by Prince
First published 2019
Prince Rogers Nelson grows up in Minnesota, absorbing the world around him with keen eyes and an active imagination. He watches, listens, and dreams of something bigger than his childhood circumstances. The young artist begins crafting not just music but an entire identity, building the foundation for what will become his legendary persona. Through his own words, scrapbooks, and handwritten materials, Prince reveals how he constructed his artistic vision from the ground up. He creates whole worlds in his music, from the funk landscape of "Uptown" to the cinematic universe of Purple Rain. The book follows his journey through four distinct phases: his childhood memories written in his own lyrical voice, his early musical development captured in personal scrapbooks, his artistic evolution shown through candid photographs, and finally his handwritten treatment for Purple Rain. This treatment represents the culmination of his self-creation, where he transforms his autobiography into a heroic narrative. Prince's most ambitious creative act was not any single song or album, but the deliberate construction of Prince himself from the raw material of Prince Rogers Nelson.
Genres: biography, 20th-century, american, african-american, autobiography, biography-memoir, music, 21st-century
Vibes: emotional, intimate, lyrical
Tropes: found-family, heroic-narrative
Setting: Minnesota
Period: 20th-century, 21st-century
280 pages · Hardcover · Spiegel & Grau/Random House, Inc.