Forced Entries- The Downtown Diaries: 1971-1973 by Jim Carroll

Forced Entries- The Downtown Diaries: 1971-1973 Reviews

• 
  Patrick O'Neil

  Jim, Jim, Jim. What can I say? Well, I probably wouldn't be saying that I didn't really like your book if you were still alive, because I have way too much respect for you. But then because you died I was thinking about you when I was looking around the used book store and I came across Forced Entries and wondered how in hell I'd never read it. The Basketball Diaries was like an anthem when I was growing up. When I saw you play with your band at the Mabuhay Gardens in SF you didn't disappoint. You were like a fuckin hero, well, as close to whatever heroes were in those days. The times we talked you were gracious, subdued, and distant - and that was cool. I was so loaded it all seemed right, like if it wasn't strange and awkward something was wrong. But Forced Entries man? Ah, no. You were too cool for the "look at me, I am so cool" sense this book breeds. It doesn't matter who you hung out with. I don't care what names you drop. You don't gotta do that to kick it dude.
• 
  Greg Swallow

  This is the first Jim Carroll book I've ever read. Sure, I watched "The Basketball Diaries" and it was interesting years ago, but nothing to crow about. I had two other books in my hands from the local library and I saw this one on the "new / featured titles" section so I added it to the stack.
  
  The book is just journal entries, embellished a bit to be sure, but Jim Carroll has a way with metaphors that I really dug. Sure I've read a little about 1970's lower east side Manhattan, and this book reinforces what everyone else I've read says about the time and place, but that's not as interesting as the images that Mr. Carroll creates throughout each entry about nothing in particular. Dreams. Women's asses. Bob Dylan's folksiness. Reading this book was like hanging out with Ernest Hemingway on a lunch counter, and then saying goodbye. Except he's also a poet and it shows in his prose. The entries are short, nothing is overly dwelled upon and overall you get a concise account of a guy's transition from excess to sobriety over a few years, with a few flourishes. Refreshing.
• 
  Stephen Kaldon

  I've just re-read this book after first reading in 1987, now that I have a commute that leaves me some time to catch up on my reading. My only regret in life is that I was born 10 years to late to really experience what was going in the NewYork art scene circa late 1960's early 1970's, as I came into it as a semi-participant, late 70's and early 80's. My re-read gives me a feeling of nostalgia and longing for a time that was the last great inclusive movement for art, music, and culture in New York City.
  
  The charm of Jim Caroll's writing is that he can spin a humorous and truthful tale with all the elements of a fictional short story. And he admits to embellishing in the Author's Note at the beginning of the book. This all makes for some highly entertaining writing which is part autobiography, part fiction, but the truth is never lost amongst the showmanship.
  
  This is his personal journal, but it is edited for an audience, so it reads as if he is chatting, telling stories to the reader on his living room sofa. Having attended Caroll's readings, and speaking to him on a few occasions, I tend to read his work in his voice, with all the unique cadences and New York drawl that goes with it. Although he is telling his stories in the first person, he "reads" them to you with some hindsight, and at times it seems he is almost as shocked as we are to hear about some of his more debaucherous moments. This slight distance from the tales allows for the reader to feel like a confidant rather than an observer of a strangers story.
  
  Besides giving us some amusing tales to entertain us, Forced Entries let's us experience Caroll's transition, starting in 1971, (a few years after Basketball Diaries ending in 1966), from heroin user, hustler, and scenester to a man who realizes he must shed these distractions if he is to seriously focus on his writing. All of this is depicted as a very personal journey, so personal that there does not seem to be a lot of dialog with the other players in his world as to steer him in one direction or another. It is the internal journey of observation, introspection, and action that brings about this transcendence.
  
  One other amusing aspect to this book is guessing at some of the real names behind some of the pseudonyms he gives to those he wishes not to cause embarrassment. Two characters at the beginning of the entries, "Jenny Ann" and "Roger", his neighbors at the Chelsea Hotel, are clearly Patti Smith and Robert Mapplethorpe, if you know your history.
  
  I intend to read more of Caroll's, including Book of Nods and his last book titled The Petting Zoo. I need to read these books for my own personal nostalgia and the memories they bring back of a New York City that held the promise of art around every corner.
• 
  Zack

  At the beginning of this one, Jim Carroll's working at Warhol's Factory and hanging out at the St. Mark's poetry project. His writing's much better here than in the more famous Basketball Diaries. He's housesitting for none other than Billy Burroughs, Jr. (given a fake name) near the beginning and houseguest Allen Ginsberg has a misadventure offstage with Carroll's girlfriend's vibrator, reprising his role as the loyal old warped uncle type--as he was to Burroughs, Jr and Jan Kerouac before Carroll. Patti Smith encouraged Jim to start a band in the early NYC punk days--The Jim Carroll Band has its moments--check out "People Who Died".
• 
  Marti

  I can't say I enjoyed this as much as I thought I would due to the fact that the names were changed and composite characters substituted to protect the guilty. In spite of this, I thought I recognized some of the people like Patti Smith and Brigid Polk. Also, for someone who spent every night at Max's Kansas City, we get very little detail about the infamous watering hole.
  
  Still, there were some funny stories which make this worth reading. It just won't add much for folks who have read Please Kill Me.
• 
  Erica

  The abcess part of this book was revoting and hilarious. You all have been warned....
• 
  Michael Davison

  JC is so sweet and captivating when listening to the live recordings of his readings of his poems and prose, such as The Loss of American Innocence. He doesn’t come across quite as viscerally when I read it from the page; maybe it’s because I can’t do his beautiful (and now rare) native NYC accent with its quiver in my mind when digesting the words. I read Basketball Diaries when I was 15, and now Forced Entries at 51. I can’t say it was great but I wasn’t expecting much from a guy who was just trying to stay alive after NYC in the 70s exploded quite literally in his face. I have a friend who still lives in the Chelsea Hotel since those times (who I used to visit on a weekly basis for nefarious sundries) and of course I am enamored with that period in street art and culture, but this isn’t great stuff; more a diary of suffering the loss of inspiration. Oddly, sometimes I got a Michel Houellebecq vibe from his prose that I obviously wouldn’t have picked up years ago. Some parts are entertaining nonetheless but it is an inconsistent affair describing an inconsistent time of his life. The name dropping is a bit aggravating, but underscores the near misses of his own success.
• 
  Dar

  I read this to fill in the gaps between the Jim Carroll I knew from The Basketball Diaries and the one I knew from Jim Carroll Band. It was not a pleasure to read. He is attempting a more literary voice while still stuck in the same narcissistic subject matter as the previous memoir. While continuing to abuse drugs and people, he tries to spin humorous anecdotes, but there's nothing underneath. He's living in a moral vacuum with little insight into his own motives and feelings. In a lucid moment, he writes, "Not only did I not give a shit, but I had no inkling that I was supposed to." At the end of the two-year period covered here, he concludes, "At least I've raised my quality of living above cockroach level."
  
  At the same time he was writing these "forced entries" (in his diary), he also wrote the poems that became his book Living at the Movies. I still love his album Catholic Boy (1980).
• 
  Katya Mills

  I enjoyed reading Jim Carroll's movement from all out junkie in NYC to mostly clean weedhead in California then traveling back to NYC to re-experience it like a challenge he was taking on for himself in his new sparkly dried out persona. - may he rest in peace - You almost think the kid didn't stand much of a chance, hobnobbing with celebrity at Max's and getting dissed by Warhol over the phone, because Warhol only wanted to talk to him when he was wired on speed (and recorded these phone calls apparently). Great street level perspective of NYC in the early seventies. Jim Carroll is an brutally honest sorta writer, so be prepared to go under carpets with him and hangout with fragments of cheese doodles and mites. Or inside a festering abscess. He certainly won't glorify substance abuse or addiction, so you don't need to worry about your children. Or do you? I found the first half of the book a little harder to get through, a lot of socializing with Ginsberg and name dropping (though anyone could be envious to hang out with William Burroughs and Bob Dylan for a night). Sometimes I felt he was writing to impress his celebrity buds. But mostly I admire Jim Carroll, I consider him a strong writer and the survivor we know by his Basketball Diaries. This book was supposed to be a sorta sequel to that one. He didn't stand a chance as a kid himself going deep on the streets, yet he always respected the muse and was a real creative mind, and a local new yorker in his heart. The second half of the book I found a bit clearer, more honest, and particularly his return from Bolinas to NYC. The last quarter of the book was a straight read, I hunkered down in my apartment and really got into it. It ends well, I mean, more intimate and heartfelt. A good read.
• 
  Jessica C.

  What do I think? Well, with Jim it's forever how do I feel after I finish a book, or a poem, or listening to a tune of his? His visceral connection to the Raw, the bleeding without dying by the age of 35 forced him to continue to write. To breathe for Carroll is to write and reflect. (and shoot dope more off than on so sad). But I read him anyway. His wisecracks and singular perspective peddled him all over NYC and introduced him to the biggest names of the day. Jim liked the situation. I liked the product of his situation during this two years. Don't forget, he won awards for his poems at 15 years of age.
  
  "If you haven't died by an age thought predetermined through the timing of your abuses and excesses, then what else is their to do but begin another diary." Jim Carroll
• 
  Bob Schnell

  Best known for "The Basketball Diaries" and the song "People Who Died", Jim Carroll was a young man on the NY art scene in the bohemian heyday of the late 1960s and early 1970s. This book/journal covers 1970-1973 and deals primarily with his heroin and methamphetamine addictions. There are plenty of anecdotes that students of the Warhol scene will find amusing and/or illuminating. There are also plenty of gross-out scenes that I could have done without. All in all, it is a nice collection of stories and vignettes that are more like supplementary material than the feature event. I suggest reading "The Basketball Diaries" first and then, if you want more, pick up this book as well.
• 
  Jessica

  I've read this book over and over, though I've only read the Basketball Diaries once. This diary takes place in the early 70's, when Jim Carroll is the new hotshot poet on the block (imagine a world where it's possible to even be a hotshot poet!), hanging out at the Factory with Andy Warhol, having Allen Ginsberg sleep on his couch, and getting tongue tied around Bob Dylan. And of course there are drugs. Lots and lots of Warholian superstar drugs. The writing style is unpretentious and funny, which is what inspires multiple readings.
• 
  Wendy

  Warning! This book is not for anyone with a weak stomach. You may feel the need to scrub yourself with a Brillo pad after reading this book, but I say it's worth it if you really want to get into the gritty folds of a New York poet and all of the elbows he rubs in this journey. See the likes of Andy Warhol, Allen Ginsberg, William Burroughs, and even Salvador Dali and Bob Dylan at their worst in this tale of a writer who struggles with his addictions, his faith, and his muse, and some other interesting ailments.
• 
  Len

  More clever and evolved than basketball diaries... seems like Carroll was in the right place at the right time. From a chance run in on the street with Dali to working for Warhol he's really sucking the marrow out the bone... the chapter on Ginsberg entitled "the poet and the vibrator" is priceless...
• 
  Courtney Morse

  I read this while living in NYC, it makes you realize how much the city has changed, but also how much it hasn't changed. I dogeared some of the sights that he frequented and did my own little Jim Caroll tour of NYC - it was nice.
• 
  Paul Grimsley

  A real look at the inside of a world where characters such as Ginsberg and Warhol's Factory commingle. I was disappointed when I found out there were only two volumes of Caroll's diaries because they really zip along and there is not a single bit of unnecessary text in this book.
• 
  Liam

  "...I don't want to become a cynical prick."- Jim Carroll, 1973
  
  "TOO LATE, MOTHERFUCKER!!!"- Dimestore Liam, 2017
  
  At his best, Carroll was an incredibly talented writer, but this book is at best uneven, and at worst so hopelessly bad and worthless that I greatly resented the fact that I paid $5.00 for it. I thought the most telling scene in the book was fairly early in the narrative when he was watching the NBA All-Star game, and said "I fucked up."; that is most likely the most honest sentence he ever wrote, for once completely without artifice or sardonic, faux-glamourous Devil-may-care pretense. I'm not half the writer Jim Carroll was (and I've always been hopeless as an athlete, in addition to my small size), but given the fact that I share his working-class Irish background and many of his less savory proclivities, I've always felt a certain connection with his outlook on life. When I was a young musician, scuffling in the gutter after the proverbial pot of gold at the end of the rainbow (the leprechaun's hoard, perhaps...), Carroll's song 'People Who Died' was one of two songs that were invariably performed at wakes (usually by a revolving pick-up band made up of friends of the deceased, passing the mic for each verse & chorus) after every overdose, murder or suicide. It seemed then that we were all destined to eventually suffer one of those three fates, and our collective fatalism grew with each lost friend (the other song we always played at wakes was the Dead Boys' 'Ain't It Fun'). Then those of us who survived grew up. I can't read even Jim Carroll's best work at this point without constantly being conscious of the sickening waste of talent his life ultimately was. 'Forced Entries' is far from his best work.
• 
  BC Batcheshire

  Jim writes from the perspective of a bisexual drug addict, in this volume making an attempt to get clean around the middle of the book. Some of the terms are dated, including descriptives of race and the queer community. I don't think he did this to denigrate anyone necessarily, but it was more the colloquialism of his particular subcommunity, coming from a street and arthouse background, and the era and city of his youth. Nowadays, the terminology would seem just dated, not as hip, slightly problematic - not "woke."
  He takes more potshots at elitists and he flat out speaks of his dependency on people from diverse backgrounds, so if it seems like he is disconnected and uses problematic language, I think it is because that was the accepted terminology of the time.
  I say that because I think it is the major issue people would have reading his work, nowadays. Some people may dismiss the work entirely, and I understand their feelings if they choose to.
  Myself, I enjoy it and revisit his poetry and journals because his imagery and experiences were always vividly recorded. He had a gift for expression, and he always inspires my visual art. And that is why I do recommend his work.
  His descriptives are incredible, and in this book in particular as he sobers, he gains focus in expression. The imagery and flow sharpen, and the beauty of his expression is on display in the last third of the book especially.
• 
  Hex75

  jim carroll è stato un grandissimo: nella poesia, nella musica e anche in questi diari. questo è il secondo, il seguito dei "basketball diaries": qui non ci sono più momenti "innocenti" che rischiaravano storie davvero drammatiche, ma c'è una saggezza e una consapevolezza che anche nei momenti peggiori alza i racconti verso vette incredibili. e -a parte la parentesi californiana- sullo sfondo c'è quella new york anni '70 che abbiamo imparato ad amare in tanti film, romanzi e dischi, qui vissuta in prima persona.
• 
  John Marr

  This far superior follow-up to the pretty good Basketball Diaries takes Mr. Carroll through the darkest parts of the Manhattan drug/art scene of the early '70s, with brief (and mildly boring) stop in Bolinas, California. Frequently insightful, often humorous, and always decadent (without the bragging!), he even manages to kick drugs without being an asshole about it. Takeaway quote: "Doesn't she know how outright embarrassing it is for a man to bet a blowjob from a woman whose cock is bigger than his own?"
• 
  Annie. Gable

  I loved the basketball diaries a lot and it's now one of my favorite books. But this second one didn't get to me as much as that one did. Maybe it's because when Jim Carroll wrote the basketball diaries he was a teenager and I'm a teenager. But this book didn't stick to me as much as that one did. But I did really in joy it.
• 
  Andrea Janov

  Better than Basketball Diaries. A bit more colorful and interesting, but still self-indulgent. It lagged at times, but some stories made me keep turning the pages and put off sleep. At the very least it gave a small glimpse into the art, music, and literary world that collided in NYC at that time.
• 
  Anastasia Offutt

  isolation blind drive toward feeling and extremes, individual to a fault lack of acknowledgement of outside humanity.
  “they were, as this one is, only another emblem of your own vanity, and the vanity of your Art.” (169)
  as if all existence outside of himself is shocking and earth shattering
• 
  Greg

  Garbage
• 
  Bridget

  I used to really go in for books like this when I was young and thought that New York was the epicenter of all things cool.
• 
  Jenny

  2.5 Not particularly impressed by this one. Very of it's time, but definitely not breaking any new literary ground and not gossipy enough to be worth reading for the name dropping.