What do you think?
Rate this book
The Last Interview
Kathy Acker: The Last Interview and Other Conversations
Kathy Acker was a punk-rock counter-cultural icon, and innovator of the literary underground. The interviews collected here span her amazing, uncompromising, and often misunderstood 30-year career.
From Acker's earliest interviews--filled with playful, evasive, and counter-intuitive responses--to the last interview before her death where she reflects on the state of American literature, these interviews capture the writer at her funny and surprising best. Another highlight includes Acker's 1997 interview with the Spice Girls on the forces of pop and feminism (which reads as if it could have been conducted with a new generation of pop star in 2018).
From Acker's earliest interviews--filled with playful, evasive, and counter-intuitive responses--to the last interview before her death where she reflects on the state of American literature, these interviews capture the writer at her funny and surprising best. Another highlight includes Acker's 1997 interview with the Spice Girls on the forces of pop and feminism (which reads as if it could have been conducted with a new generation of pop star in 2018).
256 pages, Paperback
First published December 1, 2018
18 people are currently reading
235 people want to read
About the author
Kathy Acker
86 books1,206 followersBorn of German-Jewish stock, Kathy Acker was brought up by her mother and stepfather (her natural father left her mother before Kathy was born) in a prosperous district of NY. At 18, she left home and worked as a stripper. Her involvement in the sex industry helped to make her a hit on the NY art scene, and she was photographed by the newly fashionable Robert Mapplethorpe. Preferring to be known simply as 'Acker' (the name she took from her first husband Robert, and which she continued to use even after a short-lived second marriage to composer Peter Gordon), she moved to London in the mid-eighties and stayed in Britain for five years.
Acker's writing is as difficult to classify into any particular genre as she herself was. She writes fluidly, operating in the borderlands and junkyards of human experience. Her work is experimental, playful, and provocative, engagingly alienating, narratively non sequitur.
Acker's writing is as difficult to classify into any particular genre as she herself was. She writes fluidly, operating in the borderlands and junkyards of human experience. Her work is experimental, playful, and provocative, engagingly alienating, narratively non sequitur.
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 14 of 14 reviews
November 14, 2019
I looooove Kathy Acker so so much!! This made me understand her books so much better + wanna read the ones I haven’t gotten around to ASAP. The way she explains so many difficult confusing ideas in her work in such straightforward, conversational ways is so wonderful. Some of her interviewers in the book kinda have their head up their ass (the artforum interviewer made me want to SCREAM and I’m 100% positive not even he knew what he was saying) but her answers always have so much charm and clarity and humor. Big highlight is her interviewing the Spice Girls, which is absolutely INSANE and so sweet.
December 30, 2018
https://rogueliterarysociety.com/f/ka...
...We are not controlled by economics, we’re controlled by myths…
There is a lot to like about Kathy Acker. It is unfortunate that she is perceived, or perhaps stigmatized, as a tragic figure. Having never read any of her work I found her interviews engaging and insightful. However, I also discovered in me little to no interest in reading her prose. Acker was certainly an important fringe character in our literary history. Not sure if that will be enough for her to not be forgotten.
...There is no such thing as nothing...
...We are not controlled by economics, we’re controlled by myths…
There is a lot to like about Kathy Acker. It is unfortunate that she is perceived, or perhaps stigmatized, as a tragic figure. Having never read any of her work I found her interviews engaging and insightful. However, I also discovered in me little to no interest in reading her prose. Acker was certainly an important fringe character in our literary history. Not sure if that will be enough for her to not be forgotten.
...There is no such thing as nothing...
October 18, 2019
Notwithstanding a sprinkling of clever aperçus and several careful considerations of writers and other artists, not to mention an overall appealing brashness and a sometimes engaging digressiveness, I found this collection of interviews far less interesting than Acker's brilliant fictions.
June 10, 2019
Fascinating stories, Acker is wild and unique. An interview with the spice girls, yes please! Very good introduction to Acker
May 1, 2022
Ten interviews conducted over Kathy Acker’s lifetime, almost in chronological order, each offering a different insight into her art, work, methods and intentions. I definitely felt closer to Acker’s motivation, how her politics influenced feminist theory from where she pulled it from in the seventies, and how her work subsequently influenced many thereafter in the feminist theory, art, literature and music worlds. I first read Acker in a High Risk, a compilation of ‘forbidden’ short stories published by Serpent’s Tail in the nineties co-edited by Amy Scholder, the same editor of The Last Interview here. It has the same energy. This is the first book in the The Last Interview series that I’ve read, the format works really well and I look forward to reading other Last Interviews too.
October 25, 2022
This is a nice collection but I'd read a few of the interviews before and the selection gets quite repetitive. The Spice Girls one is great. In the last interview there are other interviews referenced that aren't included in the book and it seems odd to have missed including those 'cause it would've created a cohesive throughline — particularly one with Iain Sinclair. Maybe there were rights issues? But this is a reputable house and an establised series so you'd think they'd have the clout to get whatever pieces they wanted. So I think the editing was phoned in and the introduction was weak and too obvious. Glad to have read but I think I could've curated a better selection, haha.
July 31, 2019
I like her books a lot, and enjoy reading about her writing process/thought experiments, but in interviews about her personal lief she's a privileged cis white woman who overplays her oppression a lot (compares sexism and racism, says she's POC because she's Jewish, says she's "so queer she's not gay" while also primarily dating cis men and saying she's grossed out by/"not into most BDSM"). Interview with the Spice Girls was dope though.
April 21, 2019
I picked up this book by accident from the library, distractedly and mistakenly thinking it was Chris Kraus' new biography of Kathy Acker. I was wrong. It was still more or less worth reading!
July 21, 2019
I love Kathy acker but this felt repetitive. Maybe I just wasn’t in the right mood to read it.
August 2, 2019
Finished reading this - some fantastic interviews here. Great insight into an intriguing and talented artist/writer.
August 17, 2019
"Form is determined not by arbitrary content but by intention. And intentionality is all, I guess that's what you'd say. You don't look at the finger pointing at the moon, you look at the moon."
April 5, 2020
I love you, Kathy Acker
September 17, 2021
endlessly rereadable
I am very biased here as I could read Kathy talking about anything and everything. This was my second time reading this and it was even better than my first.
I am very biased here as I could read Kathy talking about anything and everything. This was my second time reading this and it was even better than my first.
Read
September 19, 2021maybe the fact that i was scandalized at the sudden bestiality is telling of the fact that i’ve never actually read any kathy acker?
Displaying 1 - 14 of 14 reviews