Reviews tagging 'Death'

Just Kids by Patti Smith

60 reviews

addicook's review against another edition

emotional inspiring reflective fast-paced

3.5

I enjoyed reading it and it was easy to get through for the most part but it just didn't really spark a ton of emotion or reflection for me personally

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Drug use

Minor: Chronic illness and Death

c410berry's review against another edition

reflective

3.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Terminal illness, Death, and Drug use

v2001's review against another edition

emotional funny hopeful inspiring reflective medium-paced

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Homophobia and Death

thmei's review against another edition

adventurous challenging emotional hopeful inspiring reflective sad medium-paced

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Terminal illness and Death

Moderate: Drug use, Addiction, and Grief

Minor: Pregnancy

for the addiction & drug use tags: she & especially robert use drugs casually, mostly hallucinogens and later weed, and if i remember correctly they befriend some alcoholics but nothing particularly distressing or graphic is described, it’s just frequently mentioned. they have some bad trips but mostly lots of fun and creativity. for the pregnancy tag:

patti is briefly pregnant at 19 towards the beginning of the book and describes being treated badly during labor and the bittersweet sadness of giving up a child. she is also pregnant again as a married adult during the last chapter.

nothing is graphic at all. for the grief and death tags: robert’s death

from aids, as well as the death of his partner sam wagstaff,

is the primary focus of the last two chapters. you know from the prologue that he will die. these chapters are quite short and i personally didn’t find them overwhelming, but they are sad and the hopefulness at the beginning of this ordeal is very sad to the reader, who knows what will inevitably happen. it’s also quite easy to predict what will occur given the events of the book and any knowledge of the era, even with no knowledge of patti smith’s life. it is still extremely upsetting.

joensign's review against another edition

challenging emotional reflective slow-paced

3.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death, Drug use, and Terminal illness

Minor: Pregnancy and Suicide

paulinelluise's review against another edition

emotional inspiring reflective relaxing sad slow-paced

3.5

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Death

risemini's review against another edition

emotional inspiring sad medium-paced

4.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Drug use and Death

emtay's review against another edition

emotional inspiring reflective medium-paced

4.75

"Why can't I write something that would awake the dead?" (279)

This may not be Smith's endeavor in Just Kids, having accepted that the immortality of art does not extend to its creators. She instead embarks on a Homeric elegy to her dearest friend and lover Robert Mapplethorpe as well as the New York City of their formative artistic years. However, I experienced a personal rebirth. I am renewed in my artistic aspirations, inspired by Smith's succinct candor towards embracing her weaknesses, inspirations, and varied experiences as a young woman. I identified with her and found the hindsight with which she speaks aspirational. When she falls into "trouble" as a teenager:

"I had relieved the boy of responsibility... It is impossibke to exaggerate the sudden calm I felt. An overwhleming sense of mission eclipsed my fears" (18)

or when contracting a venereal disease from her dearest friend. She is loving and loyal. Creatively subversive while adhering to binaries of good and evil, life and death, God and sin. 
The only weakness is in the myriad of unexplained allusions to people in the scene, at some point, there are too many people whose eclectic influence on her life and not enough page. You have to accept the unknowing.
I am reminded of me and Jack. Of a love so deep I am not afraid of losing it. And when the love was young and ripe, I see me and Wes. 

"I was there for these moments, but was so young and preoccupied with my own thoughts that I hardly recognized them as moments" (159).

This is in part my plague. I love my own thoughts to the point of idolization, may this never stop me from living. May I walk alongside them, knowing they are there as a constant companion.

"It seemed being an actor was like being a soldier: you had to sacrifice yourself to the greater good. You had to believe in the cause. I just couldn't surrender myself enough to be an actor" (165).

This is why I have always maintained that the actor does not create the art, they are the conduit. The brush. The paint. They must be a little stupid. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Drug abuse, Terminal illness, Drug use, Death, and Medical content

Minor: Suicide

jodielk93's review against another edition

emotional funny informative inspiring reflective medium-paced

5.0

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Death, Pregnancy, Suicide, and Addiction

illicitrature's review against another edition

emotional informative inspiring lighthearted sad slow-paced

2.75

somewhere around 2.75 or 3⭐️

i saw someone said that in order for someone to read a memoir, there are two things to consider, i forgot the other thing they mentioned, but the other one truly describes why i pick this up: for curiosity, to catch something that piques my interest. though i would like to say that this is somehow a hit or miss… 

this is written in a form where it is very easy to read: it is direct to the point— as well as it isn’t. somehow, it felt like a chore reading this because there were lots of names mentioned, and there were a lot of things that felt repetitive. 

(would expound my thoughts regarding this book on my booksta review)

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Death and Addiction

Minor: Suicide, Abortion, and Panic attacks/disorders