Floor Sample [Hardcover]

Julia Cameron (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: May 4, 2006

A beautifully crafted memoir by the woman who has helped thousands of people uncover their creative inspiration.

In Floor Sample, the author of the international bestseller The Artist's Way and twenty-one other classic books on the creative process weaves an honest and moving portrayal of her life. From her early career as a writer for Rolling Stone magazine and her marriage to Martin Scorsese, to her tortured experiences with alcohol as she struggled with a Hollywood existence that she would never learn to make peace with, in this unflinching memoir Cameron reflects on the experiences in her life that have fed her own art as well as her ability to help others realize their creative dreams. She also describes the fascinating circumstances that led her to emerge as a central figure in the creative recovery movement-a movement that she inaugurated and defined with the publication of her seminal work, The Artist's Way.

Julia Cameron is a passionate and wry observer of the world, and this story of her life as a self-described "floor sample" for all she teaches in her brilliant creativity books will surprise, entertain, and inspire all of her many fans as well as anyone interested in a good literary memoir.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

At 57, Cameron, famous for her semispiritual approach to healing artist's block (presented in 1992's The Artist's Way) still seeks her creative and emotional center. She now details her creative struggles, framed by her fight to maintain sobriety after years as an alcoholic and drug addict. Early fame writing for Rolling Stone led her to the most cataclysmic relationship of her life, a youthful marriage to director Martin Scorsese, with whom she had her only child. The relationship lasted less than two years. For 10 years after, Cameron chased similar creative ground to Scorsese's, attending film school, making small films and screenwriting for film and TV. She seemed unable to settle down, moving between Los Angeles, New York, Chicago and Taos, and details a constant, painful struggle to find a creative touchstone. Her one focus remains her art—yet that often resembles monomania and leads her to periodic psychotic breaks. She leaves her daughter adrift to work on her art; relationships crash and burn because she is a workaholic and egomaniac. Cameron is best at revealing the dark side of her privileged life: her descent into alcoholic blackouts and drug-induced paranoia as well as descriptions of her bouts with psychosis. These are disturbingly vivid; the rest is febrile New Age rhetoric. (May)
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

From Booklist

Creativity guru Cameron presents a page-turning, richly textured, and wrenching memoir that begins with her strict Catholic childhood in a book-filled Illinois house. Brainy and longing to emulate Lillian Hellman and Dorothy Parker, she was "a bad girl waiting to happen." At Georgetown University, she spent her evenings in bars writing, downing doubles, and experiencing memory blackouts. During her junior year at Fordham, she stayed out drinking until dawn while still maintaining a stellar GPA. She then became a hard-drinking, hot young writer, first at the Washington Post, then at Rolling Stone; then met filmmaker Martin Scorsese and followed him to Los Angeles, where she added cocaine to the mix. Finally, a postpregnancy return to alcohol and drugs and Martin's romance with Liza Minelli pushed her to the edge. No longer able to write and drink, she foreswore drugs and alcohol, viewed God as her employer, and set the daily writing quotas that would win her fame. Now watch for Cameron on the talk show circuit, courting a "recovery" fan base. Whitney Scott
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Hardcover: 416 pages
• Publisher: Tarcher; 1ST edition (May 4, 2006)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1585424943
• ISBN-13: 978-1585424948
• Product Dimensions: 8.4 x 5.6 x 1.5 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.2 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 3.6 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (34 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,496,977 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Julia Cameron has been an active artist for more than thirty years. She is the author of twenty-eight books, fiction and nonfiction, including her bestselling works on the creative process: The Artist's Way, Walking in This World, Finding Water, and The Writing Diet. A novelist, playwright, songwriter, and poet, she has multiple credits in theater, film, and television.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

25 of 25 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Offbeat and eccentric, but it makes for great reading, August 14, 2006

By 

Paul Allaer (Cincinnati) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (TOP 500 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Floor Sample (Hardcover)

Unlike most reviewers here, let my state upfront that I was not familiar whatsoever with Julia Cameron. I saw this book and read the inside flap summary: "wrote for Rolling Stone, "was married to Martin Scorsese", hmmm, this could be interesting I thought, and off I went with the book. What a surprise that was awaiting me.

In "Floor Sample" (405 pages), Julia Cameron brings her life story, and what a story it is. From her early days, strict Catholic upbringing, Julia describes how she started the party life in college at Georgetown, seeking ways to channel her obvious writing talents, eventually leading to Rolling Stone assignments, which in turn lead to a short-lived but high intensity courtship, and eventual, marriage to Martin Scorsese. Her drinking spiraled out of control, leading to the break-up with Scorsese. Then things really turn interesting: Cameron quits drinking altogether and starts life anew, seeking out writing assignments in magazines, tipping her toes in writing Hollywood scripts, and eventually writing many fiction and non-fiction books (the best known of which is "The Artist's Way", a sort of self-help book for budding artists), poetry, and musicals. But along that long journey Cameron also suffers bouts of depression or psychotic episodes (it's never really clear which one, or perhaps both), and she describes them in frightning detail.

One of the things that struck me the most in the book was the never-ending moving back-and-forth, restless, living between Los Aneles, Taos (NM), New York, London, etc. It's just dizzying. Cameron seems very much aware of her own frailness and relies on praying constantly to make it through ("Please guide me"). That said, the book ends disappointingly open-ended, as it appears once of her musicals seems on the verge of making if (off) Broadway, but we don't find out. Nevertheless, I enjoyed this book from start to end, and I highly recommend it.

23 of 24 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Surviving as an Artist - a How To, June 27, 2006

By 

Bonnie MacBird (Los Angeles, CA USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Floor Sample (Hardcover)

I had the privilege to attend a workshop with Julia recently and was impressed by her humor, her strength, her passion, and her talent. And yes, her vulnerability. This is a fabulous book, reflecting all these facets of this complicated, gifted woman.

It's a brave memoir, in that she details serious problems, including alcohol and drug abuse as well as two failed marriages, and a great stuggle with emotional stability. But throughout it all, Julia remains true to her dual calling, that of an artist and a teacher. No matter what transpires, she not only continues to create her own art of many kinds, but works hard and with great generosity to help other artists find their muse and working rhythms.

The big message of this book is that an artist is about her work. The work continues no matter what. She preaches this, yes, but lives it too. That's what she means by "Floor Sample" - of her own method, The Artist's Way.

Unlike another reviewer who found this to be self absorbed (but what is a memoir if not an examination of self?) I found it to be inspiring and fascinating. I particularly enjoyed her discussion of balancing her teaching and mentoring with her own art work.

So few women have the courage to pursue their art despite all, but Julia has done it, and against great odds. I applaud her and admire her. If more of us could stand up to our own demons as well as Julia has, the world would be a more beautiful, and art-filled place.

Inspirational reading for those who want to keep their art in focus at all times.

13 of 13 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Candid Insight Into The Artist's Process, March 8, 2007

By 

O. Brown "Ms. O. Khannah-Brown" (Twopeas, WA) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (HALL OF FAME REVIEWER)    (TOP 50 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)   

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Floor Sample (Hardcover)

****
Julia Cameron became the guru or creativity for artists and creative people of all types with the success of her book "The Artist's Way" its sequels. Her autobiography, Floor Sample, was a good read, but disturbing. It showed me how profoundly the structure of Morning Pages, Walks, and Artist Dates (the processes she recommends in her books) grounds her in her very difficult life. It is pretty much all the grounding she has. Her life has been difficult mostly because of her artistic temperament, her turbulent interior life, her continual life-long seeking of geographic cures, and her overall high intelligence and brilliance. She is an extraordinary woman, one that many might call psychologically disturbed (her "mental illness" is controversial...she takes medication to stay functional). I disagree; I think she is instead just very, very bright, thoughtful, eccentric, and creative.

I'd wanted to know about this amazing woman who wrote "Finding Water" and so many other terrific books, and it encouraged me greatly, because it helped me to see how she managed to create DESPITE all of her various and sundry life difficulties. I would definitely recommend this book. It does, however require a bit of slogging through (which is why I gave it only four stars); I just wanted to scream each time she thought that the place she lived was horrible and that it was time to move again to the wonderful place where she'd lived only six months before. This probably happens 40-50 times. It's realistic, though, because she has portrayed her artistic process vividly and well in order to inspire and help others.

The book includes details about Julia Cameron's marriage to Martin Scorcese, her relationship with their daughter, and with other famous artists and writers. It also discusses throughout her recovery from alcoholism.

The book vividly, candidly, and courageously portrays Julia Cameron's struggle to create, and showed me that her process was far from easy for her, just something she made intrinsic---absolutely intrinsic---to her life---thus her body of amazing and diverse creative works.
****