Just Kids
Ratings125
Average rating4.2
15
Ratings125
Average rating4.2
In Just Kids, Patti Smith's first book of prose, the legendary American artist offers a never-before-seen glimpse of her remarkable relationship with photographer Robert Mapplethorpe in the epochal days of New York City and the Chelsea Hotel in the late sixties and seventies. An honest and moving story of youth and friendship, Smith brings the same unique, lyrical quality to Just Kids as she has to the rest of her formidable body of work--from her influential 1975 album Horses to her visual art and poetry.
Reviews with the most likes.
The best books, paintings, movies, really any work of art, for me, is when the artist makes it feel like the secret of their creativity is just there for the taking. It makes me want to write and create too.
I loved this book and its meditation on love and friendship and art and holy days.
I really wanted to love this book, but surprisingly, it didn't click with me. I feel bad for saying this about a memoir but I felt so bored—but it might have something to do with me not being from the Western world so I didn't really know or care for most of the references and namedrops (and they made up 40% of the book). It took me 12 days to get through this because I was falling asleep all the time. Ending chapter made up for it though
It's very exciting to follow the path of an artist even if it is filled with lots of misery and people with addiction problems and there are a ton of names mentioned in most of the pages. There were so many people here I did not know, maybe I will bother sometime to check them all. It was exciting to hear some of the names that I do know.
Was a vibe to read the ending as the new year ended ☠️☠️
I feel a bit ashamed that I did not know that such a non-conformist icon existed decades before I was born. The world did not get that much cooler, huh, or maybe I still am missing artists, names who would speak my language in the contemporary world, I have seen some, but I am always hungry for more. There are so many I am missing.
It is very inspiring to hear how much Patti gave up to do her art and to follow it. Living for art seems so reckless yet desirable and for a lot of us not a choice, but a way of life. I follow art, I am too unstable to settle and would get bored too easily any other way.
She is so iconic for elevating her favourite poets the way she did.
I didn't know much about either Patti Smith or Robert Maplethorpe except the sort of murky rumors that always surround celebrity, and most of that tawdry. I did know, first hand, the sixties, and that time has always captivated me. As much as I try to stay away from celebrity bios, I just kept hearing praise and more praise for this book, and I finally succumbed and read it.
I'm happy to say that Patti Smith is a good writer, and I'm happy to tell you that this is a story filled with all the details of the sixties that will take you right back to that place and time. It's not a particularly cheery story; Patti and Robert subsisted on little for a long time and many of the tawdry rumors were genuine. But their story offers hope to all the wanna-be artists in the world. Neither Patti nor Robert had much in the way of a formal education in art. Instead, they were immersed in art and artists, and that finally helped them become the groundbreakers they eventually became.
Featured Prompt
2,852 booksWhen you think back on every book you've ever read, what are some of your favorites? These can be from any time of your life – books that resonated with you as a kid, ones that shaped your personal...
