Spring and Autumn Annals: A Celebration of the Seasons

Di Prima (Recollections of My Life as a Woman: The New York Years) revisits a period (1954–65) covered in her earlier autobiography. This memoir, however, takes the form of an elegy for her close friend Freddie Herko, a dancer and choreographer, who jumped to his death from the window of a Greenwich Village apartment in October 1964. Di Prima's memories are grouped in chapters devoted to the four seasons, with vivid descriptions of holiday celebrations, including Halloween, Thanksgiving, the solstices, Christmas, and Good Friday. They recount her struggles to raise her children on New York's Lower East Side, often in rooms without heat or light and highlight her artistic collaborations with members of the avant-garde community that took root there, including LeRoi Jones (Amiri Baraka), Allen Ginsberg, Alan Marlowe, and Herbert Huncke. Herko's spirit is ever present both in di Prima's waking consciousness and in her dreams. No doubt, the journal entries that served as a basis for this book helped di Prima assuage her grief over Herko's tragic death.