National Book Award-winning author of Just Kids, Patti Smith writes of her childhood in this glittering memoir

A story of becoming an artist, by the godmother of rock'n'roll: the National Book Award-winning author of Just Kids Patti Smith 'A poet of distinction' New York Times 'Glorious' NPR 'Rare and ferocious' Salon 'Shockingly beautiful' New York Magazine Everything contained in this little book is true, and written just like it was. The writing of it drew me from my strange torpor and I hope that in some measure it will fill the reader with a vague and curious joy... In this small, luminous memoir, the National Book Award-winner Patti Smith revisits the most sacred experiences of her early years, with truths so vivid they border on the surreal. The author entwines her childhood self - and its 'clear, unspeakable joy' - with memories both real and envisioned from her twenties on New York's MacDougal Street, the street of cafés. Woolgathering was completed in Michigan, on Patti Smith's 45th birthday and originally published in a slim volume from Raymond Foye's Hanuman Books. Twenty years later, Bloomsbury is proud to present it in a much augmented edition, featuring writing that was omitted from the book's first printing, along with new photographs and illustrations.

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 passages evoking her childhood do reverberate with serene joy ... Writing was not Smith's first choice ... But any fans of her music will not be surprised by her mastery of it here