Patti Smith, Just Kids
There is so much to admire about Patti Smith’s enchanting memoir, Just Kids. It is, first and foremost, a depiction of Smith’s unique relationship with Robert Mapplethorpe in their youth, starting with their love affair as bohemian bookstore workers in New York City in 1969 and running through their friendship roles as muses in the fields of music, photography and poetry.
“We gathered our colored pencils and sheets of paper and drew like wild, feral children into the night, until, exhausted, we fell into bed,” Smith writes of their early time together. The power of their connection is inspiring.
The book, which won the National Book Award for Nonfiction, operates also as historical document, as Smith introduces us to a fascinating tract of cultural history: New York City in the 1970s. Here’s the legendary Chelsea Hotel, where Smith and Mapplethorpe lived together for years, bursting with artists and musicians, and there’s the wildly decadent Max’s Kansas City, where Smith and Mapplethorpe made the scene, decked in their finest hipster fare. Smith also reveals her interactions with important artistic personalities, including William Burroughs, Allen Ginsberg, Sam Shepherd and Janis Joplin, all of whom she encountered with wide-eyed innocence.
Finally, Just Kids is simply a gorgeously written book. Smith’s eye for object and place is mesmerizing; the language impeccable. She writes of her first trip to New York: “At 20 years old, I boarded the bus. I wore my dungarees, black turtleneck, and the old gray raincoat I had bought in Camden. My small suitcase, yellow-and-red plaid, held some drawing pencils, a notebook, Illuminations, a few pieces of clothing, and pictures of my sibling. I was superstitious. Today was a Monday; I was born on Monday. It was a good day to arrive in New York City. No one expected me. Everything awaited me.”
It’s also a real treasure to have Smith narrate the audiobook — a ridiculously addictive, highly listenable experience, as the older, wiser version of Patti Smith reflects on her younger self. Her youthful optimism still hangs so well, as she reflects on seeing Picasso as a teenager: “I knew I had been transformed, moved by the revelation that human beings to create art, that to be an artist was to see what others could not.”
