Also sprach Elvis.

• Author: Gillespie, Nick
• Position: Briefly Noted - "Echoes of Elvis" exhibition - Brief article

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Elvis Presley, who died in 1977, would have turned 75 this year. In death he remains more popular than most singers and actors ever manage in life. "Echoes of Elvis," an exhibition at the National Portrait Gallery in Washington that runs through August, captures Presley's immense cultural staying power.

There are ironic, unironic, and semi-ironic depictions of the King as Julius Caesar, a latter-day Western hero, a rockin' rebel, and more. There are academic studies of Presley's semiotics, cookbooks like Are You Hungry Tonight?, and tell-all confessionals by hangers-on.

But why is "the face...