In the Shadow of the American Dream: The Diaries of David Wojnarowicz

Rating:
Summary: Reflections
Review: It's indeed strange to read about oneself after 30 years-to relive those moments-to know for the first time that you actually helped someone you loved and to wonder why you did not express your feelings more directly in your personal relationship that lasted sporadically for those many years. David's years from age 14 to 21 or 22.

Rating:
Summary: Powerfully Poetic/Disturbingly Realistic
Review: Thank you, Amy Scholder (editor and introductionalist). I have just read a review of "In the Shadow of the American Dream" in one of Seattle's weekly newspapers, and I am so glad that I did. Immediately, my curiosity was peaked. Not having ever heard of David Wojnarowicz, I am now a devoted fan of his work. As an artist and a writer, David Wojnarowicz speaks with a rare truthfulness unlike any other writer that I have read in recent times. Wojnarowicz speaks of a world not many people are aware of, the world of "seedy Times Square" where he spent his youth hustling, desperately trying to make a living by selling his body to total strangers; the world of a gay activist, vehemently seeking to make the world a more tolerant place for all; the world of a Person Living with AIDS, conciously, creatively expressing his pain, his hurt and his sadness, but not without hope. "In the Shadow of the American Dream" is a collection of excerpts of the 31 diaries that Wojnarowicz spent his life writing, from the age of 17 until he died of AIDS in 1992. With writing such as "I saw a face in a passing car that looked like someone I once knew. It's like that when you move on to other places in your life--memories of faces fading like thin ice sheets in winter sidewalk puddles, they melt, become only a part of the water so you can't separate them ever again, but they do remain there." Wow! Like passing an automobile accident, you don't want to look (or read) but then you can't put it down. I highly recommend "In the Shadow of the American Dream" to anyone who is slightly interested in what artistry, activism, creativity, and hope really means.

Rating:
Summary: The life and times of a gay writer and artist.
Review: These journals of David Worjnarowicz are an account of the famed writer, artist. They begin when he is seveteen years old and end at the time of his death. The beginning explains some of his troubled background: his alcholoic father, his street hustlering in Times Square at a young age, and so on. The entries are most appealing when David speaks about his relationship with other men, especially about his love affair with Jean-Pierre, a man he meet while in Paris. These entries are fluid, full of a joy that one is in touch with when in the throes of love. Eventually David leaves Paris and is back in New York. It is this particular time and place, New York in the late 1970's to early 80's do we see an extreme sexual behavior of many gay men. This is seen not only with this work, but in the photos of Mapplethrope, and many accounts of gay men that have lived in this time period. The other entries concerning his HIV status and all the myriad emotions concerned with the fatal disease are rivetting. The diaries are, at times, disjointed, and some of the early entries I feel really don't need to be within the book. However, the book reveals a man of true in insight, an artist who felt everything, and wrote it all down word for word. A very good book!!!