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cast into feminine terms, set the standard for ambitious actors. Charlie Parker, the genius of bebop, was a heroin addict; his exploits with women were as legendary as his mastery of the sax, an instrument whose major players were all male. Jackson Pollock’s explosive drip paintings and tough-guy rebel stance attracted wide media attention, a first in American painting. Drunk, he might piss in a host’s fireplace or upend the dinner table. Such artists were invaluable for cold war propaganda purposes. Whatever the impression left by the witch-hunts of Senator Joseph McCarthy, American rebels were living proof that, in contrast to the heavily regimented Soviet Union,
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