1. Patti Smith meets up with chess grandmaster Bobby Fischer in M Train.
“I received a call from a man identifying himself as Bobby Fischer’s bodyguard. He had been charged with arranging a midnight meeting. Bobby Fischer arrived in a dark, hooded parka. He began testing me immediately by issuing a string of obscene and racially repellent references that morphed into paranoiac conspiracy rants.”
2. Sexual assault victim Chrissie Hynde blames herself in Reckless: My Life as a Pretender.
“Now let me assure you that, technically speaking, however you want to look at it, this was all my doing, and I take full responsibility. You can’t f— around with people, especially people who wear “I Heart Rape” and “On Your Knees” badges.”
3. Jewel learns her mom bankrupted her in Never Broken: Songs Are Only Half the Story.
“We both looked at my mom. ‘Where did it all go?’ My mom sat still as a desert day. Her hands peacefully folded in her lap. A Buddha’s smile on her face. Calm. Tranquil.”
4. Carly Simon identifies Warren Beatty as one of three men who inspired “You’re So Vain” in Boys in the Trees: A Memoir.
You must give Warren credit for loving women. He’s not alone, but he is privileged by being universally attractive. He became compulsive because he could.