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Jim Carroll - Seattle WA - September 2000 - Photo by Eric Thompson

Jim Carroll (1949-2009) in 2000. Photo by Eric Thompson. Courtesy Wikimedia Commons.

Jim Carroll
Born James Dennis Carroll
January 1, 1949(1949-Template:MONTHNUMBER-01)
United States
Died September 11, 2009(2009-Template:MONTHNUMBER-11) (aged 60)
New York, New York, United States
Occupation Author, poet, musician, autobiographer
Nationality American


James Dennis "Jim" Carroll (August 1, 1949 - September 11, 2009) was an American poet, prose author, and punk musician.[4] He was best known for his 1978 autobiographical work, The Basketball Diaries.[5]

Life[]

Youth[]

Carroll was born to a working-class family of Irish descent, and grew up on New York's Lower East Side. When he was in the sixth grade, his family moved north to Inwood in Upper Manhattan, where he attended Good Shepherd School.(Citation needed) He was taught by the LaSalle Christian Brothers; his brother in the sixth grade noted that he could write and encouraged him to do so.

In fall 1963, he entered public school, but was soon awarded a scholarship to the elite Trinity School.[6] He attended Trinity from 1964 to 1968.

Apart from being interested in writing, Carroll was an all-star basketball player throughout his grade school and high school career. He entered the "Biddy League" at age 13 and participated in the National High School All Star Game in 1966.

During this time, Carroll was living a double life as a heroin addict who prostituted himself to afford his habit but he was also writing poems and attending poetry workshops at St. Mark's Poetry Project.

He briefly attended Wagner College and Columbia University.[7]

Literary career[]

While still in high school, Carroll published his first collection of poems, Organic Trains. Already attracting the attention of the local literati, his work began appearing in the Poetry Project's magazine The World in 1967. Soon his work was being published in elite literary magazines like Paris Review in 1968,[6] and Poetry the following year. In 1970, his second collection of poems, 4 Ups and 1 Down was published, and he started working for Andy Warhol. At first, he was writing film dialogue and inventing character names; later on, Carroll worked as the co-manager of Warhol's Theater. Carroll's first publication by a mainstream publisher (Grossman Publishers), the poetry collection Living At The Movies, was published in 1973.[8]

In 1978, Carroll published The Basketball Diaries, an autobiographical book concerning his life as a teenager in New York City's hard drug culture. Diaries is an edited collection of the diaries he kept between the ages of 12 and 16, detailing his sexual experiences, high school basketball career, and his addiction to heroin, which began when he was 13.

In 1987, Carroll wrote a 2nd memoir entitled Forced Entries: The downtown diaries, 1971-1973, continuing his autobiography into his early adulthood in the New York City music and art scene as well as his struggle to kick his drug habit.

After working as a musician, Carroll returned to writing full time in the mid-1980s and began to appear regularly on the spoken word circuit. Starting in 1991, Carroll performed readings from his then-in-progress first novel, The Petting Zoo.[9]

Music career[]

In 1978, after he moved to California to get a fresh start after kicking his heroin addiction, Carroll formed The Jim Carroll Band, a New Wave/punk rock group, with encouragement from Patti Smith, with whom he once shared an apartment in New York City along with Robert Mapplethorpe.[10] The band was formerly called Amsterdam, based in the San Francisco Bay Area. The musicians were Steve Linsley (bass), Wayne Woods (drums), Brian Linsley and Terrell Winn (guitars). They released a single "People Who Died", from their 1980 debut album, Catholic Boy. The album featured contributions from Allen Lanier and Bobby Keys. The song appeared in the 1985 Kim Richards vehicle Tuff Turf starring James Spader and Robert Downey Jr. (which also featured a cameo appearance by the band), as well as 2004's Dawn of the Dead. It was also featured in the 1995 film The Basketball Diaries (based on Jim Carroll's autobiography), and was covered by John Cale on his Antártida soundtrack. A condensed, 2-minute, version of the song was made into an animated music video by Daniel D. Cooper, an independent filmmaker/animator, in 2010. The song's title was based on a poem by Ted Berrigan.[11] Later albums were Dry Dreams (1982) and I Write Your Name (1983), both with contributions from Lenny Kaye and Paul Sanchez. Carroll also collaborated with musicians Lou Reed, Blue Öyster Cult, Boz Scaggs, Ray Manzarek of The Doors, Pearl Jam, Electric Light Orchestra and Rancid.

Death[]

Carroll died at 60 of a heart attack at his Manhattan home.[4] He was reportedly working at his desk when he died.[12]

"The_Basketball_Diaries"_trailer

"The Basketball Diaries" trailer

His funeral Mass was held at Our Lady of Pompeii Roman Catholic Church on Carmine St. in Greenwich Village.

Recognition[]

The Basketball Diaries was made into a 1995 film of the same name, starring Leonardo DiCaprio as Carroll.

Publications[]

Poetry[]

  • Organic Trains: Poems (chapbook). Penny Press, 1967.[13]
  • 4 Ups and 1 Down (pamphlet). New York: Angel Hair Press, 1970.
  • Living at the Movies. Harmondsworth, UK, & New York: Penguin, 1973.
  • The Book of Nods. New York: Viking, 1986.
  • Fear of Dreaming: The selected poems of Jim Carroll. New York: Penguin, 1993.
  • Void of Course: Poems, 1994-1997. New York: Penguin, 1998.

Novel[]

  • The Petting Zoo: A novel. New York: Viking, 2010.

Non-fiction[]

  • The Basketball Diaries. New York: Penguin, 1963, 1978.
  • Forced Entries: The downtown diaries, 1971-1973. New York: Penguin, 1987.


Except where noted, bibliographical information courtesy WorldCat.[14]

Jim_Carroll_Band_-_Catholic_Boy

Jim Carroll Band - Catholic Boy

Audio / video[]

Albums[]

Solo[]

  • Catholic Boy (1980)
  • Dry Dreams (1982)
  • I Write Your Name (1983)
  • A World Without Gravity: The best of the Jim Carroll Band. Los Angeles, CA: Rhino, 1993.[14]
  • Pools of Mercury (1998)
  • Runaway EP (2000)

Spoken word[]

Jim_Carroll_-_reading_"Curtis'_Charm"_at_Naropa_Institute_-_RARE

Jim Carroll - reading "Curtis' Charm" at Naropa Institute - RARE

  • Praying Mantis (1991) (Re-released 2008)
  • The Basketball Diaries (1994)
  • Pools of Mercury (1998)

Collaborations[]

People_Who_Died_-_The_Jim_Carroll_Band_-lyrics

People Who Died - The Jim Carroll Band -lyrics

  • Club Ninja, Blue Öyster Cult (1986)
  • Other Roads, Boz Scaggs (1988)
  • Between Thought and Expression: The Lou Reed Anthology, Lou Reed (1992)
  • ...And Out Come the Wolves, Rancid (1995)
  • Catholic Boy, [Pearl Jam] (1995)
  • Feeling You Up, Truly (1997)
  • Yes I Ram, Jon Tiven Group (1999)

Compilations and soundtracks[]

  • E.T. The Extra Terrestrial Soundtrack (1982)
  • Tuff Turf Soundtrack (1985)
  • Back to the Streets: Celebrating the Music of Don Covay (1993)
  • Sedated in the Eighties (1993)
  • The Basketball Diaries (soundtrack) (1995)
    Jim_Carroll_Poem_From_Void_Of_Course

    Jim Carroll Poem From Void Of Course

  • WBCN Naked 2000 (2000)
  • Dawn of the Dead (2004)
  • The Darwin Awards (2005)

See also[]

References[]

  1. O'Hehir, Andrew (1995-04-12). "A Poet Half-Devoured - Jim Carroll Feature Articles". CatholicBoy.com. http://www.catholicboy.com/ohehir.php. Retrieved 2012-12-18. 
  2. Goldman, Marlene (1999-01-08). "Mercury Rising (1999) - Jim Carroll Interviews". CatholicBoy.com. http://www.catholicboy.com/rsinterview.php. Retrieved 2012-12-18. 
  3. "About Jim Carroll". CatholicBoy.com. 2009-02-14. http://www.catholicboy.com/intro.php. Retrieved 2012-12-18. 
  4. 4.0 4.1 Grimes, William (September 13, 2009). "Jim Carroll, Poet and Punk Rocker, Is Dead at 60". The New York Times. http://www.nytimes.com/2009/09/14/books/14carroll.html. Retrieved 2012-12-18. Template:Subscription required
  5. Jim Carroll, NNDB. Web, Jan. 20, 2013.
  6. 6.0 6.1 Mallon, Thomas (6 December 2010). "Off the Rim: Jim Carroll's "The Petting Zoo"". The New Yorker (Condé Nast): 90–93. http://www.newyorker.com/arts/critics/books/2010/12/06/101206crbo_books_mallon. Retrieved 2010-12-27. 
  7. "Jim Carroll: author of The Basketball Diaries", The Times, 15 September 2009, http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/comment/obituaries/article6834246.ece, retrieved 25 March 2010 
  8. "Living at the Movies, First Edition - Books by Jim Carroll - CatholicBoy.com". Catholicboy.com. http://www.catholicboy.com/movies.php. Retrieved 2009-07-10. 
  9. Woo, Elaine (2009-09-14). "Jim Carroll dies at 60; poet and punk rocker wrote about travails in 'The Basketball Diaries'". latimes.com. http://www.latimes.com/news/obituaries/la-me-jim-carroll15-2009sep15,0,7425211.story. Retrieved 2012-12-18. 
  10. Smith, Patti (2010). Just Kids. New York: HarperCollins. pp. 162–164, 166–167. ISBN 978-0-06-093622-8. 
  11. MacAdams, Lewis (September 16, 2009). "Remembering Jim Carroll". The Los Angeles Times. http://www.latimes.com/entertainment/news/arts/la-et-carroll16-2009sep16,0,1608675.story. Retrieved 2012-12-18. 
  12. [1]Template:Dead link
  13. Organic Trains: Poems by Jim Carroll, JimCarroll.com. Web, May 25, 2014.
  14. 14.0 14.1 Search results = au:Jim Carroll, WorldCat, OCLC Online Computer Library Center Inc. Web, May 25, 2014.

External links[]

Poems
Audio /video
Books
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