But uniting them all is the shared origin point: since the early 1700s, celebrity has been one of the most emphatic driving forces in popular culture it is a lurid cousin to Ancient Greek ideas of glorious and notorious reputation, and its emergence helped to shape public attitudes to ethics, national identity, religious faith, wealth, sexuality, and gender roles. A few found fame as small children, some had to wait decades to get their break.

Some craved fame while others had it forced upon them. Whether it was the scandalous Lord Byron, whose poetry sent female fans into an erotic frenzy or the cheetah-owning, coffin-sleeping, one-legged French actress Sarah Bernhardt, who launched a violent feud with her former best friend or Edmund Kean, the dazzling Shakespearean actor whose monstrous ego and terrible alcoholism saw him nearly murdered by his own audience - the list of stars whose careers burned bright before the Age of Television is extensive and thrillingly varied.Ĭelebrities could be heroes or villains warriors or murderers brilliant talents, or fraudsters with a flair for fibbing trendsetters, wilful provocateurs, or tragic victims marketed as freaks of nature. But the famous and infamous have been thrilling, titillating, and outraging us for much longer than we might realise. Celebrity, with its neon glow and selfie pout, strikes us as hypermodern.

Dead Famous by Greg Jenner