Pimp: The Story Of My Life

By (author) Slim, Iceberg; Introduction by Welsh Irvine
Short description/annotation:
The perennial cult classic, introduced by Irvine Welsh
Description:

In this astonishing account, Iceberg Slim reveals the secret inner world of the pimp, and the smells, sounds, fears and petty triumphs of his world. A legendary figure of the Chicago underworld, this is his story: from defending his mother against the men in their lives to becoming a giant of the streets.

A seething tale of brutality, cunning and greed, Pimp is a harrowing portrait of life on the wrong side of the tracks, and a rich warning from a true survivor.

Review quote:
Slim belongs to the knuckle-duster-in-the-face school of storytelling
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Slim always told it as it was, without compromise
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Pimp is hot and frantic, a remarkable tour de force of carnality and violence
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This brutally honest memoir . . . is as shocking today as ever. A precursor of forty years of black-street culture, this is uncompromising and harrowing, but a landmark book nonetheless
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Iceberg Slim does for the pimp what Jean Genet did for the thief
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Pimp is an eye-boggling netherworld documentary, a tear-arse tale of ferocious emotion, expressed through action
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Iceberg Slim always kept it real. It is blatant, uncompromising, and as close to the truth as you can get without going there yourself
Biographical note:
Robert Beck, who used the moniker Iceberg Slim, was a major-league pimp during the ''40s and ''50s. He decided to leave the pimping game having served his third and final stretch in jail. He moved to Los Angeles where he straightened out and began a career as a writer. Pimp was originally published in 1967.