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My New York Diary
THE CLASSIC GRAPHIC NOVEL, BACK IN PRINT
Back in print is the classic graphic novel by the acclaimed (though no longer working in comics) iconic artist Julie Doucet. In one of the first contemporary graphic novels, Doucet abruptly packs her bags and moves to New York. Trouble follows her in the form of a jealous boyfriend, insecurity about her talent, her worsening epilepsy, and a tendency to self-medicate with booze and drugs.
104 pages, Paperback
First published May 1, 1999
14 people are currently reading
3329 people want to read
About the author
Julie Doucet
62 books182 followersJulie Doucet is a Canadian underground cartoonist and artist, best known for her autobiographical works such as Dirty Plotte and My New York Diary.
Doucet began cartooning in 1987. Her efforts quickly began to attract critical attention, and she won the 1991 Harvey Award for "Best New Talent".
Shortly thereafter, she moved to New York. Although she moved to Seattle the following year, her experiences in New York formed the basis of the critically-acclaimed My New York Diary (1999). She moved from Seattle to Berlin in 1995, before finally returning to Montreal in 1998. Once there, she released the twelfth and final issue of Dirty Plotte before beginning a brief hiatus from comics.
She returned to the field in 2000 with The Madame Paul Affair, a slice-of-life look at contemporary Montreal which was originally serialized in Ici-Montreal, a local alternative weekly. At the same time, she was branching out into more experimental territory, culminating with the 2001 release of Long Time Relationship, a collection of prints and engravings. In 2004, Doucet also published in French an illustrated diary (Journal) chronicling about a year of her life and, in 2006, an autobiography made from a collage of words cut from magazines and newspapers (J comme Je).
In 2007, Doucet published 365 Days, in which she chronicles her life for a year, starting in late 2002.
After a long hiatus, Doucet came back to publication with Time Zone J (2022).
Doucet began cartooning in 1987. Her efforts quickly began to attract critical attention, and she won the 1991 Harvey Award for "Best New Talent".
Shortly thereafter, she moved to New York. Although she moved to Seattle the following year, her experiences in New York formed the basis of the critically-acclaimed My New York Diary (1999). She moved from Seattle to Berlin in 1995, before finally returning to Montreal in 1998. Once there, she released the twelfth and final issue of Dirty Plotte before beginning a brief hiatus from comics.
She returned to the field in 2000 with The Madame Paul Affair, a slice-of-life look at contemporary Montreal which was originally serialized in Ici-Montreal, a local alternative weekly. At the same time, she was branching out into more experimental territory, culminating with the 2001 release of Long Time Relationship, a collection of prints and engravings. In 2004, Doucet also published in French an illustrated diary (Journal) chronicling about a year of her life and, in 2006, an autobiography made from a collage of words cut from magazines and newspapers (J comme Je).
In 2007, Doucet published 365 Days, in which she chronicles her life for a year, starting in late 2002.
After a long hiatus, Doucet came back to publication with Time Zone J (2022).
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 160 reviews
January 3, 2019
Intimate, fun, and you won't breeze through a more aesthetically pleasing graphic novel than this one.
Doucet's insistence in drawing minutiae like bottles, wrappers, puddles, laundry, books, & junk all over the place elicits a feeling of permanence, of actually having lived in the Big Apple and having to let go of albatrosses clinging to the neck for the sake of success and a chance at literary triumph. It's brave & actually brings comfort to the idea of selling yourself & living Da Bomb bohemian lifestyle.
Doucet's insistence in drawing minutiae like bottles, wrappers, puddles, laundry, books, & junk all over the place elicits a feeling of permanence, of actually having lived in the Big Apple and having to let go of albatrosses clinging to the neck for the sake of success and a chance at literary triumph. It's brave & actually brings comfort to the idea of selling yourself & living Da Bomb bohemian lifestyle.
March 20, 2023
Julie Doucet’s slice-of-life graphic piece builds on episodes from Doucet’s life which come together to form a narrative of her journey towards independence and her development as an author/artist - eventually succeeding through the mentorship of prominent comic artists Aline Kominsky-Crumb and Robert Crumb. Originally Canadian, Doucet opens with episodes set in a suburb of Montreal in 1983, where Julie fresh out of convent school is determined to rebel, meet boys and lose her virginity - most of which she manages although her encounters with men are exceptionally underwhelming. Hers is a male-dominated world, in which women are defined through their relationships with men, and men see no reason to respect women’s boundaries. Julie’s everyday is punctuated by incidents sparked by the losers and creeps who follow her on the street or stalk her even though she’s made it clear she’s not interested. But it’s obvious she doesn’t yet have the self-confidence to live alone, outside of a relationship. Instead, she vividly captures her encounters in a series of dark, black-and-white images, each richly detailed, meticulously recreating a world of run-down cramped apartments - every inch taken up with objects, scattered clothes and beer cans - and littered cityscapes.
Julie makes it through art school and moves to New York to live with a boyfriend who’s also an aspiring artist of sorts. She ends up in Washington Heights, which is beautifully realised in Doucet’s illustrations; it’s well before the days of high property prices and gentrification, the streets are lined with rubbish thrown out of windows, and it’s not safe for women to walk around alone even during the day. Julie lives on the fringes, listening to Sonic Youth and visiting clubs on the Lower East Side, taking drugs and vegging in front of the TV, but her boyfriend becomes more and more controlling and dependent on her wages. Her isolation is increased by epilepsy that’s becoming increasingly unmanageable. But at her tiny desk in a dingy apartment, Julie never stops working on her comics, embedded in a contemporary D.I.Y subculture and aesthetic that flourished in the punk and post-punk years, in which hand-crafted zines (fanzines) were central, distributed through a variety of underground networks. Through her zines Doucet compellingly recreates and reframes her life from her seizures to her disappointing sexual encounters, to a painful miscarriage. It’s a surprisingly compelling book and it’s no wonder Doucet’s regarded as so significant, one of a handful of female producers who paved the way for later graphic women artists/writers by breaking into an area primarily associated with men, and legitimising the representation of women’s everyday domestic and bodily existence.
Rating: 3.5
Julie makes it through art school and moves to New York to live with a boyfriend who’s also an aspiring artist of sorts. She ends up in Washington Heights, which is beautifully realised in Doucet’s illustrations; it’s well before the days of high property prices and gentrification, the streets are lined with rubbish thrown out of windows, and it’s not safe for women to walk around alone even during the day. Julie lives on the fringes, listening to Sonic Youth and visiting clubs on the Lower East Side, taking drugs and vegging in front of the TV, but her boyfriend becomes more and more controlling and dependent on her wages. Her isolation is increased by epilepsy that’s becoming increasingly unmanageable. But at her tiny desk in a dingy apartment, Julie never stops working on her comics, embedded in a contemporary D.I.Y subculture and aesthetic that flourished in the punk and post-punk years, in which hand-crafted zines (fanzines) were central, distributed through a variety of underground networks. Through her zines Doucet compellingly recreates and reframes her life from her seizures to her disappointing sexual encounters, to a painful miscarriage. It’s a surprisingly compelling book and it’s no wonder Doucet’s regarded as so significant, one of a handful of female producers who paved the way for later graphic women artists/writers by breaking into an area primarily associated with men, and legitimising the representation of women’s everyday domestic and bodily existence.
Rating: 3.5
October 26, 2007
Pretty unremarkable as far as graphic novels go; I've read much better about similar topics. The drawings were too crowded. The writing and story nothing special. Persepolis, Epileptic, Blankets, and others are much better at dealing with some of the same subject matter and have better illustrations.
November 17, 2018
Oh man I feel sort of surprised that I read this for the first time in 2012. It's impossible to really remember when you're first exposed to stuff, but as someone who's only been a comics person since 2010, Doucet feels like more advanced content than I would've guessed I'd've gotten to in the first two years.
I'm reading this new critical work on her right now though and if there's one good sign your critical work is doing a good job it's when it makes you super thirsty for the primary text. So I am enjoying the critical work enough that I had to put it down and go reread this real quick.
And it is great! It is so so great!! Doucet is a force and it's such a pleasure to encounter her.
I'm reading this new critical work on her right now though and if there's one good sign your critical work is doing a good job it's when it makes you super thirsty for the primary text. So I am enjoying the critical work enough that I had to put it down and go reread this real quick.
And it is great! It is so so great!! Doucet is a force and it's such a pleasure to encounter her.
March 14, 2011
My son had to read this for a university class and then write a paper about it. He asked me to read the paper and I was intrigued about the book. I was underwhelmed. While Doucet is clearly a talented artist, she's not so much a writer. I found the whole book evocative of Phoebe Gloeckner's The Diary of a Teenage Girl. Gloeckner came out ahead.
I came away from the book with a bad taste in my mouth. Doucet portrays herself as an innocent young girl - but puts herself into so many terrible situations that I ended up wondering how innocent she really was. Where were her parents? They were completely absent in this story. Who lets their young, epileptic daughter move to New York (from Canada) and in with a man she barely knows?
Bad choice follows bad choice. Drawings were excellent - story was sub par.
I came away from the book with a bad taste in my mouth. Doucet portrays herself as an innocent young girl - but puts herself into so many terrible situations that I ended up wondering how innocent she really was. Where were her parents? They were completely absent in this story. Who lets their young, epileptic daughter move to New York (from Canada) and in with a man she barely knows?
Bad choice follows bad choice. Drawings were excellent - story was sub par.
October 28, 2014
This book just made me sad, in general and for the author, and to no useful purpose.
It's the story of an amazingly naive young girl making horrible choices and how wretched they make her life. In the end she escapes to what is, I guess, a better situation but there is no feeling of growth or learning in it.
Well illustrated and laid out just short on being a real winner for the story.
It's the story of an amazingly naive young girl making horrible choices and how wretched they make her life. In the end she escapes to what is, I guess, a better situation but there is no feeling of growth or learning in it.
Well illustrated and laid out just short on being a real winner for the story.
November 16, 2023
Worth it for Doucet's cartooning. I personally prefer her fictional comics including her dream comics, but this is pretty great as well.
Julie leaves Montreal and stays with her boyfriend in Washington Heights. They seem to be a good pairing, both enjoy doing light-drugs and drinking lots of beer, living in filth but even from the start it seems the boyfriend is jealous of Doucet's success as an artist.
The one scene where they are having sex, Julie gets a phone call. The panel shows the boyfriend fully erect completely pissed off he's being ignored for the phone. It's hilarious.
Julie is suffering from epileptic seizures, her medication isn't working too well. Julie has trouble balancing her lifestyle with the boyfriend and her desire to create comics.
It was inevitable that Doucet would have a falling out with her boyfriend. But she has trouble breaking it to him while trying to find another place to live.
Julie leaves Montreal and stays with her boyfriend in Washington Heights. They seem to be a good pairing, both enjoy doing light-drugs and drinking lots of beer, living in filth but even from the start it seems the boyfriend is jealous of Doucet's success as an artist.
The one scene where they are having sex, Julie gets a phone call. The panel shows the boyfriend fully erect completely pissed off he's being ignored for the phone. It's hilarious.
Julie is suffering from epileptic seizures, her medication isn't working too well. Julie has trouble balancing her lifestyle with the boyfriend and her desire to create comics.
It was inevitable that Doucet would have a falling out with her boyfriend. But she has trouble breaking it to him while trying to find another place to live.
December 3, 2019
12/2/19: Still great, could look at her panels all day long.
Really great to revisit this book and marvel at Julie Doucet's amazingly skilled, cluttery drawings that give so much visual information - sometimes almost more than you feel you can take, but it's all so fascinating. I don't know how she pulls it off. I read this slim volume very slowly and found myself staring at the pages, trying to figure it all out. I'd forgotten how harrowing the main story was too, but certainly remembered all over again with Doucet's help that living in the Washington Heights area of Manhattan sucks (lived there from late '95 until late '96 before we moved to midtown, thank god - those bloody long A train rides were the worst). Meanwhile, Julie D., like so many other awesome 90's cartoonists, has quit comics apparently for good and I mourn the loss still. Five stars.
Really great to revisit this book and marvel at Julie Doucet's amazingly skilled, cluttery drawings that give so much visual information - sometimes almost more than you feel you can take, but it's all so fascinating. I don't know how she pulls it off. I read this slim volume very slowly and found myself staring at the pages, trying to figure it all out. I'd forgotten how harrowing the main story was too, but certainly remembered all over again with Doucet's help that living in the Washington Heights area of Manhattan sucks (lived there from late '95 until late '96 before we moved to midtown, thank god - those bloody long A train rides were the worst). Meanwhile, Julie D., like so many other awesome 90's cartoonists, has quit comics apparently for good and I mourn the loss still. Five stars.
April 29, 2010
I don't read many female authors. I don't know why. Maybe the patriarchy has gelled me a bias. But Julie Doucet is delightful. she is charming and witty, and pokes fun in the smallest details--from the posters and cockroaches in the background, to the weird details of things like penises and the names on punk shirts. She allows the character of herself to get seduced by the most scummy, moronic men and she handles it with the panache of a fairy. She loses her virginity in this book to a nonsense hippy of an artist and the sound effect of their sex is "flitch...flitch...flitch..." as he wildly pounces her and she hardly feels it, as if to say 'Oh, so this is sex.'
Her relationship debacle reminds me of a friend i had who moved to new york for the same reason, and the overbearing protector she moved there with lost his mind and induced the loss of her own. But when she broke out, she became so free. You can see this ticklish freedom in her expression and satire. It is refreshing.
She has a masterful way of exploding the setting into a single dimension, so that everything is very apparent, very bubbly and visible--overwhelming, teetering on too overwhelming. But it's good, because the anxiety is created. I'm not ashamed to say that i've developed a bit of a crush. So, ms. julie, i'll have you know. I'm probably as big of a douchebag as the other flippant trolls you've messed with, but i think you'd draw me well. I can see myself as a whiny anal miscreant who wastes his talent in drunken debauchery and the abuse of women by means of an insecure stranglehold on their time and patience. But what an entertaining cartoon i'd make!
Her relationship debacle reminds me of a friend i had who moved to new york for the same reason, and the overbearing protector she moved there with lost his mind and induced the loss of her own. But when she broke out, she became so free. You can see this ticklish freedom in her expression and satire. It is refreshing.
She has a masterful way of exploding the setting into a single dimension, so that everything is very apparent, very bubbly and visible--overwhelming, teetering on too overwhelming. But it's good, because the anxiety is created. I'm not ashamed to say that i've developed a bit of a crush. So, ms. julie, i'll have you know. I'm probably as big of a douchebag as the other flippant trolls you've messed with, but i think you'd draw me well. I can see myself as a whiny anal miscreant who wastes his talent in drunken debauchery and the abuse of women by means of an insecure stranglehold on their time and patience. But what an entertaining cartoon i'd make!
May 9, 2008
How to draw your heart out without being maudlin, romantic or boring.
March 14, 2017
I loved this. It seems to me to be an almost perfect example of this type of autobiographical graphic novel. It balances just the right amount of text/drawing, detail/big picture, sex/mundanity, politics/chatter. I really enjoyed the tone, historical details and funny references.
October 18, 2024
Highly recommend! Doucet does a great job of blending comics techniques with meaning. Now I understand why Professor Nishikawa assigned us this book. The story feels realistic - I think many people can relate to Julie on some level.
October 6, 2011
Bam. I love you, Julie D.
You're kind of brutally honest about what's going on around you, the drugs you are doing, the seizures you are having in the bathtub, and the comics that have arrived in the mail from John Porcellino! In this fabulous installment of Julie's life, she chronicles a few choice moments of art school, and then skips ahead to a stay in New York with a kind of terrible, drug addicted, emotionally needy boyfriend, who I sympathized with a little when all was said and done. I'm not sure that was intended, but dude, sad.
What gets me about Doucet's stuff is that she's so consistently spacy/in her own world/not digging into her own feelings about stuff as she tells her stories, but her artwork is incredibly emotional and rich and messy in contrast. And also that whole, it's a lady doing this messy, raw, dirty, sexy art-stuff. That's a big deal, I guess. Yay.
You're kind of brutally honest about what's going on around you, the drugs you are doing, the seizures you are having in the bathtub, and the comics that have arrived in the mail from John Porcellino! In this fabulous installment of Julie's life, she chronicles a few choice moments of art school, and then skips ahead to a stay in New York with a kind of terrible, drug addicted, emotionally needy boyfriend, who I sympathized with a little when all was said and done. I'm not sure that was intended, but dude, sad.
What gets me about Doucet's stuff is that she's so consistently spacy/in her own world/not digging into her own feelings about stuff as she tells her stories, but her artwork is incredibly emotional and rich and messy in contrast. And also that whole, it's a lady doing this messy, raw, dirty, sexy art-stuff. That's a big deal, I guess. Yay.
December 18, 2018
Good introduction to Doucet's work before taking the plunge in purchasing her Dirty Plotte anthology from Drawn and Quarterly. Her drawing style is very cool and gritty. She also gives credit to her reader and doesn't rely on 'telling' and instead takes the reader on a journey to figure it out themselves by showing before spilling the beans of whats going on in some of her comics.
I love reading the experience of Canadian cartoonists that take place in my country and also about their experience abroad. At the end of this, Doucet mentions a move to Seattle where Genevieve Castee also settled. I might look deeper into that!
I love reading the experience of Canadian cartoonists that take place in my country and also about their experience abroad. At the end of this, Doucet mentions a move to Seattle where Genevieve Castee also settled. I might look deeper into that!
September 27, 2019
Read this for the first time in college and just read it again today. I think before I couldn't recognize Julie's random sexual encounters for the violence they were; many of them border on rape or simply are rape, though only Julie can really speak to that. Anyway, content warning for sexual violence, obviously. In terms of the art, the bobblehead, uncute faux chibi style of Julie's characters doesn't exactly grab me. Overall, she captures the pretentious / boring milieu of art school, as well as the irritatingly persistent and pervasive nature of misogynist patriarchy, in amusing ways that makes this graphic novel a worthwhile read.
March 10, 2018
I found this both depressing and infuriating to read as Doucet makes one naive and bad decision after another spiraling into a mess of her own creation. I get that people make mistakes but I'm sure the whole point is to learn from them, not to keep making them. The story aside, the illustrations are detailed and honest giving a no holds barred approach, which on one hand is great but on the other means there is a lot of information to take in. Overall it wasn't a bad book but not one I would read again either.
April 1, 2016
Julie Doucet's works were recommended to me mostly for her deconstruction of What it Means to be Woman. This collection was the only one my local public library carries, and was one of the two main titles I was suggested to read.
It ended up being on my short hate-list of most boring, poorly-told graphic memoir garbage books that I couldn't even get through no matter how many times I tried.
It ended up being on my short hate-list of most boring, poorly-told graphic memoir garbage books that I couldn't even get through no matter how many times I tried.
April 3, 2015
How obnoxious and boring can you get? This book is it.
Read
November 29, 2017It's rare that I'll put down a graphic novel rather than muscling through parts I don't like or enjoy. I put this one down after two or three of the vignettes/episodes.
September 7, 2019
[Comics Canon Review]
Julie Doucet is a master of visual detail. That she is also a master storyteller is merely a bonus.
Julie Doucet is a master of visual detail. That she is also a master storyteller is merely a bonus.
July 20, 2025
Ovaj strip-album dobila sam na poklon još prije četiri mjeseca od strip-crtača Envera Krivca i tek je sada došao na red za čitanje. Za Julie Doucet znam od ranije, vidjela sam njene originale u Muzeju stripa u Angoulemu i vidjela sam i neka njena izdanja dok sam bila u Francuskoj i nije bilo moguće ne zapamtiti je zbog njene osebujne stilizacije likova i tretmana prostora unutar kadra. Na prvu mi se činilo da ću se teško probijati kroz tako gusto iscrtan strip prepun detalja (morala sam koristiti i povećalo da ih vidim bez naprezanja), no ispostavilo se da se Julie čita vrlo tečno i da su joj scenariji vrlo zanimljivi. Riječ je o nekoliko priča u kojima govori o svojim dugim, kratkim i vrlo kratkim vezama i svime što s tim ide u paketu. Enver mi je, dok mi je poklanjao strip, rekao da je to literatura za žene i zaista je bio u pravu na najbolji mogući način. No, treba napomenuti da se tu ne radi o chick-literaturi niti o kiču kakav viđamo u ljubićima već o zanimljivoj ženskoj perspektivi u kojima su muškarci prikazani vrlo realno, barem mi se tako čini kada usporedim njene priče sa svojim životnim iskustvima ili iskustvima mojih prijateljica, poznanica, rođakinja. Muškarci su u ovim stripovima daleko od ideala princa na konju, oni troše svoje potencijale na ispijanje piva, drogiranje, neuredni su (u jednoj od priča muški lik namače sve svoje prljavo posuđe u kadi, u vodi u kojoj se bio okupao), siromašni, nezaposleni, sitničavi, ljubomorni, zavidni, prijete samoubojstvima i prave scene na javnim mjestima, a nakon prekida veze zadaju vrlo niske udarce. Julie sve svoje brodolome prikazuje ne uljepšavajući stvarnost i obogaćujući je kroz iznimno kreativan narativni postupak u kojemu je tekst savršeno odmjeren a u vizualnom se pripovijedanju, unatoč arhaičnosti stila, jako vješto koriste gesta i gluma odnosno govor tijela. Sklonost autorice da crta brojne detalje u prostoru dodatno pomaže da se likovi profiliraju i portretiraju kroz ambijente u kojima žive.
Ono što me posebno zaintrigiralo jest i ta neka ženska crta u cjelokupnom pristupu stripu, neki detalji koje prepoznajem u svojim najranijim stripovima, od toga da se u njima koristi autofiksacija do toga da se ignorira cjelokupna povijest mainstream stilova u stripu i pronalazi neki autentični način da se koristi stripovski jezik. Najviše oduševljava njena iskrenost i spremnost da se izloži i da sa čitateljima podijeli svoja osobna i intimna iskustva, bez obzira na to što su u neku ruku luzerska, pa onda s tim u vezi i imaju ljudsku (a ne superjunačku) notu. Zbog svega toga rado ću potražiti još njenih stripova, voljela bih je opet čitati.
p.s. Sinoć neposredno prije nego što sam pročitala prvu tablu stripa moj je mačak napao knjigu i odgrizao komad kartonskih korica. Ne znam je li to zato što je nanjušio da se u stripu nalazi još jedna crna mačka, ljubimica glavne junakinje...
p.p.s. U stripu se kao epizodni likovi pojavljuju face kao što su Chris Ware, Art Spiegelman, Kaz i Leslie Stenberg.
Ono što me posebno zaintrigiralo jest i ta neka ženska crta u cjelokupnom pristupu stripu, neki detalji koje prepoznajem u svojim najranijim stripovima, od toga da se u njima koristi autofiksacija do toga da se ignorira cjelokupna povijest mainstream stilova u stripu i pronalazi neki autentični način da se koristi stripovski jezik. Najviše oduševljava njena iskrenost i spremnost da se izloži i da sa čitateljima podijeli svoja osobna i intimna iskustva, bez obzira na to što su u neku ruku luzerska, pa onda s tim u vezi i imaju ljudsku (a ne superjunačku) notu. Zbog svega toga rado ću potražiti još njenih stripova, voljela bih je opet čitati.
p.s. Sinoć neposredno prije nego što sam pročitala prvu tablu stripa moj je mačak napao knjigu i odgrizao komad kartonskih korica. Ne znam je li to zato što je nanjušio da se u stripu nalazi još jedna crna mačka, ljubimica glavne junakinje...
p.p.s. U stripu se kao epizodni likovi pojavljuju face kao što su Chris Ware, Art Spiegelman, Kaz i Leslie Stenberg.
July 9, 2020
Went into this blind while high—I CANNOT OVERSTATE HOW MUCH YOU SHOULD NOT DO THAT!!!
First twenty-ish pages were very rough, man. But after I collected myself and finished it the opening seemed earned. The toxicity of the men in Julie’s life perpetuates their behaviour that she suffers through, and the quick and hard opening chapters were constant reminders of the terrible terrible ways that behaviour manifests. Seeing Julie grow as a character and eventually gtfo, while seemingly not a super happy ending, was v satisfying and left me with hope.
All in all a very well done graphic memoir. The art style reminded of me Charles Burnes (who makes a cameo appearance) with its detailed expressions and extremely black panels and all the little messy details that really s u c k you into those panels and make the memoir feel more lived in.
First twenty-ish pages were very rough, man. But after I collected myself and finished it the opening seemed earned. The toxicity of the men in Julie’s life perpetuates their behaviour that she suffers through, and the quick and hard opening chapters were constant reminders of the terrible terrible ways that behaviour manifests. Seeing Julie grow as a character and eventually gtfo, while seemingly not a super happy ending, was v satisfying and left me with hope.
All in all a very well done graphic memoir. The art style reminded of me Charles Burnes (who makes a cameo appearance) with its detailed expressions and extremely black panels and all the little messy details that really s u c k you into those panels and make the memoir feel more lived in.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
January 30, 2023
Un journal sans concession pour une jeune femme mal dans sa peau, qui ne sait pas bien s'entourer.
Un dessin chargé d'émotions. Tous les visages de ses personnages laissent entrevoir une certaine méchanceté, ou du moins une souffrance.
Ça donne envie d'en découvrir plus, notamment son dernier livre, une frise ininterrompue de 20m de carnet !
Un dessin chargé d'émotions. Tous les visages de ses personnages laissent entrevoir une certaine méchanceté, ou du moins une souffrance.
Ça donne envie d'en découvrir plus, notamment son dernier livre, une frise ininterrompue de 20m de carnet !
June 19, 2025
My New York Diary by Julie Doucet – considered a classic graphic novel, included on the 1,000 Novels Everyone Must Read list
8 out of 10
I am not a fan of graphic novels, although their brevity makes them easy to read – sure, there would be very long ones out there, but the few included on the 1,000 Novels Everyone Must Read are accessible – and then it helps that we can see the rooms, people, background, and we get into the atmosphere, maybe we should call them immersive
Then the conclusions are simple, based on what you prefer, Magister Ludi Kingsley Amis https://realini.blogspot.com/2022/12/... had trouble with Joyce (I do too), Proust (one of my favorites), Lawrence (I agree), Updike, Bellow and Nabokov, so ‘beauty is in the eye of the beholder’
Julie Doucet writes about herself, and the first part is about her days in Montreal, when the characters seemed outré, asking to go to the park, then there is no beer, so this is fine so far, but then this fellow, keeps on about being to the hospital, but he is all right, he can still…get it up, he has had an operation, but it is all good
Not that our heroine cares, but she wants to meet people, being in a convent, she had not had the chance to meet any boys, and those we can see, there are drawings of them, this being a graphic novel, are commenting on the convent…’I bet she never went all the way, then I bet she never kissed, but she says yes’
However, one of them talks about kissing with the tongue – we do have this erotic, perhaps, element in there, she will be nude, having sex, the New York boyfriend will take photos of her in the nude, and then later on talk about masturbating to them, when she refuses to have sex, so there is this sexual atmosphere…
The main character then goes to the place of one who looks rather old to me, but maybe I just do not interpret those graphics correctly, and then she is about to see his paintings, and one thing leads to another, there is the intimacy element I have just mentioned, and they have sex, she is curious, has not had it yet
It appeared somewhat troubling that the (old?) guy keeps on about ‘not having that in mind’, ‘I swear I did not have that in mind’ – in the old days, we had here this stupid theory, that one has to go easy, and the ‘scheme’ was in these words – you keep trying to seduce, making it come ‘naturally’ and then she will ask
‘What are you doing?’ and you insist it is ‘nothing’, while things move forward, but that was because they wanted to be assured, they want a fellow who is an expert, he knows how to smooth his way and so on…this was at a time when boys were meant to be what, sexist, chauvinist, and all the rest, that was the ‘lesson’ for them
The young woman says ‘she felt nothing’, but still, was rather satisfied with ‘not being a baby anymore’ she had had sex (if we could call it that, seeing the lack of emotions, sensations, well, anything pleasurable) then it is art class, which is not what she expected, but eventually, it will be her career, we can see that
She is a successful author, and those classes must have helped, there is evidence, what we discover in Outliers https://realini.blogspot.com/2013/05/... the classic by Malcolm Gladwell
The magic formula is ten thousand hours of practice, exercise over ten years, which translates into three hours every day, and then if you have talent, and meet some other conditions, you can be at the very top, the cases of Mozart, Beatles, Steve Jobs, Bill Gates and others are analyzed, plus the culture of Asia and the focus on work
While in the West (which for this purpose included Russia) the most important crops would be maize, wheat, which require effort from spring to autumn, but then farmers could relax somewhat, in large parts of Asia, the main resource had been for millennia rice, which is very demanding, you need to give it attention and work always!
Let me come back to Julie Doucet, who gets close to this philosophy student who knows all about the world, and describes the catastrophe awaiting the world, nuclear Armageddon, one colleague is so bizarre that he takes a bath, puts the dishes in the used water, in order to avoid wasting hot water, which is not the only delicate detail
Further on, the heroine is out, and she is bleeding, with just some toilet paper, so we have that award detail, but hey, this is modern, genuine, right, feminist too, not for the ultra-conservative, Orange Jesus or Vance types, true was not really crazy about that special aspect, but there is another gloomy side…
Julie suffers from epilepsy and she has seizures, at one time, there is one when she is taking a bath, and thus this quite repellent boyfriend claims that he saved her life, came to see about her, and she was about to drown…nevertheless he is one God damn negative personage, keeps doing drugs, wants to keep her when she is already beyond it
He has no money, takes some part time jobs painting apartments, insists on living in a dangerous, ugly part of New York, and threatens suicide, even makes some cuts to his wrists, he looks like taking her down with him, unless she does something drastic and escapes, moves out, which she writes about, but does not do…
At least for some time, maybe she will get the courage, she also feels pressure, because this boyfriend uses blackmail, he could not live without her (obviously, he can and will, finding a new girlfriend very fast) but she might escape…
Now for my standard closing of the note with a question, and invitation – maybe you have a good idea on how we could make more than a million dollars with this http://realini.blogspot.com/2022/02/u... – as it is, this is a unique technique, which we could promote, sell, open the Oscars show with or something and then make lots of money together, if you have the how, I have the product, I just do not know how to get the befits from it, other than the exercise per se
There is also the small matter of working for AT&T – this huge company asked me to be its Representative for Romania and Bulgaria, on the Calling Card side, which meant sailing into the Black Sea wo meet the US Navy ships, travelling to Sofia, a lot of activity, using my mother’s two bedrooms flat as office and warehouse, all for the grand total of $250, raised after a lot of persuasion to the staggering $400…with retirement ahead, there are no benefits, nothing…it is a longer story, but if you can help get the mastodont to pay some dues, or have an idea how it can happen, let me know
As for my role in the Revolution that killed Ceausescu, a smaller Mao, there it is http://realini.blogspot.com/2022/03/r...
Some favorite quotes from To The Hermitage and other works
‘Fiction is infinitely preferable to real life...As long as you avoid the books of Kafka or Beckett, the everlasting plot of fiction has fewer futile experiences than the careless plot of reality...Fiction's people are fuller, deeper, cleverer, more moving than those in real life…Its actions are more intricate, illuminating, noble, profound…There are many more dramas, climaxes, romantic fulfillment, twists, turns, gratified resolutions…Unlike reality, all of this you can experience without leaving the house or even getting out of bed…What's more, books are a form of intelligent human greatness, as stories are a higher order of sense…As random life is to destiny, so stories are to great authors, who provided us with some of the highest pleasures and the most wonderful mystifications we can find…Few stories are greater than Anna Karenina, that wise epic by an often foolish author…’
‚Parturiunt montes, nascetur ridiculus mus’
“From Monty Python - The Meaning of Life...Well, it's nothing very special...Try and be nice to people, avoid eating fat, read a good book every now and then, get some walking in, and try and live together in peace and harmony with people of all creeds and nations.”
8 out of 10
I am not a fan of graphic novels, although their brevity makes them easy to read – sure, there would be very long ones out there, but the few included on the 1,000 Novels Everyone Must Read are accessible – and then it helps that we can see the rooms, people, background, and we get into the atmosphere, maybe we should call them immersive
Then the conclusions are simple, based on what you prefer, Magister Ludi Kingsley Amis https://realini.blogspot.com/2022/12/... had trouble with Joyce (I do too), Proust (one of my favorites), Lawrence (I agree), Updike, Bellow and Nabokov, so ‘beauty is in the eye of the beholder’
Julie Doucet writes about herself, and the first part is about her days in Montreal, when the characters seemed outré, asking to go to the park, then there is no beer, so this is fine so far, but then this fellow, keeps on about being to the hospital, but he is all right, he can still…get it up, he has had an operation, but it is all good
Not that our heroine cares, but she wants to meet people, being in a convent, she had not had the chance to meet any boys, and those we can see, there are drawings of them, this being a graphic novel, are commenting on the convent…’I bet she never went all the way, then I bet she never kissed, but she says yes’
However, one of them talks about kissing with the tongue – we do have this erotic, perhaps, element in there, she will be nude, having sex, the New York boyfriend will take photos of her in the nude, and then later on talk about masturbating to them, when she refuses to have sex, so there is this sexual atmosphere…
The main character then goes to the place of one who looks rather old to me, but maybe I just do not interpret those graphics correctly, and then she is about to see his paintings, and one thing leads to another, there is the intimacy element I have just mentioned, and they have sex, she is curious, has not had it yet
It appeared somewhat troubling that the (old?) guy keeps on about ‘not having that in mind’, ‘I swear I did not have that in mind’ – in the old days, we had here this stupid theory, that one has to go easy, and the ‘scheme’ was in these words – you keep trying to seduce, making it come ‘naturally’ and then she will ask
‘What are you doing?’ and you insist it is ‘nothing’, while things move forward, but that was because they wanted to be assured, they want a fellow who is an expert, he knows how to smooth his way and so on…this was at a time when boys were meant to be what, sexist, chauvinist, and all the rest, that was the ‘lesson’ for them
The young woman says ‘she felt nothing’, but still, was rather satisfied with ‘not being a baby anymore’ she had had sex (if we could call it that, seeing the lack of emotions, sensations, well, anything pleasurable) then it is art class, which is not what she expected, but eventually, it will be her career, we can see that
She is a successful author, and those classes must have helped, there is evidence, what we discover in Outliers https://realini.blogspot.com/2013/05/... the classic by Malcolm Gladwell
The magic formula is ten thousand hours of practice, exercise over ten years, which translates into three hours every day, and then if you have talent, and meet some other conditions, you can be at the very top, the cases of Mozart, Beatles, Steve Jobs, Bill Gates and others are analyzed, plus the culture of Asia and the focus on work
While in the West (which for this purpose included Russia) the most important crops would be maize, wheat, which require effort from spring to autumn, but then farmers could relax somewhat, in large parts of Asia, the main resource had been for millennia rice, which is very demanding, you need to give it attention and work always!
Let me come back to Julie Doucet, who gets close to this philosophy student who knows all about the world, and describes the catastrophe awaiting the world, nuclear Armageddon, one colleague is so bizarre that he takes a bath, puts the dishes in the used water, in order to avoid wasting hot water, which is not the only delicate detail
Further on, the heroine is out, and she is bleeding, with just some toilet paper, so we have that award detail, but hey, this is modern, genuine, right, feminist too, not for the ultra-conservative, Orange Jesus or Vance types, true was not really crazy about that special aspect, but there is another gloomy side…
Julie suffers from epilepsy and she has seizures, at one time, there is one when she is taking a bath, and thus this quite repellent boyfriend claims that he saved her life, came to see about her, and she was about to drown…nevertheless he is one God damn negative personage, keeps doing drugs, wants to keep her when she is already beyond it
He has no money, takes some part time jobs painting apartments, insists on living in a dangerous, ugly part of New York, and threatens suicide, even makes some cuts to his wrists, he looks like taking her down with him, unless she does something drastic and escapes, moves out, which she writes about, but does not do…
At least for some time, maybe she will get the courage, she also feels pressure, because this boyfriend uses blackmail, he could not live without her (obviously, he can and will, finding a new girlfriend very fast) but she might escape…
Now for my standard closing of the note with a question, and invitation – maybe you have a good idea on how we could make more than a million dollars with this http://realini.blogspot.com/2022/02/u... – as it is, this is a unique technique, which we could promote, sell, open the Oscars show with or something and then make lots of money together, if you have the how, I have the product, I just do not know how to get the befits from it, other than the exercise per se
There is also the small matter of working for AT&T – this huge company asked me to be its Representative for Romania and Bulgaria, on the Calling Card side, which meant sailing into the Black Sea wo meet the US Navy ships, travelling to Sofia, a lot of activity, using my mother’s two bedrooms flat as office and warehouse, all for the grand total of $250, raised after a lot of persuasion to the staggering $400…with retirement ahead, there are no benefits, nothing…it is a longer story, but if you can help get the mastodont to pay some dues, or have an idea how it can happen, let me know
As for my role in the Revolution that killed Ceausescu, a smaller Mao, there it is http://realini.blogspot.com/2022/03/r...
Some favorite quotes from To The Hermitage and other works
‘Fiction is infinitely preferable to real life...As long as you avoid the books of Kafka or Beckett, the everlasting plot of fiction has fewer futile experiences than the careless plot of reality...Fiction's people are fuller, deeper, cleverer, more moving than those in real life…Its actions are more intricate, illuminating, noble, profound…There are many more dramas, climaxes, romantic fulfillment, twists, turns, gratified resolutions…Unlike reality, all of this you can experience without leaving the house or even getting out of bed…What's more, books are a form of intelligent human greatness, as stories are a higher order of sense…As random life is to destiny, so stories are to great authors, who provided us with some of the highest pleasures and the most wonderful mystifications we can find…Few stories are greater than Anna Karenina, that wise epic by an often foolish author…’
‚Parturiunt montes, nascetur ridiculus mus’
“From Monty Python - The Meaning of Life...Well, it's nothing very special...Try and be nice to people, avoid eating fat, read a good book every now and then, get some walking in, and try and live together in peace and harmony with people of all creeds and nations.”
October 7, 2007
I enjoyed Doucet's drawings of little bottles and the clutter that fills all her inhabitations. If I'm going to invest my time in a graphic novel I MUST like the drawings, otherwise I can't read it. I also liked how she was making comics in the book, using pen and ink. I just got done with my first real pen and ink drawing and I really liked using it and reading this book and seeing pen and ink work at the same time.
I liked the memoir stories much better than her actual New York Diary though. Her remembrances when she was just out of high school and in college seem more important and significant, maybe because she is more removed because it didn't just happen, or maybe she is being more selective about what to write/draw about since it was so long ago. The things that stick in your memory from the past are usually more interesting or significant to your life than what just happened to you. It seems a little more real too, struggling though school, not liking school. Her New York Diary seemed more mundane even though really intense shit happened to her in New York. Maybe I just started to get annoyed with her and couldn't feel any of the empathy I did in the first section, because you realize that all the bad stuff that's happening to her is her own fault and she's how old? The just out of high school bad experiences are more tolerable because she's naive and it's like a coming of age story. I also can't feel sorry for her when she's name dropping comic artists and at a party in NYC and puts in her comic how successful she is. What's that all about? A little braggy I think, maybe I'm just envious because I want attention from Art Spiegelman. At this point it's very narcassistic, not that having a comic book about yourself isn't, but I think it's going beyond creating interesting stories and just becoming a general account of events which may or may not be interesting to other people. I think I'm just bitter about the whole putting how famous you are in your own comic book thing. And her boyfriend and her are annoying at times. Maybe I was in a bad mood when I read the second part, but the julie in junior college was much more genuine.
I liked the memoir stories much better than her actual New York Diary though. Her remembrances when she was just out of high school and in college seem more important and significant, maybe because she is more removed because it didn't just happen, or maybe she is being more selective about what to write/draw about since it was so long ago. The things that stick in your memory from the past are usually more interesting or significant to your life than what just happened to you. It seems a little more real too, struggling though school, not liking school. Her New York Diary seemed more mundane even though really intense shit happened to her in New York. Maybe I just started to get annoyed with her and couldn't feel any of the empathy I did in the first section, because you realize that all the bad stuff that's happening to her is her own fault and she's how old? The just out of high school bad experiences are more tolerable because she's naive and it's like a coming of age story. I also can't feel sorry for her when she's name dropping comic artists and at a party in NYC and puts in her comic how successful she is. What's that all about? A little braggy I think, maybe I'm just envious because I want attention from Art Spiegelman. At this point it's very narcassistic, not that having a comic book about yourself isn't, but I think it's going beyond creating interesting stories and just becoming a general account of events which may or may not be interesting to other people. I think I'm just bitter about the whole putting how famous you are in your own comic book thing. And her boyfriend and her are annoying at times. Maybe I was in a bad mood when I read the second part, but the julie in junior college was much more genuine.
Read
October 12, 2010Am I finally sick of the hipster in new york city comix genre? No! Not yet, though I'm sure some time in the future what I find to be anathema in prose form will also be detestable to me in comic form as well. I liked this artist's drawing style, the cluttered spaces and how everyone looks like a cat/adult baby, though after a while in can become a trite bit claustrophobic, nauseating and samey. Also, I know she is from Canada and English is her second language, but this book could have used a little editing in regards to syntax and sentence design.
I liked the two pre-new york stories best. There was too much of a gap between them and the new york stories and I think some of my connection to the character was lost along the way, so at times I felt like her emotionally abusive/self-destructive boyfriend, cut off from her daily life and rising to fame and thus a tad bit jealous when it all happens so quickly (What? She's turning down the Village Voice now? That cocky bitch! When did she get so successful and popular? Did I miss that? She's not communicating with me. Why isn't she telling me these things?!). It's not that the pacing was bad, there were just more parts missing than I would have liked. For instance, did she ever have a day job? And I'm sure she's not telling the whole side of the story with the boyfriend. It would've been nice to see some parts when he wasn't a total manipulative jerk. All in all not bad and enjoyable if a bit predictable, daily-foibles-of-an-artist stuff.
I liked the two pre-new york stories best. There was too much of a gap between them and the new york stories and I think some of my connection to the character was lost along the way, so at times I felt like her emotionally abusive/self-destructive boyfriend, cut off from her daily life and rising to fame and thus a tad bit jealous when it all happens so quickly (What? She's turning down the Village Voice now? That cocky bitch! When did she get so successful and popular? Did I miss that? She's not communicating with me. Why isn't she telling me these things?!). It's not that the pacing was bad, there were just more parts missing than I would have liked. For instance, did she ever have a day job? And I'm sure she's not telling the whole side of the story with the boyfriend. It would've been nice to see some parts when he wasn't a total manipulative jerk. All in all not bad and enjoyable if a bit predictable, daily-foibles-of-an-artist stuff.
January 24, 2008
This is the book that renewed my love for comics. I had grown up reading the superhero stuff and some of the 'mature reader' stuff in the mid-80's like 'american flagg', 'dark knight returns' and 'cerebus'. Then, basically, high school set in and i stopped reading them altogether. I would glance occasionally at an issue of 'cerebus' whenever I was visiting argos books in grand rapids, but that was the extent of my comic reading.
'My New York Diary' was the first sort of auto-biographical comic I had read, which by now is a mainstay in the alternacomics genre...but, Julie Doucet's tale of a Junior College student and her eventual move to New York City was everything a great comic and autobiography should be. Actually, I have no idea what the criteria for what great comics and autobiography are, but, I liked 'diary' quite a bit.
I should mention that Julie Doucet is an inventive artist. Her panels are filled to capacity with details. Every empty beer bottle and the assortment of junk that make up the background of that first dirty, dingey apartment that everyone has is drawn with care. The panels are cluttered like an tiny apartment is.
I can't remember too much about the story other than it is poignant. As a matter of fact, there's a copy of it at the kalamazoo public library...which is kind of mindblowing. I suppose it's a testement to how far comics or graphic novels and libraries for that matter, have come. I think I will read it again.
'My New York Diary' was the first sort of auto-biographical comic I had read, which by now is a mainstay in the alternacomics genre...but, Julie Doucet's tale of a Junior College student and her eventual move to New York City was everything a great comic and autobiography should be. Actually, I have no idea what the criteria for what great comics and autobiography are, but, I liked 'diary' quite a bit.
I should mention that Julie Doucet is an inventive artist. Her panels are filled to capacity with details. Every empty beer bottle and the assortment of junk that make up the background of that first dirty, dingey apartment that everyone has is drawn with care. The panels are cluttered like an tiny apartment is.
I can't remember too much about the story other than it is poignant. As a matter of fact, there's a copy of it at the kalamazoo public library...which is kind of mindblowing. I suppose it's a testement to how far comics or graphic novels and libraries for that matter, have come. I think I will read it again.
April 15, 2010
one of the things i like about julie doucet is, like, how little autonomy she writes herself as having, in spite of her awesome career and indie success. the pre-stories in this trade show her falling into sexual relationships she doesn't care about, and a catastrophic romantic relationship she all to willingly goes through the motions of, while describing the blase reality via thought bubble.
the meat of it is the four sections of her moving to new york to start, live and finish a disastrous relationship with the worst dude ever. she does a lot of drugs, has too many seizures, and forgets about her work in lieu of this shitty emotional terrorist who is keeping her hostage in washington heights, far from the glitz and punk glamour of the early 90s east village (i mean, RENT! joe's apartment! come ON!). eventually, her career takes off and she moves to brooklyn, and then onto seattle, another city she hasn't spent time in.
as with all doucet's work, i like relating to her haphazard bullshit, except without my being penpals with john porcellino. this falls directly into the category of mid20s whatthefuckamidoingness that i've loved, oh, forever, and having found this book in a pile of garbage in a junkstore was all the better an omen.
the meat of it is the four sections of her moving to new york to start, live and finish a disastrous relationship with the worst dude ever. she does a lot of drugs, has too many seizures, and forgets about her work in lieu of this shitty emotional terrorist who is keeping her hostage in washington heights, far from the glitz and punk glamour of the early 90s east village (i mean, RENT! joe's apartment! come ON!). eventually, her career takes off and she moves to brooklyn, and then onto seattle, another city she hasn't spent time in.
as with all doucet's work, i like relating to her haphazard bullshit, except without my being penpals with john porcellino. this falls directly into the category of mid20s whatthefuckamidoingness that i've loved, oh, forever, and having found this book in a pile of garbage in a junkstore was all the better an omen.
December 29, 2012
(7/10) My New York Diary is a comic about domestic violence not polite enough to speak its name -- the kind of everyday domination men exercise over the women in their life. Lured by the image of a trendy artistic life in New York City, Doucet (or the comics-memoir version of her) stumbles into an unfamiliar and abusive world -- but this is not so much a phenomenon of New York as one of a patriarchal society.
In comics this idea was first really articulated by Phoebe Gloeckner, and Gloeckkner is an obvious influence on Doucet, from the beats of the story to the grotesque art style. (Where influence turns into derivativeness is another issue altogether.) This works better in the short stories we see at the start of this volume. In a longer narrative, like the one about the abusive cartoonist boyfriend that takes up most of the book, after a while the ugliness just starts to seem repetitive. (Although this may legitimately be how living through such a relationship feels like.) My New York Diary didn't really click for me, and it certainly isn't the major work the ad copy makes it out to be, but it's worth checking out if you want a little ugliness in your comics.
In comics this idea was first really articulated by Phoebe Gloeckner, and Gloeckkner is an obvious influence on Doucet, from the beats of the story to the grotesque art style. (Where influence turns into derivativeness is another issue altogether.) This works better in the short stories we see at the start of this volume. In a longer narrative, like the one about the abusive cartoonist boyfriend that takes up most of the book, after a while the ugliness just starts to seem repetitive. (Although this may legitimately be how living through such a relationship feels like.) My New York Diary didn't really click for me, and it certainly isn't the major work the ad copy makes it out to be, but it's worth checking out if you want a little ugliness in your comics.
December 6, 2014
I've read it before, but I like re-reading comix because it requires less time investment than text. Julie Doucet's "My New York Diary" can be read in a sitting. But there's much reward in her little confessional book. Its insight into the life of a unique artist, a window into the squalid New York of the early 90s. The artwork conveys much of the mood, crowded little panels replete with scurrying roaches, grimy and cluttered apartments, litter-strewn streets. It's the art that fills in the gaps that exposition would in a conventional novel. The author bio in this edition says that Ms. Doucet has abandoned comix and is now doing fine art printing. You can see that coming in these little drawings, each one a work of art in itself. Taken all together its a fine experience, well paced, well drawn.
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