Archive for January 3, 2011
JUST KIDS by Patti Smith
There are a handful of writers who haunt me. That is, as I’m reading their books they come to me in my dreams, usually with sharp elbows and voices clamoring for attention. Cormac McCarthy effects me this way. So does, not surprisingly perhaps, Friedrich Nietzsche. No writers whisper to me in my dreams. It was the second night of reading Just Kids that I discovered here too a voice so strong and compelling so as to ring in my ears after the book is closed, the eyes shut and the brain turned off. Like caffeine, if consumed after a certain late hour, you know you’re in for a ride. Patti Smith is an original. She is a poet with the heart of a rock star and the drive of an Olympic athlete. She comes at you hard and fast and won’t let go, even in a dream state. She is that mesmerizingly good.
January 3, 2011
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Judi Clark · 
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Tags: 1970s, Art, Music, Nonfiction · Posted in: 2010 National Book Award Shortlist, Award Winning Author, Coming-of-Age, National Book Award, New York City, Non-fiction
