Xia Wu
September 20, 2015
Underwear Power
Andy Warhol
In this excerpt of The philosophy of Andy Warhol, Andy Warhol writes about his underwear shopping experience with his friend B, who has a different shopping taste from the author. During this shopping, they encountered several salesmen and we can see Andy’s philosophy about underwear, comfort, fashion and even life clearly through the conversation he and his friend have and his preference about brand and shopping place.
One of my favorite quotations is “At Herald Square people were pouring into Macy’s from all over the world.”[1] I like this quote for two reasons. Literarily, I was amazed by the vivid personification and metaphor in the quote. Without saying that there were so many people, I can imagine how crowded Macy’s was when Andy and his friend were there. Emotionally, I think Macy’s is similar to New York and somehow and can represent New York. Both of them are like a melting pot, since everyone can get into the environment easily, just like they have been there for a long time and they take it for granted buying and living in these two places.
I would like to ask my peers about the reason that Andy wrote so many dialogue between him and his friend B, since B obviously have different likes from Andy. I think Andy intended to create a contrasting effect, and thus, to let the readers having fun while reading for the struggle between him and his friend. Moreover, I think Andy wanted to show that there is no right or wrong in one’s taste and opinion since they are all personal. And by doing so, his philosophy, thoughts and tendency about brands and underwear became a symbol of him, his Avatar.
I enjoyed this excerpt because there are a lot of humorous scene and dialogue here. The author’s avatar became vivid during his conversation with different salesmen and his friend because of Andy’s specific preference of shopping place, material of underwear and shopping style (slow, do not want to rush). And I realized that if one can open his heart and assemble all the different opinions and identities of different people together, he or she will find something interesting and fantastic, just like what Andy and New York did; Andy accepted the different taste between him and B and they became really close friends, so his friend B became the inspiration and the main character in his writing, which makes his work attractive and fun for readers. New York welcomed everyone with different races, religion and culture to come and live and that is the one thing that makes New York New York.
[1] Andy Warhol, The philosophy of Andy Warhol (New York: Harcourt, Inc., 1975), 231.
