Kicking The Pricks

Oct 8, 2024 6:24 PM

Author:Derek Jarman

Kicking The Pricks

A fascinating journal written after the creation of Derek Jarman’s The Last of England, covering the making of the film itself and the origins of its deeply autobiographical content.

In 1986 Derek Jarman started filming The Last of England, one of his most original and innovative films. It is also his most personal work, with the strongest autobiographical content. Shortly after filming began Derek Jarman started work on this book, which contains diary entries, interviews and notes from the script. Jarman writes of his extraordinary childhood and his kleptomaniac father; the process by which he came to terms with his sexuality; his early work as painter and designer; and finally his debut as a film director. Throughout, however, the reader will follow Jarman at his most fervent, as he writes of the corruption of the cinema industry, of the moral and personal consequences of the AIDS virus, and of the evils of Thatcher's Britain.

Reviews

The most engrossing book I've read in an age...Jarman is the sort of troublemaking visionary who one day may be compared with Blake

—— Time Out

A journey back and forth to the influences of sex, society and art which shaped this most individual of British film makers...There is reason to be grateful for the courageous eye he casts on his own society

—— Irish Times

Moving, poetic, inspirational

—— New Musical Express

O'Brien is a capable and intelligent writer...a refreshing biography of the iconic popstress

—— Guardian

If Madonna is your Elvis you will devour Lucy O’Brien’s definitive biography; not only can she write properly, but her book is objective, immaculately researched and illuminating.

—— Irish Examiner

Lucy O’Brien’s measured and comprehensive profile takes a look at [Madonna's] extraordinary life to date, focusing on the cultural impact she’s made.

—— The Good Book Guide

British rock journalist Lucy O’Brien seeks to go beyond the fastidiously cultivated image and get a glimpse of the woman behind the veil. She uncovers some fascinating, often shocking, nuggets.

—— Irish Independent

An illuminating study of a complex, iconic woman, covering her life, her relationships and what motivates her as a woman and an artist.

—— Sainsbury's magazine

With detailed, surgical precision O'Brien bores to the heart of her subject, a heart that is, by turns, cold, impenetrable but forever beating.

—— Paul Tierney, arts journalist

The great chronicler of Hollywood in the late twentieth century turns his critical eye to the cinema and television of the twenty first. Essential reading

—— Colin MacCabe

A bold, witty, and brilliantly argued analysis of the role pop culture has played in the rise of American extremism

—— Ruth Reichl

Your book was . . . like a bag of pot, with me saying, 'I'm not gonna smoke.' But I was insatiable

—— Quentin Tarantino on EASY RIDERS, RAGING BULLS

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