There are two streams of thought in the slim volume beginning with the foundation of a memoir. This is intimate for the reader to witness the author's preparation for trip to Paris and experience her deep knowledge of the city's gems. Her reading of French authors influences who she is as a person and writer. The reader is offered her expertise and her hand as a thinker. Devotion is short enough to devour at one enjoyable sitting and thought-provoking enough to deserve re-reading.”—Suzi Feay, Financial Times Occasionally, thoughts like these would be ones I could relate to, or her writing about the streets of Paris would remind me of walking through Montmartre, or strolling through the streets near Notre Dame, but then it would return to thoughts on writing. Am înțeles că micro-romanul sub formă de poem în proză se vrea a fi un manifest sau, mai degrabă, zic eu, un memento scris de autoare la jumătatea vieții. Într-adevăr aceasta evocă multe momente relevante din copilăria ei, tema principală fiind acele torcătoare de vise pe care le vedea de pe fereastra camerei când frații ei dormeau. Torcătoarele erau niște ființe magice care, într-un fel, țeseau universul, iar Patti reușea să participe la rândul ei la acest proces în mod pasiv. Abia pe la sfârșitul celor 90 de pagini, în ultimele capitole, avem parte de niște paragrafe mai concrete despre întâmplările la care făcuse până atunci referință. Pe scurt, este un roman puțin suprarealist, chiar dacă autobiografic, prin forma artistică aleasă de Smith; multe dintre analogiile făcute de ea nu au avut sens pentru mine, fiind clar și deseori vorba despre niște juxtapuneri și jocuri de cuvinte metaforice. Mă întreb cum or fi sunat cele câteva strofe presărate printre pagini în original, în engleză, dar nu sunt încă atât de curioasă cât să vreau cu adevărat să cercetez opera lirică a autoarei. 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

She said something that brought the story into perfect view, describing her love of French literature: "There’s just something about his language. There’s something about French in translation that I just relate to. Maybe it’s the starkness. It’s both complex and simple at the same time." And of course this entire small book is an exercise in woolgathering, defined as indulgence in aimless thought or dreamy imagining (Oxford Dictionary). Détendu, sous le ciel, il médite sur tout et rien. La nature du travail. La nature de l'oisiveté et le ciel lui-même avec ses masses qui se gonflent si près qu'on pourrait attraper un nuage au lasso pour y poser sa tête ou s'en remplir le ventre. Saucer les haricots et la sauce brune avec un morceau de viande de nuage, et s'allonger pour une petite sieste." There is an Estonian language interview with first time literary translator Paula Taberland where she discusses the translation process and her mentoring by Estonian poet & LR editorial board member Doris Kareva which you can read here. Non-Estonian readers will have to turn on their web translators.

Summary

Devotionis 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 Ama bazen kızkardeşlerimizi de eleştirmek gerekiyor. By kitaptaki kurgu hikayeyi sevmedim. Ciddiye alınmak isteyen fakat yavan kalan bir hikaye olmuş, bence. Başındaki ve sonundaki notlar, ona o hikayeyi yazdıran ortam ve koşullar ve Patti’nin duygularını ifade ediş tarzı her zamanki gibi harika. Siyah beyaz fotoğraflar ve el yazıları da cabası. A triptych of compact, heartfelt essays on discovery, solitude and writing.”—Darragh McManus, Irish Independent oh my god this woman!!! ahhh what am i supposed to do?!! i need to get through my physical tbr but now i’m obsessed with patti and i want to read everything she’s written now 😭 HELP 😭

Devotion shows rather than tells what it means to give a life to writing. ”—Katherine Cooper, Hyperallergic But still, there was something else, I couldn't put my finger on it until I read an interview with Smith by critic Scott Timberg (Culture Crash) in the LA Review of Books. https://lareviewofbooks.org/article/p... Silence. Passing cars. The rumble of the subway. Birds calling for dawn. I want to go home, I whimpered. But I already was.’ 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 I was looking for something, and I found something else." Art as serendipity, as whim, as discovery, in a life lived also deliberately, consciously.

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 WE go to Paris and drink coffee at the Cafe de Flore, pay our respects to Picasso and Apollinaire, to"the Deux Magots of the existentialists. The Hotel des Etrangers, where Rimbaud and Verlaine presided over the Circle Zutique..." and now Rimbaud becomes part of the matrix. Paris holds a welter of her associations, to French film, to French and expat literature, to younger versions of herself. She comes across a skater on French television, a young Russian who melds with the figure of Simone Weil, and so on. One association leads to another. This is the inner life of art, she never has to say. Smith says books or songs or films are triggers (oh, that’s a term Richard Hugo uses, in The Triggering Town) for her creative activity, for writing. “The right book can serve as a docent of sorts, setting a tone or even altering the course of a journey.”