Woolgathering (Hardcover)

Woolgathering By Patti Smith Cover Image
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Description


The National Book Award–winner Patti Smith presents a treasure box of a childhood memoir about “clear unspeakable joy” and “just the wish to know.”


A great book about becoming an artist, Woolgathering tells of a youngster finding herself as she learns the noble vocation of woolgathering, “a worthy calling that seemed a good job for me.” She discovers—often at night, often in nature—the pleasures of rescuing “a fleeting thought.” Deeply moving, Wool- gathering calls up our own memories, as the child “glimpses and gleans, piecing together a crazy quilt of truths.” Smith introduces us to her tribe, “a race of cloud dwellers,” and to the fierce, vital pleasures of cloud watching and stargazing and wandering.



A radiant new autobiographical piece, “Two Worlds” (which was not in the original 1992 Hanuman edition of Woolgathering), and the author’s photographs and illustrations are also included. Woolgathering celebrates the sacred nature of creation with Smith’s beautiful style, acclaimed as “glorious” (NPR), “spellbinding” (Booklist), “rare and ferocious” (Salon), and “shockingly beautiful” (New York Magazine).

About the Author


Patti Smith is a poet, performer, visual artist, and author of M Train and the National Book Award-winning memoir Just Kids. She has twelve albums, has had numerous gallery shows, and continues to give concerts of her music and poetry. Her books include Early Work, The Coral Sea, Witt, Babel, Auguries of Innocence, Woolgathering, Land 250, Trois, and many others. In 2022, Smith was awarded the Ruth Lilly Poetry Prize by the Poetry Foundation in recognition of her outstanding lifetime achievement. She lives in New York.

Praise For…


A poet of distinction.
— The New York Times

Smith is well attuned to the otherwordly dimension of dreams and cosmic visions. In this intimate and vaulting collection, she ushers us into the kingdom of childhood…Smith looks to family history for sources of her artistic impulses and portrays herself in adulthood as a roaming mystic, journal in hand, heart and mind open. Exultations of concentrated beauty and mystery ignite Smith’s soulful poems about the making of an artist.
— Booklist

Capturing moments of her adult life, Smith pares down her prose to a state of vivid impressionism, so enigmatic that even ordinary acts - preparing mint tea, nodding off while sewing - take on spiritual weight.
— The Guardian


Product Details
ISBN: 9780811219440
ISBN-10: 0811219445
Publisher: New Directions
Publication Date: November 28th, 2011
Pages: 80
Language: English