I Am Jack's X

About

I Am Jack's X is a snowclone.

Origin

The phrase was popularized by the 1999 movie Fight Club^[1] based on the 1996 novel^[2] of the same name by American author Chuck Palahniuk.^[3] In the movie, the main character is shown reading an excerpt from a Reader's Digest article told from the perspective of a man's organs.

The actual stories^[4] were published in Reader's Digest singly over several years and published as a compilation^[5] in 1986. In these stories, the name used was "Joe," but it was changed to "Jack" in the film's screenplay.^[6]

Spread

In April 2006, an aggregator called I am Jack's…^[7] was created, collecting every instance of the phrase seen on the web between 2006 and 2008, linking to them when possible. Over the two years it was active, the site compiled 419 instances. Many blogs have used the phrase as a title for their postsover the years including I am Jack's Bacon Shake Review^[9], I am Jack's sense of the moment^[10] and I am Jack's nostalgic narrator.^[11] In 2008, a collection of essays on Fight Club was published, subtitled "I Am Jack's Completely Unauthorized Essay Collection.^[12]

Many image macros as well as personal texts posts that begin with the phrase "I Am Jack's" can be found on Tumblr.^[8]

External References