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Dinners & Nightmares by Di Prima, Diane, Prima, Diane Di (1998) Paperback
Last Gasp proud to bring back this early. Boat classic Diane di Prima has long been recognized as on of the strongest voice of her generation, and one of the few women wh was able to break through the male dominated beatnik scene. Her poetic portrayal of lowlife Bohemians and revolutionary mentalities shatter the conservative myths of the Fifties and lay bare the emerging sexual experimentation that would shape the Sixties.
Paperback
First published March 2, 1961
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About the author
Diane di Prima
114 books237 followersDiane di Prima was an American poet and member of the Beat Generation. She was San Francisco’s poet laureate from 2009 to 2011.
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Displaying 1 - 27 of 27 reviews
January 2, 2021
“... homesickness is not for where you have been but for where you will never go ...” (153).
Bibliophilic Serendipity keeps on happening. “Bibliophilic Serendipity” is my theory that certain books come to me at the right time. I usually reserve that term for new books, not rereads, since familiarity with a book would seem to remove the element of chance. But old books can harbor new surprises.
Often when I reread, something quite different strikes me than what struck me on my first reading. All the more so if a book was first read very long ago. So I will count this as a case of genuine Bibliophilic Serendipity.
Here’s how it happened. I was writing a review of Marie Kondo’s decluttering manifesto and lamenting all the cool stuff I discarded over the years. I was reminiscing especially about the books I wish I had kept. In that spirit of nostalgia I pulled Dinners and Nightmares off the shelf and started to read it.
It had been calling to me for a few weeks, but I was immersed in another book and kept telling it to wait. But I pulled it off the shelf and started to read. It’s a short book so I allowed it to divert me. My review of it was taking shape as I read.
I wondered why I kept feeling drawn to the book even though I never thought it was particularly good. I suppose it’s because Diane Di Prima is so good at representing the Zeitgeist of her generation. A minor figure among the Beats, she is not an original, not an innovator, but she conveys the mood of the new bohemians better than anyone else.
This is how a book can be good and not good at the same time. Nothing in the collection is good on its own. But taken together, what emerges is a vivid portrayal of broke countercultural artists living in cold water flats and rapping about expressionist painting, jazz music, and the new poetry.
Dinners and Nightmares is a memoir of the mundane ~ food, conversations, music ~ and that’s what I like about it. Rereading it in my current state of heightened nostalgia and resurfacing memories, I instantly connected with Di Prima’s memory of a book she foolishly discarded.
“... that small brown-covered Keats I always carried, with margins in red drawn all around each page and flowers embossed on the cover. How it fell apart from sleeping under my pillow. One of the first of the irreparable wrongs I did was to throw it away” (152).
In the review I was writing I paid homage to some of the books I foolishly discarded in my youth and here was Di Prima expressing her own regret over a book she discarded. (Though another Keats came her way later on.)
“Forgiveness is strange, and comes unexpectedly. In San Francisco last year I found another Keats almost as small and carriable, bound in blue leather and bought it. Someday, too, I’ll find another opal” (152).
What happened to her opal I do not know. I know what happened to mine. I was young and careless and I cracked the stone. The gold setting was undamaged, but the square opal with the perfect blend of purple and green was broken. And a broken opal is indeed irreparable, for every opal is unique.
I had completely forgotten that ring until I reread Dinners and Nightmares. So thank you Diane for giving me back, not the ring, but the memory of the ring and how much I enjoyed it while I had it.
However, this is a purely personal and idiosyncratic response to the book. Di Prima does more than just awaken a latent memory in me. She also expresses a universal truth.
“Walking out again, and down the stone steps after. The peace of the morning, the stores beginning to open. The smell of the cheese hanging there so fine. Understanding homesickness is not for where you have been but for where you will never go, where the cheeses are hanging, the children playing in mud. A goat maybe tethered beside the house. Understanding that order, that universe better than this” (153).
In this otherwise ordinary memory, Di Prima offers a taste of the spiritual homesickness that the Germans call Sehnsucht. This is the nature of nostalgic longing ~ the peace of the morning, the smell of the cheeses, the goat which may or may not be. The memory of a time outside of time. Of a place that feels more like home than home. I go there sometimes in my dreams.
Bibliophilic Serendipity keeps on happening. “Bibliophilic Serendipity” is my theory that certain books come to me at the right time. I usually reserve that term for new books, not rereads, since familiarity with a book would seem to remove the element of chance. But old books can harbor new surprises.
Often when I reread, something quite different strikes me than what struck me on my first reading. All the more so if a book was first read very long ago. So I will count this as a case of genuine Bibliophilic Serendipity.
Here’s how it happened. I was writing a review of Marie Kondo’s decluttering manifesto and lamenting all the cool stuff I discarded over the years. I was reminiscing especially about the books I wish I had kept. In that spirit of nostalgia I pulled Dinners and Nightmares off the shelf and started to read it.
It had been calling to me for a few weeks, but I was immersed in another book and kept telling it to wait. But I pulled it off the shelf and started to read. It’s a short book so I allowed it to divert me. My review of it was taking shape as I read.
I wondered why I kept feeling drawn to the book even though I never thought it was particularly good. I suppose it’s because Diane Di Prima is so good at representing the Zeitgeist of her generation. A minor figure among the Beats, she is not an original, not an innovator, but she conveys the mood of the new bohemians better than anyone else.
This is how a book can be good and not good at the same time. Nothing in the collection is good on its own. But taken together, what emerges is a vivid portrayal of broke countercultural artists living in cold water flats and rapping about expressionist painting, jazz music, and the new poetry.
Dinners and Nightmares is a memoir of the mundane ~ food, conversations, music ~ and that’s what I like about it. Rereading it in my current state of heightened nostalgia and resurfacing memories, I instantly connected with Di Prima’s memory of a book she foolishly discarded.
“... that small brown-covered Keats I always carried, with margins in red drawn all around each page and flowers embossed on the cover. How it fell apart from sleeping under my pillow. One of the first of the irreparable wrongs I did was to throw it away” (152).
In the review I was writing I paid homage to some of the books I foolishly discarded in my youth and here was Di Prima expressing her own regret over a book she discarded. (Though another Keats came her way later on.)
“Forgiveness is strange, and comes unexpectedly. In San Francisco last year I found another Keats almost as small and carriable, bound in blue leather and bought it. Someday, too, I’ll find another opal” (152).
What happened to her opal I do not know. I know what happened to mine. I was young and careless and I cracked the stone. The gold setting was undamaged, but the square opal with the perfect blend of purple and green was broken. And a broken opal is indeed irreparable, for every opal is unique.
I had completely forgotten that ring until I reread Dinners and Nightmares. So thank you Diane for giving me back, not the ring, but the memory of the ring and how much I enjoyed it while I had it.
However, this is a purely personal and idiosyncratic response to the book. Di Prima does more than just awaken a latent memory in me. She also expresses a universal truth.
“Walking out again, and down the stone steps after. The peace of the morning, the stores beginning to open. The smell of the cheese hanging there so fine. Understanding homesickness is not for where you have been but for where you will never go, where the cheeses are hanging, the children playing in mud. A goat maybe tethered beside the house. Understanding that order, that universe better than this” (153).
In this otherwise ordinary memory, Di Prima offers a taste of the spiritual homesickness that the Germans call Sehnsucht. This is the nature of nostalgic longing ~ the peace of the morning, the smell of the cheeses, the goat which may or may not be. The memory of a time outside of time. Of a place that feels more like home than home. I go there sometimes in my dreams.
July 19, 2019
Natalie Goldberg writes about reading this book in WRITING DOWN THE BONES, and I was curious enough to buy it. The Oreo part is wonderful, and I've performed it for an audience. After reading it for a minute, you start to realize that this book is a hermit crab memoir, a memoir disguised as a collection of musings.
April 12, 2021
the shopping for thanksgiving was very lovely and it was cold out. i took my shopping cart and arthur who lived next door i mean in the next apartment and we went to all these stores on the east side. there was at that time a vegetable market on east houston street, more expensive than the other east side vegetable markets, but very good, with everything very fresh, and i bought yams and mushrooms and fennel and millions of salad things and avocados and chestnuts to cook with everything. already i had the turkey and the sausage and all the italian goodies, the olives, alicia, and the spices my forty-eight of them in test tubes in test tube racks marshalled at home. then arthur and i squeezed into the tiniest cheese store it had two other customers and it was overcrowded, i have noticed more cheese stores are like tiny like that, cheese stores and bread stores and no other kind of store. we bought fromage de brie and very good crumbly provolone and something new to me called kashkaval, cause the man said to taste it and i did and it was marvelous. and then did i have enough apples and pears for the cheese so we went back to the vegetable store and bought more apples and pears. the man was taking in mushrooms as big as a fist, baskets of them from his car, but he wouldn't sell them he said they were for himself for his own thanksgiving. then we bought wine, some of it, some was coming with people tomorrow and huge loaves of fresh italian bread because the man in the bread store said no he wouldn't open tomorrow and i wondered all the way home how to keep it fresh.
February 18, 2017
alas
I believe
I might have become
a great writer
but
the chairs
in the library
were too hard
the word you worshipped
turned your hair
to snakes
and that star
your face
went nearly
out
you are not stone
or molten sound
I think
you have no hands
it is rumoured
that the unicorns
have staked
a large
claim
in the rocky mountains
I believe
I might have become
a great writer
but
the chairs
in the library
were too hard
the word you worshipped
turned your hair
to snakes
and that star
your face
went nearly
out
you are not stone
or molten sound
I think
you have no hands
it is rumoured
that the unicorns
have staked
a large
claim
in the rocky mountains
February 6, 2021
“I don’t forget things
fast enough
I sing last summers ballads
all winter long
like that’s uncool.”
gift from my neighbor, perfect set of poetry about 50s Beat New York, eating eggs off watery plates, oreos getting stuck to teeth, bad sex, going home for Sunday dinners, thinking you could’ve been a good writer if “the chairs in the library weren’t so hard.”
fast enough
I sing last summers ballads
all winter long
like that’s uncool.”
gift from my neighbor, perfect set of poetry about 50s Beat New York, eating eggs off watery plates, oreos getting stuck to teeth, bad sex, going home for Sunday dinners, thinking you could’ve been a good writer if “the chairs in the library weren’t so hard.”
December 15, 2023
What I Ate Where is why I picked up this book and it was definitely my favorite section. Di Prima was a watcher, one who wrote down what she saw. There's a certain irony in some stories in Conversations that you can't quite comment on, you just have to watch it happen through her eyes.
She's done it again. (50 years ago) Whatever. She's one of my new favorites.
She's done it again. (50 years ago) Whatever. She's one of my new favorites.
December 4, 2020
A little of this a little of that, snapshots of Beatnik moments
My favorite was What I Ate Where which was oddly satisfying. Part of the charm of this book is having an original 1961 paperback copy. There’s a mix of random prose and poetry.
My favorite was What I Ate Where which was oddly satisfying. Part of the charm of this book is having an original 1961 paperback copy. There’s a mix of random prose and poetry.
February 5, 2021
love love love LOVE charting your life through dinners.
but these poems are more unfinished, along with unfinished prose projects. Can't wait to read Diane di Prima's revolutionary letters, but these are quite fun
but these poems are more unfinished, along with unfinished prose projects. Can't wait to read Diane di Prima's revolutionary letters, but these are quite fun
March 13, 2023
after reading so much of the misogyny of the male beats, di prima is a nice breath of fresh air. she slays
a fave poem:
for you
i’d kill my favourite roach
that lives in the woodwork
by the drawing table
a fave poem:
for you
i’d kill my favourite roach
that lives in the woodwork
by the drawing table
February 5, 2020
First Beatnik I truly enjoyed and ~vibed~ with
October 3, 2021
shes a hilarious insightful genius and word wizard. best read out loud to yourself
February 10, 2022
Note to self, Do NOT re-read Nightmare #4
September 13, 2022
this one got weird for me
Read
August 30, 2025“get your cut throat off my knife”
November 23, 2021
I really enjoyed the beginning sections of this book (what i ate where, conversations) more than the later sections (poetry, “nightmares”). The first few sections focus on small snippets about what she ate, without much money, while living in NYC, “The lukewarm meats when it got dark”; menstrual pudding. “Conversations” focuses on conversations between friends, mostly, without any quotes. Poems are not great.
Style - kind of stream of consciousness, casual tone, run-on sentences, etc. Talks about visiting Italian family in Brooklyn, childhood memories, etc. It made me want to read more by Diana di Prima.
Style - kind of stream of consciousness, casual tone, run-on sentences, etc. Talks about visiting Italian family in Brooklyn, childhood memories, etc. It made me want to read more by Diana di Prima.
January 28, 2013
It's fun to look back on old poems and stories I wrote back in high-school and college, interesting to see how I've developed as a writer, comparing old work with what I'm doing now.
A lot of it reads very naive and sophomoric, but some of it really isn't that bad. A few pieces I read and was surprised by the creativity-- a travel brochure for joining a cult, something I had written while sitting in class, bored. What led me to write something like that?
I re-read recently Dinners and Nightmares, by Diane di Prima, on the flight to Philly for Thanksgiving. [Side note: She's one of the few Beats that I have a lot of respect for. The last time I had to go to the doctor, the SF Free Clinic out in the avenues, one of the assistants told me that Diane used to be a patient there. I thought that was pretty cool.]
In one of her "What I Ate Where" stories, di Prima writes about going back to the house where she grew up for a family dinner:
"You would come back in blue jeans and holes in your sneakers and everyone would look sadly at you... and then you'd go up to your room and look at it, the things in it untouched since your last visit, except the furniture escaping one piece at a time and going to make up the furniture of other rooms. and you'd putter with the papers and old letters and take out your files, just to see how they were all there, to know it. it gave you a good safe feeling to know that there was a place to send papers, a place to leave letters and books that you wouldn't be reading."
I already knew I would be doing the same, and it was funny to me how my life at that moment was imitating the art I was ingesting.
A lot of it reads very naive and sophomoric, but some of it really isn't that bad. A few pieces I read and was surprised by the creativity-- a travel brochure for joining a cult, something I had written while sitting in class, bored. What led me to write something like that?
I re-read recently Dinners and Nightmares, by Diane di Prima, on the flight to Philly for Thanksgiving. [Side note: She's one of the few Beats that I have a lot of respect for. The last time I had to go to the doctor, the SF Free Clinic out in the avenues, one of the assistants told me that Diane used to be a patient there. I thought that was pretty cool.]
In one of her "What I Ate Where" stories, di Prima writes about going back to the house where she grew up for a family dinner:
"You would come back in blue jeans and holes in your sneakers and everyone would look sadly at you... and then you'd go up to your room and look at it, the things in it untouched since your last visit, except the furniture escaping one piece at a time and going to make up the furniture of other rooms. and you'd putter with the papers and old letters and take out your files, just to see how they were all there, to know it. it gave you a good safe feeling to know that there was a place to send papers, a place to leave letters and books that you wouldn't be reading."
I already knew I would be doing the same, and it was funny to me how my life at that moment was imitating the art I was ingesting.
May 13, 2015
Rating: Soft 4, though I wonder if 3 1/2 might be more accurate.
From Robert Creeley's intro: She is beautifully warm, but her nature balks at false responses. She is true.
Hits and misses: a lot of misses, but in the boring, mediocre sense; not in the 'so horrible' sense. The down and out vibe is strong with this one. The need for more cash or fire wood, the presence of rats and roaches, etc. Slang is sprinkled throughout: fuzz, drag, pad, dig, cut, kicking off, a gas, etc. But it gives her writing a human quality, instead of making it more difficult to understand. I appreciate the variety of forms here, though it's easy to see why she isn't known as a screenwriter. Anyway, these are the pieces that stood out to me:
"Prevailing Foods At Times" - from "What I Ate Where'
"Hot Plate Cooking - 1955" - from "What I Ate Where"
"The Art Class" - from "Conversations"
"Three Laments" - from "More Or Less Love Poems"
"Tale For A Unicorn" - from "Some Early Prose"
"Music Journal" - from "Some Early Prose"
I remember the winter the January I ate nothing but Oreos. - "What I Ate Where"
One day I forgot my sleeve and my heart pinned to my arm was burning a hole there. - "Nightmare 7"
... she wanted to act or something, she couldn't dance, she couldn't sing, she couldn't act, and she wasn't sexy, so everybody figured she might really make it. - "A Couple Of Weekends"
... and he got too skinny and went to the west coast, which is mostly what people do when they get too skinny. - "A Couple Of Weekends"
From Robert Creeley's intro: She is beautifully warm, but her nature balks at false responses. She is true.
Hits and misses: a lot of misses, but in the boring, mediocre sense; not in the 'so horrible' sense. The down and out vibe is strong with this one. The need for more cash or fire wood, the presence of rats and roaches, etc. Slang is sprinkled throughout: fuzz, drag, pad, dig, cut, kicking off, a gas, etc. But it gives her writing a human quality, instead of making it more difficult to understand. I appreciate the variety of forms here, though it's easy to see why she isn't known as a screenwriter. Anyway, these are the pieces that stood out to me:
"Prevailing Foods At Times" - from "What I Ate Where'
"Hot Plate Cooking - 1955" - from "What I Ate Where"
"The Art Class" - from "Conversations"
"Three Laments" - from "More Or Less Love Poems"
"Tale For A Unicorn" - from "Some Early Prose"
"Music Journal" - from "Some Early Prose"
I remember the winter the January I ate nothing but Oreos. - "What I Ate Where"
One day I forgot my sleeve and my heart pinned to my arm was burning a hole there. - "Nightmare 7"
... she wanted to act or something, she couldn't dance, she couldn't sing, she couldn't act, and she wasn't sexy, so everybody figured she might really make it. - "A Couple Of Weekends"
... and he got too skinny and went to the west coast, which is mostly what people do when they get too skinny. - "A Couple Of Weekends"
August 12, 2010
Very unbalanced. In the start it's pretty great--specifically the first four sections, with their exuberance and colloquialisms, but actually when you think about it it's very much like Kerouac and all his run-ons--then by the time it gets to 'Conversations' it gets monotonous, and by the end the reader is served up a dose of 'Some Early Prose' that was written while di Prima was in her late-teens/early-twenties and it sounds in the worst way exactly like something written by someone in their late-teens/early-twenties. Interesting for it's slice of bohemian life aspects, too; especially with what you can read between the lines--every once in a while 'the baby' gets mention and that has you wondering where she (the baby) has been for the rest of it. Did di Prima store her in a cardboard box under the bed or something? Also, some of the worst book design I've seen. Last Gasp has a pretty cool logo so you'd think they'd know better.
October 1, 2015
Very gritty collection of poems and prose from the most often-noted female Beat poet. DiPrima was definitely not blind to the sometimes banal reality of her existence--this is no joyous rampage through the Beat nightlife. She notes many a cheap dinner, lousy job, crummy pad, and loser boyfriend or roommate. Still, her dedication to her art is admirable and it's yet another fascinating look at the Bohemian New York City life of the late 40s and early 50s, from a helpful and enlightening female perspective.
Everyone drifts in and out of her life like shadows, as they do in most Beat Literature, leaving bits of poetry, jazz, beer and unequal parts joy and sadness. Well worth reading if you are interested in the Beat era.
Everyone drifts in and out of her life like shadows, as they do in most Beat Literature, leaving bits of poetry, jazz, beer and unequal parts joy and sadness. Well worth reading if you are interested in the Beat era.
February 26, 2014
Beatnik writing is hate it or love it. The off beat writing sometimes makes no sense and leaves you thinking. but Prima's work here is different.
The first section is about eating food. Where, When, with Who and what she ate. ★boring.
The second section is the nightmares which I thought was the best part of the book. As for the rest of the sections they kinda sit in with the the first section.
I will plan on reading more of her work. One of the few beatnik woman writers.
The first section is about eating food. Where, When, with Who and what she ate. ★boring.
The second section is the nightmares which I thought was the best part of the book. As for the rest of the sections they kinda sit in with the the first section.
I will plan on reading more of her work. One of the few beatnik woman writers.
June 14, 2008
Her life in NY. The Nightmares are probably my favorite. Also, the conversations made me feel up close and personal with her. Would suggest to people who have lived in NY without tons of cash. : )
February 7, 2013
I liked the book, but I prefer di Prima's poetry and prose over her memoir-type writing. I really liked the section on Nightmares as well as the one on Conversations. The Dinner section read to me the way Instagram pictures look to me.
June 26, 2008
Gorgeous poetry (by a beatnik women!)
June 8, 2022
I’m really partial to this book. I recommend it knowing it won’t be for everyone.
February 13, 2009
I love this, too. DiPrima has amazing heart.
April 20, 2009
My favorite parts were the dinners, and the nightmares. Especially the "Onward Christian Roaches" nightmare.
February 21, 2016
As a boundary-pusher, this prose/poetry collection was like coming home.
Displaying 1 - 27 of 27 reviews