1974

A Personal History

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Pub Date Jun 18 2024 | Archive Date Jul 30 2024

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Description

“In this remarkable memoir, the qualities that have long distinguished Francine Prose’s fiction and criticism—uncompromising intelligence, a gratifying aversion to sentiment, the citrus bite of irony—give rigor and, finally, an unexpected poignancy to an emotional, artistic, and political coming-of-age tale set in the 1970s—the decade, as she memorably puts it, when American youth realized that the changes that seemed possible in the ’60s weren’t going to happen. A fascinating and ultimately wrenching book.”—Daniel Mendelsohn, author of The Lost: A Search for Six of Six Million

The first memoir from critically acclaimed, bestselling author Francine Prose, about the close relationship she developed with activist Anthony Russo, one of the men who leaked the Pentagon Papers--and the year when our country changed.

During her twenties, Francine Prose lived in San Francisco, where she began an intense and strange relationship with Tony Russo, who had been indicted and tried for working with Daniel Ellsberg to leak the Pentagon papers. The narrative is framed around the nights she spent with Russo driving manically around San Francisco, listening to his stories--and the disturbing and dramatic end of that relationship in New York.

What happens to them mirrors the events and preoccupations of that historical moment: the Vietnam war, drugs, women's liberation, the Patty Hearst kidnapping. At once heartfelt and ironic, funny and sad, personal and political, 1974 provides an insightful look at how Francine Prose became a writer and artist during a time when the country, too, was shaping its identity.

“In this remarkable memoir, the qualities that have long distinguished Francine Prose’s fiction and criticism—uncompromising intelligence, a gratifying aversion to sentiment, the citrus bite of...


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EDITION Other Format
ISBN 9780063314092
PRICE $27.99 (USD)
PAGES 240

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Average rating from 9 members


Featured Reviews

I was expecting a broader memoir about the mid-seventies, but this book focuses fairly tightly on a short period of time where the author had a fast, intense relationship with Tony Russo, who was involved with leaking the Pentagon Papers. The two mostly cruise around in his car, driving all over San Francisco, as he figures out life post-prison and she figures out life post-marriage. Although Russo lived until 2008, his story is pretty tragic, as he was shoved aside by Ellsberg and struggled with mental illness, and Prose details her own issues as she handled their relationship. A well-written and fascinating book, and look back at a grim year.

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