Marshall Mathers: The Rise and Fall of Slim Shady

This blog explores the life of Marshall Mathers and his alter ego Slim Shady by taking an in depth look at the song "Stan" and several other of his works. "Stan" is an autobiographical song written and performed by Marshall Mathers under the persona of Slim Shady. The song chronicles Marshall's struggle as he slips further from the reality of his life and retreats into the dangerous persona he has created. It shows the tailspin Marshall can see occuring, but is ultimately unable to stop.

Stan represents the part of Marshall's personality that longs to be Slim Shady. The first lyric that suggests the link between Stan and Slim Shady is in reference to the song, Bonnie and Clyde. Marshall knows that becoming the impulsive and dangerous Slim Shady will lead to the destruction of himself and the people that are closest to him.
There are several links that correlate Stan to Marshall Mathers in the backgrounds that they share. The progression of Marshall's fall into becoming Slim Shady can be charted through the contact Stan tries to make with Slim Shady. Stan's communication becoming more and more psychotic represents the movement of Marshall in his life to becoming the Slim Shady character and abandoning his ego completely.
As Stan (Marshall) becomes more and more like Slim Shady he ultimately loses complete control of his life and destroys not only himself but his entire family. What makes, "Stan," an autobiographic is that it is not until he goes through the traumatic experience of almost losing everything that he is able to gain the perspective of knowing how to properly reflect on the events of his life, and ultimately the wisdom to fix everything that had gone wrong.

What makes Marshall's autobiography interesting is that although he has the wisdom to know what is right, he knows that Slim Shady will always be a part of him and that the danger of that persona is a permanent part of his life.