminal", "Dirty Diana", "Man in the Mirror" and "Just Good Friends", Michael sings about events that happen in real life. In “Bad,” he says “Just show your face, in broad daylight, I tell you, the way I feel, I'll hurt your mind.” This is probably a response to his critics, because he was tired of all the things they said. This scenario doesn't just happen to Micheal, it happens to other people too. There are people who like to bully or talk behind others' backs. These people usually never “show their faces in broad daylight,” which means they never want to confront the person they hurt in public. Michael wants to face the critics and will tell them how he feels and what he tells them will hurt their minds. Michael isn't looking for a fight, but what he says will destabilize the critics. Usually, when a person is a victim of bullying and decides to confront it, they will not seek a hand-to-hand fight, but a conversation that hinders the bully's will to continue bullying. Tells the truth about bullies without distorting anything. Later in the song he says, "You're not a man, you throw stones to hide your hands." By this he means that critics do not have the courage to face him like a man, and they avoid him while trying to hurt him with insults. They hide their hands because they don't want to be involved in what happens next. This is exactly what bullies do. His song "Bad" reflects the conflict with modern bullies and backstabbers. He fictionalized the events that happened to him and sang about them to reach a wide audience and spread the word about bullies. He said what they do and how they do it without distorting the truth and he said it with humility, without calling them out as if he wanted to fight. The second song that shows realistic lyrics in Michael's songs is in "Smooth Criminal". “SmoothCriminal” reflects first-degree murder. In "Smooth Criminal" Jackson said, "He came to her apartment... She got shot, it was her sentence." The killer knew when and where he could find and then kill the target, because he went to her apartment and found her there. Murder then kills his victim. Later in the song he says, "Every time I tried to find him, he left no clue, left behind, and they have no way of knowing about the suspect or what to expect." When relatives of the deceased try to find the killer, they usually fail. First degree murderers usually plan things out to make sure no clues are left behind, so no one can pick up on them. When Michael says "they have no way of knowing," he's talking about the police because there aren't enough clues. “Smooth Criminal” reflects first-degree murders in real life, as those people are normal in society. Murderers are everywhere and people accept this fact without trying to stop them. People try to stop them only after they kill someone, they fail to find the killer and give up instead of looking differently. Murderers are taken lightly because society doesn't care enough to stop them, it's as if society doesn't care about them at all. The third song with realistic lyrics is "Man in the Mirror". In "Man in the Mirror" he says: "For once in my life I'll make a change... As I turned up the collar of my favorite winter coat, this wind is driving me crazy, I see children on the street, without enough to eat, who it's me for being blind, pretending not to see their needs "Many people say they will change something in their life, but don't change. They usually keep their promise when they see someone living a harder life than them, because they simply cannot ignore the fact that they are ungrateful for things they take for granted. Later in the song he says, “If you want to make the world a better place, take a look at yourself and then make a change.” To change the problem of compacted earth one must examine oneself before examining others. This is a paraphrase of Matthew 7:5, which says, “You hypocrite, first remove the log from your own eye, and then you will see clearly to remove the speck from your brother's eye.” Michael saw how people wanted to change the world, but were also concerned with changing themselves. Michael tells the truth about changing the world, because the only way to change it is not to wait for others to change, but to start by yourself. He decided to take the first step to make the world a better place, because he couldn't stand the fact that the world was in such a bad state and no one was really trying to change it. Everyone accepted it as normal. The fourth song that contains realistic lyrics is "Just Good Friends", featuring Stevie Wonder. Michael said, “(Before you make) Before you make, (A big mistake) Remember, looks can deceive you.” This is exactly what is happening in the twenty-first century. People are attracted to others just because of their appearance. Being attracted to looks has become so common that people practically worship looks. Many people try to undergo surgery to look even better and be more attractive. These texts should be taken as a warning by many men and women, because many people fall in love with people of the opposite sex because they look good on the outside. Michael calls it a big mistake, and it really is a big mistake. Getting fooled by appearance will cause many sad moments. Later in the song, Stevie Wonder says, "You better take advice, never trust first impressions." That's another warning to people about.