What do you think?
Rate this book
A Period of Juvenile Prosperity
At the age of 17, Mike Brodie hopped his first train close to home in Pensacola, Florida, thinking he would visit a friend in Mobile, Alabama. Instead, the train took him in the opposite direction to Jacksonville, Florida. Days later he rode the same train home, arriving back where he started.
Nonetheless, it sparked something in him and he began to wander across America by any means that were free - walking, hitchhiking, and train hopping. Shortly after his travels began he found a camera stuffed behind a car seat and began to take pictures. Brodie spent years crisscrossing the U.S., documenting his experiences, now appreciated as one of the most impressive archives of American travel photography.
A Period of Juvenile Prosperity was named the best exhibition of the year by Vince Aletti in Artforum; and cited as one of the best photo books of 2013 by The Guardian, The New York Times, The Telegraph, and American Photo; it was short-listed for the Paris Photo/Aperture Foundation First PhotoBook Award.
Nonetheless, it sparked something in him and he began to wander across America by any means that were free - walking, hitchhiking, and train hopping. Shortly after his travels began he found a camera stuffed behind a car seat and began to take pictures. Brodie spent years crisscrossing the U.S., documenting his experiences, now appreciated as one of the most impressive archives of American travel photography.
A Period of Juvenile Prosperity was named the best exhibition of the year by Vince Aletti in Artforum; and cited as one of the best photo books of 2013 by The Guardian, The New York Times, The Telegraph, and American Photo; it was short-listed for the Paris Photo/Aperture Foundation First PhotoBook Award.
104 pages, Hardcover
First published March 1, 2013
378 people want to read
About the author
Mike Brodie
7 books3 followersMike Brodie, born in 1985, traveled on a freight train for the first time when he was 17 years old. Over the next few years, driven by a longing for freedom, boundless curiosity and the desire to explore an alternative lifestyle, he hopped freight trains through America for months at a time, covering a total distance of 50,000 miles. After a year of travel, he began to take photographs with a Polaroid camera of his impressions and the lives of his free-spirited friends.
After years of shooting, Brodie created a large series of photographs and the book A Period of Juvenile Prosperity. The title jars at first glance, after all, his images do not hide the fact that life on the trains is hard. Yet at the same time, they perceptively and poetically tell of the fascination of this rebellious lifestyle and the freedom it offers, which comes across as being immeasurably valuable. With an unerring sense of composition and his use of colour and light, Brodie creates sentimental tableaus that reveal an unobtrusive intimacy. These almost romantic portraits of his “train-hopping” family also bring a timeless calm to a world in which everything is in constant motion.
Young people of Brodie’s generation are driven to ride the trains not by the need to find work, but above all by the desire for adventure. Most of the people he met settled down after a few months or years of riding the rails. As did Brodie himself, who has since given up traveling and photography, and currently works as a diesel mechanic operating out of his own shop in Oakland, California.
After years of shooting, Brodie created a large series of photographs and the book A Period of Juvenile Prosperity. The title jars at first glance, after all, his images do not hide the fact that life on the trains is hard. Yet at the same time, they perceptively and poetically tell of the fascination of this rebellious lifestyle and the freedom it offers, which comes across as being immeasurably valuable. With an unerring sense of composition and his use of colour and light, Brodie creates sentimental tableaus that reveal an unobtrusive intimacy. These almost romantic portraits of his “train-hopping” family also bring a timeless calm to a world in which everything is in constant motion.
Young people of Brodie’s generation are driven to ride the trains not by the need to find work, but above all by the desire for adventure. Most of the people he met settled down after a few months or years of riding the rails. As did Brodie himself, who has since given up traveling and photography, and currently works as a diesel mechanic operating out of his own shop in Oakland, California.
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 18 of 18 reviews
May 12, 2013
A peek into the culture of trainhopping and hitchhiking. I liked this collection, but for me the juxtaposition of images at the start implied a sort of story (the process of hopping a train), substituting different "characters" as the "story" progressed. Then the book transitions into random scenes, objects, and people, often tired or destitute, until the final three images imply an unhappy, aimless future (thus the satiric title). For me a more cohesive collection would've communicated Brodie's themes better. Instead, the "muddled middle" felt like a "best of" photo collection that could've done a better job at connecting the beginning and end of his ongoing, open-ended "story."
March 22, 2021
Beautiful, gritty, and thought-provoking, these images provoke a lot of questions and reactions from the viewer. I had first heard of this collection of photographs on NPR and I am glad I was quickly able to request it from the Hennepin County Library Minneapolis Central branch, which has one of the 3000 copies currently available. Following the photographer Mike Brodie (known on the ‘net as the Polaroid Kidd) between 2006 and 2009 as he jumped freight trains with a varying group of other adventurous young people as they attempt to travel as far as possible for as little money as possible, operating far off of the grid of the normal conformity of American culture. In living this life, he grants an intimacy to these portraits that most journalists or photographers might struggle to capture. In addition to capturing these people who, for whatever reason, follow this life of freedom, the photography illustrates the divergent landscapes of America as well, wilderness, rural, suburban, urban. The images are presented in a spare, gallery style, neither judging nor romanticizing the train hopping lifestyle and the photos can only speak for themselves.
For me, I feel that they are a great portrait of this period of US history. While on occasion seeming to reflect comparison to the “Dirty Thirties” during the height of the Great Depression, the post-punk style of the clothes, tattoos, and squats these young people inhabit are distinctly contemporary. I can’t help but feel that as our economy and environment continue to falter (i.e., the Great Recession) this subculture will continue to increase as people travel to escape the drudgery of modern life or are simply unable to find employment. A great example of places and populations normally unseen in our culture, it is amazing how much power and emotion can be packed into one photograph.
For me, I feel that they are a great portrait of this period of US history. While on occasion seeming to reflect comparison to the “Dirty Thirties” during the height of the Great Depression, the post-punk style of the clothes, tattoos, and squats these young people inhabit are distinctly contemporary. I can’t help but feel that as our economy and environment continue to falter (i.e., the Great Recession) this subculture will continue to increase as people travel to escape the drudgery of modern life or are simply unable to find employment. A great example of places and populations normally unseen in our culture, it is amazing how much power and emotion can be packed into one photograph.
December 21, 2024
similar in vibe to Larry Clark's tremendous Tulsa book and definitely part of the Gummo Extended Universe. I wonder how many of these kids are still alive.
July 25, 2013
"I don't want to be famous, but I hope this book is remembered forever."
August 9, 2025
There’s nothing else like this out there. Brodie was born to do this.
September 1, 2019
Cards on the table, I know absolutely nothing about photography so I'm reviewing this as a complete layman. I just saw a few of the images from the artist online and enjoyed them enough to pick up the book.
Taken over the course of several years in the mid-2000s, A Period of Juvenile Prosperity consits of photographs taken by Brodie while freighthopping across the USA. There's a real mix here, from genuinely exciting images that capture the danger of leaping onto a moving train, to the quiet moments in between. A couple of shots look staged, but not in a deceptive way, just placing someone in a chair framed by trees for a picture, stuff like that.
What I really enjoyed was the way he seems to frame this lifestyle. Everyone is dirty and covered in cuts in bruises, sleeping on filthy mattresses and eating out of bins, but while the images are certainly gritty, they're never grim. A sense of freedom shines through in every single one of the shots.
Brodie's essay is also an entertaining read, an extension to the work rather than an explanation of it. Definitely recommended.
Taken over the course of several years in the mid-2000s, A Period of Juvenile Prosperity consits of photographs taken by Brodie while freighthopping across the USA. There's a real mix here, from genuinely exciting images that capture the danger of leaping onto a moving train, to the quiet moments in between. A couple of shots look staged, but not in a deceptive way, just placing someone in a chair framed by trees for a picture, stuff like that.
What I really enjoyed was the way he seems to frame this lifestyle. Everyone is dirty and covered in cuts in bruises, sleeping on filthy mattresses and eating out of bins, but while the images are certainly gritty, they're never grim. A sense of freedom shines through in every single one of the shots.
Brodie's essay is also an entertaining read, an extension to the work rather than an explanation of it. Definitely recommended.
December 3, 2023
These photos say a lot. It’s easy to imagine a day in the life of the subjects—jumping trains and sleeping rough. I loved the the accompanying piece written by the photographer at the end of the book.
December 12, 2017
Oogle photography. Punk Ryan McGinley. Nice book.
September 28, 2020
Uncomfortable, but captivating.
January 9, 2024
The photos in this book are honest and raw and beautiful. Brodie's self-written author biography is unpretentious, honest, scathing and you still want to read it to completion.
October 10, 2014
Really liked the pictures and the candid letter at the end. This is a book of amateur photos taken by a homeless 27 year old man who somehow received sponsorship to publish them. Some of them are really beautiful, without stopping to be sad and disturbing.
February 10, 2014
An amazing pictorial narrative of life on the road, the companionship of your fellow travelers and the joy in looking for something beyond here and now. At times it was offensive, shocking and even disturbing, but definitely worth the read.
September 17, 2013
young hobos
December 28, 2013
A very gritty but kind of romantic book in a way. Many of the pictures look like they were shot at dawn or dusk and the book sometimes put me in mind of the Terrence Malick movie "Days of Heaven".
October 10, 2014
A fascinating collection of portraits of homeless youth catching rides on trains. Beautiful peek at a subculture most people will never encounter.
September 29, 2015
amazing insight into an existence few of us even know exists. Mike Brodie has the eye of a true photographer.
April 23, 2015
Powerful images.
Displaying 1 - 18 of 18 reviews