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79th out of 221 books
—
74 voters
Don't Follow Me, I'm Lost: A Memoir of Hampshire College in the Twilight of the '80s
by
Richard Rushfield (Goodreads Author)
A strange and salacious memoir of life at the ultimate hippie college during the height of Reaganomics
Opening its doors in 1970, Hampshire College was once known as a land of eternal partying, where countercultures thrived and jocks were nowhere to be found. Self- proclaimed nerd Richard Rushfield knew this progressive Massachusetts campus was the place for him, offering...more
Opening its doors in 1970, Hampshire College was once known as a land of eternal partying, where countercultures thrived and jocks were nowhere to be found. Self- proclaimed nerd Richard Rushfield knew this progressive Massachusetts campus was the place for him, offering...more
Hardcover, 304 pages
Published
October 29th 2009
by Gotham
(first published 2009)
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Jan 05, 2010
Paxton Lee
added it
I never realized that "The Dicks" were "Hated". It was my experience that most people did not really think they were that important...just a group of people who felt they needed to give themselves an identity with a name, (who does that? Really?) and had to make a name for themselves by offending others...it was very pathetic. You could not help but to feel sad for them....Mirror Mirror on the wall, who is fairest of them all? Heaven forbid the mirror may speak truly, and praise another over Jun...more
I was around for much of what went on in this entertaining and endearing book ("Meg".)
Before reading it, I read in the promo blurb that the Hampshire student body hated the Dicks and friends. I was like, really? Its possible. No wait, I think I knew that at the time. Did I? No, that can't be true. I was scared to read it, paranoid that Rich would write something embarrassing about me.
Hampshire was comprised mostly of smart, dynamic, diligent students whose brains and accomplishments are absolu...more
Before reading it, I read in the promo blurb that the Hampshire student body hated the Dicks and friends. I was like, really? Its possible. No wait, I think I knew that at the time. Did I? No, that can't be true. I was scared to read it, paranoid that Rich would write something embarrassing about me.
Hampshire was comprised mostly of smart, dynamic, diligent students whose brains and accomplishments are absolu...more
Richard Rushfield’s memoir, “Don’t Follow Me, I’m Lost” details his years spent at Hampshire College during the late 80’s/ early 90’s. I simply did not buy into his story at all. It felt like someone who was recalling a series of events that over the years grew more monumental in his own mind. I also think they are stories that are far more interesting to the people who were actually there, rather than the reader. I felt like I was reading a bunch of inside jokes that I just didn’t get.
Rushfield...more
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I chose to read this book because I considered applying to Hampshire College, but instead went to Hampshire's public and West Coast equivalent, Evergreen in Olympia, WA. I started college during the same year as this author and was interested to read his perspective on going to a liberal and non-traditional college in the 80s.
Clearly Rushfield chose Hampshire for the wrong reasons because he had a hard time finding his niche. As he figured out a way to acclimate to the environment, he chose to...more
Clearly Rushfield chose Hampshire for the wrong reasons because he had a hard time finding his niche. As he figured out a way to acclimate to the environment, he chose to...more
i am a moron. when i first signed up to win this from goodreads.com. i thought "yay - it will have stories of donna tartt and tales about what a douche bret easton ellis is/was", because my mind equated the entire state of new hampshire, including bennington, with hampshire college. and i am a new england girl, i even knew people (performance artists, naturally) who went to hampshire. so once my brain righted itself, i settled in to enjoy the book anyway. hampshire is an admirable concept-colleg...more
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This is a great book for anyone who tried to navigate the strange waters of 1980s college life (or for anyone interested in the same), where a kind of surreal 'political correctness' on many liberal-arts campuses reflected the equally surreal rise of Reagan conservatism in the country at large, and led to a kind of nightmarish disassociation of students who didn't really feel comfortable in either camp. (And resulted in some interesting artistic/musical gestures that could loosely be seen as fal...more
I really thought I had reviewed this, but apparently not. I liked this book because I went to Hampshire College - which is a flimsy reason to like something, but there it is. I recognized and appreciated the mood & setting, it made me both homesick for the place and homesick for a time in my life. I would have to say that this is probably not the best written memoir I've ever read (pacing is awful) and I'm not sure that it would make sense if you don't understand Hampshire - but since I do,...more
In 1986, Richard Rushfield left his hometown of Los Angeles and traveled to Massachusetts so that he could begin his freshman year at Hampshire, a liberal arts college. At first he felt lost being thousands of miles away from home but then he slowly began to adapt to this New England campus and eventually he started to hang out with a group of students who had a reputation for being misfits. Young, away at college and on their own for the first time, Richard and his friends skipped class, got dr...more
Dec 08, 2011
Mark Feltskog
rated it
1 of 5 stars
Recommends it for:
No one
Recommended to Mark by:
A fellow Hampshire alumnus
Shelves:
mla-bibliography-additions
Rarely do I fail to finish a book. However, I must say that this book is one for which I was happy to make an exception. The narrative, which is in fact essentially fiction, conforms to Dorothy Parker's dictum (and I paraphrase): "This is not a book to be set aside lightly; it should be thrown with great force." When I was a student at Hampshire, I avoided people like Richard Rushfield, just as I avoid them now.
And by the way, Hampshire is what you make of it. If you are immature, there is a goo...more
And by the way, Hampshire is what you make of it. If you are immature, there is a goo...more
Yes Kids, before facebook and the interweb we would gather & sit around and listen to albums not saying much to each other. At times we would go out and do something silly. I have always been interested in hearing stories about Hampshire which was the polar opposite of the 79 Babson business school that I attended. I glad Richard wrote this.
I enjoyed the book which was a funny and quick read.
http://www.richardrushfield.com/2010/...
perhaps this was what it was like.
http://www.youtube.com/wa...more
I enjoyed the book which was a funny and quick read.
http://www.richardrushfield.com/2010/...
perhaps this was what it was like.
http://www.youtube.com/wa...more
While there are a few amusing bits, the book suffers from a cloistered and somewhat dull viewpoint. This is a shame because this book could have been interesting.
The memoir recounts the writer's self-absorbed experience attending Hampshire College in the late 1980's. Twenty years later he doesn't seem to have much in the way of perspective on who he was or what was going on around him.
In short, he has nothing interesting to say.
The memoir recounts the writer's self-absorbed experience attending Hampshire College in the late 1980's. Twenty years later he doesn't seem to have much in the way of perspective on who he was or what was going on around him.
In short, he has nothing interesting to say.
I wanted to read this because one of my friends is in the book, so it did help me understand a bit where she was coming from. Overall, though, I wasn't crazy about the book. It did capture a certain tone/spirit that I know all too well, and brought up angst-ridden memories of my teens and twenties that I didn't especially want brought up. Maybe someone who experienced less angst in the '80s might enjoy this book more.
Hampshire College, hidden out in the woods of New England, is the liberal answer to any standard-issue southern Christian college and just as frightening. Imagine a place where forming a fraternity is actually considered a subversive act. I read Richard Rushfield's memoir of this college in the last half of the 1980s with equal parts humor and horror. Like some kind of gleeful imp, Rushfield set out to push the boundaries of the college's "It's all good" philosophy and in so doing, exposes them...more
Drugs, music, and an utter lack of institutional control or criminal prosecution corrupt a young man at an institution that lays claim to 'higher learning' in only the punniest sense of the word. Nevertheless as a psychological study of obsession, ennui and disassociation, this book will be relevant to many who get to college without a good answer to the question 'Why am I here?'.
Extremely entertaining but not exactly transcendent. Definitely a good read for anyone who attended a small liberal arts college and lived to tell the tale. While the Hampshire experience seems a little more extreme (and implausible) than my own as presented in this book, I definitely could relate to the various factions of students who claimed open-mindedness but frequently clashed with each other.
the Mishima of Melancholy, Rushfield has cultivated a wonderfully insulting comedy of manners under the leaden skies of Northhampton Oblast during the addled eighties. This unbildungsroman really brought me back, unwillingly, to a time when mind could fool the body that it was having fun. I can't wait for the uplifting sequel, Guerrilla Acapella.
To the author of "Don't Follow Me, I'm Lost: A Memorior of Hampshire College in the Twilight of the 80's": you entered Hampshire 15 years before I did, and yet everything you describe is incredibly familiar, if not of my own experience, then of someone I knew. Holy crap. Something things (or institutions) never change, as much as they try.
Loaned to me by a neighbor so I read it. Geez. The blurbs on the jacket say it is supposed to be funny but I found it not so funny at all. Kind of painful to read about the authors first years of college. I guess we all did our own version of being lost in those late adolescent years but crikey.
I read the first half of the book and ended up just skimming the rest. I didn't really like the style--it seems like the author was trying too hard to be funny. It also just wasn't that interesting to me. Although the structure of Hampshire College was interesting, the story itself wasn't--it seem likes another story about college students wasting their time doing whatever.
The characters themselves were not very memorable and I did not develop a liking towards any of them.
The characters themselves were not very memorable and I did not develop a liking towards any of them.
If you attended Hampshire or spent any quality time there, you need to read this book. Otherwise, skip the damn thing. It reads a little bit like a justification of being a spoiled asshole, but if you know Hampshire at all, this spoiled asshole is a strangely fond memory.
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I really, really want this book to be a movie, because I want to absorb the hilarious absurdity of Richard's book in more than one medium. This is the anti-college memoir, if you will, where those who suggest wet T-shirt parties are equated with fascists and rapists. It'll make you want to join a frat, even if you're a girl. I know this isn't a very helpful review but you just have to read it to enjoy it, especially if you have a hankering to read about an alternate universe where the put-upon a...more
The jacket promises a good memoir, but the book does not deliver. Funny in parts but mostly boring stories about college students who really went to Hampshire to do nothing.
Vanity Fair contributing editor Richard Rushfield describes his meanderings through the maze of college life in the mid to late 1980's.
A book about the humorlessness of a PC campus. Unfortunately, turned out to be not funny and also boring.
This was easily one of the funniest books I have read in a long time. Fantastic!
Wouldn't read it again, but it was an interesting glimpse into his life in college.
Love it! It's a love song for a very crazy and special time and place.
A great read that uses my safety school as a backdrop.
Nov 30, 2011
Jenny
marked it as partially-read
Recommended to Jenny by:
Price Armstrong
Shelves:
memoir-biography
Read 84 pages and stopped. Rare for me, but I was just hating it: I kept thinking "it wasn't like that!" although maybe it was when he was there. I hope that sometime between page 84 and the end of the book, the author transforms from clueless slacker to creative and responsible human being (redemption! narrative arc!), but I was not compelled to find out for myself. Maybe I'll come back to it another time, but most likely not; I had my own experience at Hampshire, and there are too many wonderf...more
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