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Patti Smith

Devotion (Why I Write) Paperback – Illustrated, September 4, 2018

by Patti Smith (Author)

4.5 712 ratings

Part of: Why I Write (3 books)

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“Devotion is short enough to devour at one enjoyable sitting and thought-provoking enough to deserve re-reading.”—Suzi Feay, Financial Times

“Devotion shows rather than tells what it means to give a life to writing. ”—Katherine Cooper, Hyperallergic

A work of creative brilliance may seem like magic—its source a mystery, its impact unexpectedly stirring. How does an artist accomplish such an achievement, connecting deeply with an audience never met? In this groundbreaking book, one of our culture’s beloved artists offers a detailed account of her own creative process, inspirations, and unexpected connections.

Patti Smith, a National Book Award-winning author, first presents an original and beautifully crafted tale of obsession—a young skater who lives for her art, a possessive collector who ruthlessly seeks his prize, a relationship forged of need both craven and exalted. She then takes us on a second journey, exploring the sources of her story. We travel through the South of France to Camus’s house, and visit the garden of the great publisher Gallimard where the ghosts of Mishima, Nabokov, and Genet mingle. Smith tracks down Simone Weil’s grave in a lonely cemetery, hours from London, and winds through the nameless Paris streets of Patrick Modiano’s novels. Whether writing in a café or a train, Smith generously opens her notebooks and lets us glimpse the alchemy of her art and craft in this arresting and original book on writing.

The Why I Write series is based on the Windham-Campbell Lectures, delivered annually to commemorate the awarding of the Donald Windham-Sandy M. Campbell Literature Prizes at Yale University.

Part of series

Why I Write
Print length

120 pages
Language

English
Publisher

Yale University Press
Publication date

September 4, 2018
Dimensions

4.75 x 0.5 x 7 inches
ISBN-10

0300240228
ISBN-13

978-0300240221
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Editorial Reviews

Review

“Devotion is short enough to devour at one enjoyable sitting and thought-provoking enough to deserve re-reading. . . . It’s a privilege to spend any time with Patti Smith, however brief.”—Suzi Feay, Financial Times

“A triptych of compact, heartfelt essays on discovery, solitude and writing.”—Darragh McManus, Irish Independent

“By turns allegorical, metaphysical, fictional and factual, Devotion shows rather than tells what it means to give a life to writing. A master of poetic innovation, Smith takes her style to the next level in this slim volume.”—Katherine Cooper, Hyperallergic

“Smith, a contemplative writer of gratitude and reverence, . . . deepens her inquiry into the nature of inspiration in this slender, trenchant volume. . . . Gracefully improvisational, as always, Smith offers an unusually poetic, mystical, and transfixing perspective on the mystery of literary creation.”—Donna Seaman, Booklist

“The lesson is obvious: that a writer draws on every detail of his or her life for the alchemical, often unconscious process of creation. But seeing the process in action is a profound experience. Smith’s writing in the essays is as beautifully structured as her poetry.”—Publishers Weekly

“Smith is telling it her way, but also in the ancient way. It’s recognizable to readers for its mythic proportion, accessible to all kinds of people for its brevity and intensity—and yet, it’s still distinctly Patti Smith.”—Megan Volpert, PopMatters

“This is what is so astonishing about [Smith’s] career and what motivates Devotion—the way that, as she has gotten older, Smith’s vision has expanded, framing her self-awareness not as self-absorption but rather a deep dive into everything, the exhilaration and the terror and the transcendence that we all share.”—David Ulin, Barnes & Noble Review

“A creative, graceful and uncommonly beautiful little book about writing from the poet and singer who has, in maturity, become an even richer and more complex artist than she was at her greatest fame. She has become one of the most compelling writers of prose that we have and one of the most arresting about artists and other writers. Follow her here as she deals with Camus, Nabokov, Mishima, Genet, Simone Weil, and Patrick Modiano. Originally delivered as a series of lectures at Yale and artfully illustrated for this edition, this, in book form, is as exquisite as anything published in this season. In her late-life self discovery as a prose master, Patti Smith may have found yet another masterful voice.”—Jeff Simon, Buffalo News

“Packed with enough passion and contagious energy to move readers to tune into their own inspirations and—whatever their medium—get to work.”—Kelsey J. Waite, AV Club

“In Devotion, [Smith] starkly shares and uncovers, through a spare, haunting prose, the reasons she is compelled to write; so evocative is Smith’s writing that we’re compelled to read it as her voices transfixes us with its bell-like clarity and ringing passion.”—Henry Carrigan, No Depression: The Journal of Roots Music

“An enchanting peek into the mysterious ways of creativity, as Smith immerses in her beloved French literary classics and cites the everyday encounters that can spark inspiration.”—Brian McCollum, Detroit Free Press

“This is what Smith does to her devoted readers—she provokes memory, isolation, and the desire to make something out of the mundane. . . . Devotion, though a departure from her previous books, does not deviate from Smith’s remarkable gift.”—Jerilyn Jordan, Detroit Metro Times

“Through her lyrical and mystical style, Smith gracefully shares her perspective on the mystery of literary creation.”—New York Spaces

About the Author

Patti Smith is a writer, performer, and visual artist. Her memoir Just Kids received a National Book Award, and her book M Train is a critically acclaimed New York Times best seller. Smith was awarded the prestigious title of Commandeur des Arts et des Lettres by the French Republic, and in 2007 she was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. Smith lives in New York City.

Product details

Publisher ‏ : ‎ Yale University Press; Illustrated edition (September 4, 2018)
Language ‏ : ‎ English
Paperback ‏ : ‎ 120 pages
ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 0300240228
ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-0300240221
Item Weight ‏ : ‎ 4.8 ounces
Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 4.75 x 0.5 x 7 inches

Best Sellers Rank: #187,274 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- #19 in Punk Musician Biographies
- #549 in Author Biographies
- #1,600 in Women's Biographies

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4.5 712 ratings

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Patti Smith

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Patti Smith is a writer, performer, and visual artist. She gained recognition in the 1970s for her revolutionary merging of poetry and rock. She has released twelve albums, including Horses, which has been hailed as one of the top one hundred debut albums of all time by Rolling Stone.

Smith had her first exhibit of drawings at the Gotham Book Mart in 1973 and has been represented by the Robert Miller Gallery since 1978. Her books include Just Kids, winner of the National Book Award in 2010, Wītt, Babel, Woolgathering, The Coral Sea, and Auguries of Innocence.

In 2005, the French Ministry of Culture awarded Smith the title of Commandeur des Arts et des Lettres, the highest honor given to an artist by the French Republic. She was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2007.

In 1980, she married the musician Fred Sonic Smith in Detroit. They had a son, Jackson, and a daughter, Jesse. Smith resides in New York City.

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ramble on

Ambitious, unconventional, deeply connecting

Reviewed in the United States on August 12, 2023

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"The alchemy of art and craft"

Reviewed in the United States on April 21, 2023

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to Patti Smith. That's why I buy, read and love her books. This is my comfort reading. Capricorn on Capricorn. Amen. :)

Reviewed in the United States on October 22, 2017

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Patti Smith latest publication, Devotion, is a deceptively simple volume containing a short story bookended by accounts of her travels and experiences surrounding the writing of the short story. The short story itself is fine and demonstrates just how far Smith's command of this kind of prose writing has developed since her first tentative attempts at it in her 1978 volume Babel.

But the real import of Devotion occurs in the two bookended chapters in which Smith shows how seemingly unrelated day-to-day events in her life fueled the process of creation and led to something new and different. Her point being that inspiration can come from anywhere if you remain open to it.

Devotion is the third book Smith has published this decade and the three works form an interesting progression in her work. Just Kids, her 2010 reminiscence of her life in New York with Robert Mapplethorpe, was a linear account with a tremendous forward momentum. 2015's M-Train kept the memoir format but deviated from Just Kids by playing with the concept of how we experience events in time. The story in M-Train is not linear but instead moves backward and forward in time. Devotion picks up where M-Train left off in the two bookends but moves in an entirely different direction by including a short story. One wonders if Smith's next published volume will use the latest innovation -- the short story -- as a launch pad for yet another new, creative direction.

23 people found this helpful

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FW2

Patti the Story Teller

Reviewed in the United States on October 8, 2022

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Another of Patti’s books that allows her to reach deep into the psyche and pull out streams of metamorphic, spiritual lava that only can originate from the depths of a soul infinitely connected to the divine.

4 people found this helpful

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M. Evans

Patti Smith's Guide to Writing

Reviewed in the United States on September 12, 2017

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Originally part of a lecture series, this slight book is probably my favorite by Patti Smith and I've read them all. Set up in three sections the first and third are very similar to M Train. We follow Ms. Smith as she goes about her day; drinking coffee, ruminating, taking photographs, and writing in her notebook. In the second part of the book we are treated to a short story by Patti Smith. What I think this book is about is the process in which we create. If you read carefully, you will see Patti Smith going about her day and find those details scattered through out the short story. She is showing us how an artist takes life and distills it into a work of art. I loved this book, I was only sad that it ended so quickly. I hope that Patti Smith publishes more fiction, I certainly enjoyed it.

52 people found this helpful

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Amazon Customer

Why She Writes

Reviewed in the United States on August 7, 2020

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A great short piece from Patti Smith. The first of original stories I've read by Smith, one that does ring bells in echoing the mystic of a tale we all (including Smith) have read one time as a child. Be she doesn't refrain from any loss of innocence, which we must all lose some time during our life, much like our teenage protagonist. A writer or artist can relate to how Patti puts why she writes in her narratives in the beginning and end of the book, and also being very much inspired at the same time.

7 people found this helpful

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drinking tea with mittens on

i hope she never stops writing

Reviewed in the United States on March 22, 2018

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i love every book patti smith has presented to our world. this book was not what i was "expecting" and so it took me a few beats to shift gears and step into the book as she had intended. now that i've given the book four stars, i am debating on giving it five stars because, really, she definitely delivered me right back into her world, a place i so enjoy experiencing. but i give five stars to her other books and this book is just a touch less than her other books. so i'll stay with the four stars.

9 people found this helpful

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richard strauss

Patti: Keep Writing!

Reviewed in the United States on January 2, 2021

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5 stars, I would've given 6 if available. As all Patti Smith writings, awesome. I have the paperback by the way. I'm a baby boomer that needs to fold pages,which can't be done on Kindle. "M" train is next. I need to get Alex to "order another Patti Smith book ".

One person found this helpful

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Chaitanya Sethi

Patti answers why she writes; we love it

Reviewed in India on July 12, 2022

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It's the age-old question - why do people write? What moves them enough to put to paper fragments of thought floating on drawstring bridges? Why go through all that effort to speak across time; to record the mundane and sublime; the ordinary and exceptional; fact or fantasy?

This short book is Patti's answer, except, she says that the 'Why' and 'How' are intertwined. And she lets us in on the How of her creative spirit. This act is akin to a magician revealing her tricks but somehow enhancing the magic. You see the creative cogs and wheels turn, and shards of life coalesce into art.

The first section deals with her journal. In line with 'M Train' and 'Year of the Monkey', we follow Patti through her days, her coffee cups, a trip to Paris, and what occupies her mind wherein. The second section is a story that she wrote in a train, synthesizing elements from the journal into the storytelling, meshing life an art into a homogeneous fabric. The final section is a visit to Camus's house where he used to retreat to write.

With Patti, I always struggle to sell what entices me about her writing. I can't break it into plot or structure or flow. It's the whole that exceeds the sum of its parts. The turns of phrases that are distinctly hers. That desire to devote oneself to art, irrespective of outcome. The itch to create.

Reading Camus's incomplete draft of 'Le Premier Homme', Patti experiences a restlessness; to run up the stairs and fling open her diary and mind. She says, "That is the decisive power of a singular work: a call to action. And I, time and again, am overcome with the hubris to believe I can answer the call."

M K

Another great offering from Patti

Reviewed in Canada on November 21, 2022

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Loved this, so good. 10/10 recommend for Patti fans, or any fans of beatnik era/rock n roll art scenes. Quick read, very good !

Dorian Gray

Patti Smith : the Well of Devotion that is the Female Heart

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on January 12, 2020

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Patti Smith - the Bad Girl of Rock who became its High Priestess - has always been an accomplished writer , producing as many poems as songs, as many books as albums.

In Devotion she tries to answer the question : why do I write ?

And the answer is given in a single sentence . Made up of only 5 words. Its the last sentence of the book so I wont give it away !

Suffice to say I for one will be re-reading this book again + again coz of the writing. Utterly enchanting : poetry as prose.

Short , sharp sentences.

Ideas often made beautifully concrete by carefully chosen images/photographs + depictions of events, characters, moods + feelings.

Her Devotion is not just to writing but to the departed : her family, friends, lovers, dead Gods + dead Goddesses.

And here's the thing about any great writer. As well as being entertained (wonderfully) U are also informed. Consider this sentence : It occurs to me that the young look beautiful as they sleep and the old, such as myself, look dead .

2 people found this helpful

Jm

Livre

Reviewed in France on April 15, 2022

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Reçu avant la date prévu, génial car cadeau pour une fan de patti smith. Merci

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Paul Carter

Very Enjoyable read

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on January 19, 2023

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I purchased both versions - Kindle and hardback...
I have been a fan of Patti Smith since the early days of her music, always enjoying the creative words/phrases of the lyrics.
It's only recently I have taken to reading her books, I'm now thinking why did I leave to soooo long to engage with her written works. I have found it difficult to put down the book, but life eventually has to take over. This is the forth book I have had the pleasure of reading.

One person found this helpful

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