Laborde sets out to move beyond critique to theorize a more nuanced account of the contentious relationship between religion and liberalism. In an endlessly-frenzied debate that seems dangerously deadlocked, this ambition deserves to be applauded.
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The real Elvis is American, remember, and America is a consumer society. The desires we project, the stuff we buy—that is what feels real to us. It lets us have any Elvis we want. He left plenty of kitsch in his wake, plenty of pseudo-religion, plenty of Elvis jokes—but he was not, is not, a joke. He lived our contradictions, released our inhibitions, and lost himself in the process.
