Although he once threatened to attack me with a hockey stick if I didn’t stick with him during our time working together, Keith Gessen deserves special recognition for editing early versions of the material that inspired this book and convincing me to write about Bed-Stuy in the first place. That collaboration provided the kernel for a mode of self-exploration this work relies on. Astra Taylor, the great filmmaker, writer, and activist, first introduced me to Keith and edited my earliest work for n+1, which Keith helped found and where I’ve encountered a remarkable community of writers over the years.
I am forever indebted to teachers and mentors such as Chuck Rybak, Greg Taylor, and the late Robin O'Hara, who, respectively, exposed me to works of literature, motion pictures, and the realities of a career in independent filmmaking that bore tremendous effect on the narratives and perspectives contained herein.
Thanks to a wide array of friends, ones who are also talented magazine and Web editors, for thoughtfully editing much of this material as it appeared in other places: Scott Macaulay (long a mentor and dear friend), Dayna Tortorici, Nikil Saval, Malcolm Harris, Leo Goldsmith, Rachael Rakes, Carla Blumenkranz, David Wolf, Moira Donegan, James Yeh, and Jesse Barron.
Thanks are also due to Barry Harbaugh, who believed in this book from the start and acquired it when few others would, as well as to my editor, Tracy Sherrod, whose remarkable patience, insight, and good humor were perhaps more important than any other factor in this text’s evolution over the years I worked on it. The thoughtful opinions and unyielding encouragement of early readers of this manuscript, people such as Paul Felten, Michael Barron, Michael Lipschultz, Kaleem Aftab, and my agent, Matt McGowan, were invaluable. Of course, this book would not be possible without the enduring love of my mother, for which I am so eternally grateful. And for the years I spent in the presence of the people depicted in this text, for many of whom I still hold such tremendous affection and unending love, I wish to express my appreciation. You know who you are.
Lastly, this book would simply not be possible without the music of the following acts, played loudly on a variety of sound systems in the myriad contexts in which I wrote this book: Stereolab, Portishead, Hole (especially “Doll Parts”), Flying Lotus (“Getting There” and “Phantasm” were crucial for this text), and Sonic Youth (their entire oeuvre, but especially “Massage the History”) were key at various early stages, while albums as disparate as Kendrick Lamar’s Good Kid, M.A.A.D City, Broadcast’s Tender Buttons, Arcade Fire’s The Suburbs, and Gil Scott-Heron’s Pieces of a Man allowed me to get through the doldrums of the final months of this process more or less intact.