Station 11-The inside scoop for the inside scoop

This post focuses on how Station Eleven portrays the behind the scenes of a celebrity interview. Would technology change our view of gossip?

An inside look at celebrity lives?

It seems that before and even after the events of the pandemic, people are still obsessed with the idea of celebrity coverage from the media. There are many instances in the book where paparazzi, interviews, and celebrity tabloids have popped up.

Due to the fact that the character Jeevan used to be a paparazzi and then a journalist, we get to see the behind the scenes of the interviews-the pre-published versions.

When Jeevan interviews Arthur, the audio of the entire interview is being recorded until Arthur turns off the recorder and requests that what he says next isn’t in magazines for a full 24 hours. Even though Jeevan promises Arthur for this, Arthur’s publicist is doubtful that Jeevan will keep his word. This might have been because the publicist knows how fast news can travel in this day and age and how hard it is to keep celebrity information secret.

These interviews give us an insight on how little privacy it is that celebrities have and that while most of their interviews often have permission before being published, sometimes they are caught completely off guard. An example of this would be when Jeevan took a picture of an unsuspecting Miranda and it appeared in magazines no less than a day later.

Station Eleven also shows us that the things we see in magazines and tabloids aren’t always true. In Station Eleven, we see a “celebrity” or a person being interviewed specifically asked for a section of their interview not to be recorded or published. When Kristen is asked about her knife tattoos, she specifically asks the interviewer not to record what she said in the paper because it wasn’t what she wanted to be remembered for. This helps to show us that celebrities are people too and often times only show the best sides of themselves to the public.

Does technology change our view of gossip?

In a world where we are so reliant on technology to bring us gossip, it makes us wonder if our views would change if these magazines or websites didn't exist anymore. It doesn't seem that way as in Station Eleven, people still like to hear about the lives of celebrities. We see this when Kirsten is interviewed and the transcript is published in a newspaper that makes it's way around to different people. This idea is also seen when Kirsten goes around collecting newspapers and magazine articles about Arthur Leander. It seems that even then, people still believe whatever it is they see in the media that exists.

Station Eleven shows that people tend to hold gossip in very high regard but the things we see in media are often not true and that there is a lot that goes on behind the scenes before we see the stories. Even though life is so different in Station Eleven and much of technology has been wiped out, it doesn't stop people from wanting to read gossip or celebrity coverages.