Just Kids

Smith, Patti. Just Kids. New York: HarperCollins 2010. Print

First Sentences:

I was asleep when he died.

I had called the hospital to say one more good night, but he had gone under, beneath layers of morphine. I held the receiver and listened to his labored breathing through the phone, knowing I would never hear him again.

Description:

I was completely unfamiliar with Patti Smith and her art, not to mention her life with fellow artist, the photographer Robert Mapplethorpe, during the turbulent 1960s. But fortunately for me and other interested readers, Smith carefully documented that fascinating world in her beautifully written memoir, Just Kids. 

In 1967, Smith moved to New York City to find work that would provide enough money to live, explore art, and mingle with the artistic energy and people of the city. Armed only with the new white waitress uniform and shoes given to her by her mother, Smith lived on the street, unable to afford a room, getting by eating old food donated by sympathetic restaurant chefs. One of her biggest joys was finding two quarters in Central Park.

I would spend that day much as I spent the next few weeks, looking for kindred souls, shelter, and most urgently, a job. 

She finally landed a cashier job at a Brentano's bookstore where one day Mapplethorpe came in and bought her favorite, secretly-coveted coveted necklace from the display case. She impulsively told this complete stranger, "Don't give it to any girl but me" and he promised he wouldn't. Sure enough, later after they had established a relationship, he actually did give it to her. 

[Robert] wasn't certain whether he was a good or bad person. Whether he was altruistic. Whether he was demonic. But he was certain of one thing. He was an artist. And for that he would never apologize.

Together, they lived in various tiny lodgings including the Chelsea Hotel, that famous refuge for struggling artists. Smith spent free hours writing poetry, songs, and sketching while Robert made and occasionally sold necklaces and collage art pieces constructed from objects scrounged from the trash. For a splurge they took a train to Coney Island, split one hot dog and a Coke, and people-watched all day. To settle problems, they went to the "bad doughnut shop...the Edward Hopper version of Dunkin' Donuts. The coffee was burnt, the doughnuts were stale, but you could count on it being open all night."

During the late Sixties, they met, discussed art and politics with, and attended performances of emerging stars like Andy Warhol, William Burroughs, Jim Morrison, Jimi Hendrix, Janis Joplin, and many, many more. It was these people and the City itself that gave them energy and inspiration.

The city was a real city, shifty and sexual....The skyscrapers were beautiful. They did not seem like mere corporate shells. They were monuments to the arrogant yet philanthropic spirit of America. The character of each quadrant was invigorating and one felt the flux of its history. The old world and the emerging one served up in the brick and mortar of the artisan and the architects.

Patti Smith quietly began to perform some of her poetry and songs at local dive bars, fighting off drunks and hecklers. Meanwhile, Robert was given an old Polaroid instant camera and instantly he began to create his now-famous, often controversial, photographs. Both Smith and Mapplethorpe begin to achieve larger and larger measures of acceptance in the artistic world and some financial security. 

Just Kids portrays the hopes, frustrations, and lifestyles of a wide variety of artists  who eventually gained fame that lasts to this day. Her style reminded me of individual soap bubbles, where each paragraph was full and complete, then floated away as she moved on in the next paragraph to another episode, person, art piece, or contemplation. While that may sound disjointed, it came across as a peek into an artistic mind that feels deeply about incidents and people and is willing to share them with readers.

Smith recounted how some of her acquaintances did not make it out of the Sixties, including Jimi Hendrix who once helped Smith when she was on the street; Joplin, Morrison, her poetic idol; Tinkerbell (Warhol's model); and Mapplethorpe himself as foreshadowed in the opening sentences. The end of the book was some of Smith's strongest writing and passion for both Mapplethorpe and her own future.

I feel no sense of vindication as one of the handfuls of survivors. I would rather have seen them all succeed, catch the brass ring. As it turned out, it was I who got one of the best horses. 

A thoroughly absorbing and informative look into that era and its artistic inhabitants from one who lived it each day.

Happy reading. 

Fred

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Great autobiography of Neil Young in his own rambling, opinionated, lyrical words. Introduces his experiences and changes with music and the artists of the Sixties and later years.