So, my blog title comes from a book that I am currently reading titled The Savage Girl by Alex Shakar. Paradessence, as described by a character in the book, is the paradoxical essence of a product, and every successfully marketed product (according to this character) has one. Here is a passage from the book where the term is introduced:
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“What’s the paradessence of coffee?” Chas asks her.
Paradessence? She came across the word essence in a couple of the marketing books she skimmed, usually attached to some glib distillation of the product’s selling points. But paradessence? What could that mean? Something paradise, perhaps.
She takes a shot. “I guess something about how it wakes you up, maybe. Or the way it warms you up on a cold morning.”
“Waking and warming,” Chas says. “Very close. Now think. Locate the magic. Locate the impossibility.”
“‘The impossibility’? I don’t know. Being warm. Thats kind of like being sleepy, I guess.”
“The paradessence of coffee is stimulation and relaxation. Every successful ad campaign for coffee will promise both of those mutually exclusive states.” Chas snaps his fingers in front of her face. “That’s what consumer motivation is about, Ursula. Every product has this paradoxical essence. Two opposing desires that it can promise to satisfy simultaneously. The job of the marketer is to cultivate this schismatic core, this broken soul, at the center of every product.” (p. 60-61)
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I haven’t finished the book yet, but I like that term. Some of the other examples given in the book were air travel, which promises both adventure/exploration but in a sanitary contained way, and ice cream which is erotic and sensual but also has images of the 50s soda jerk and wholesomeness. Maybe I chose paradessence for the blog because my infatuation with horrible media is enjoyable (I have read many of the Left Behind books and got caught up in the stories) but also critical (those books are problematic all over the place), so maybe the essence of my infatuation with these stories is a paradox.
