Engaging look at Lower East Side writers and artists in the wake of the 1975 New York fiscal crisis.The severe financial austerity imposed on New York City during the 1975 fiscal crisis resulted in a city falling apart. Broken windows crumbling walls and piles of bricks were everywhere. While for many this physical decay was a sign that the postwar welfare state had failed for others it represented a site of risky opportunity that could stimulate novel forms of creativity and community. In this book Andrew Strombeck explores the legacy of this crisis for the citys literature and art focusing on one neighborhood where changes were acutely feltthe Lower East Side.In what became a paradigmatic example of gentrification the Lower East Sides population shifted from workingclass people to Wall Street traders and ad agents. This transformation occurred in part because of highprofile local artists such as JeanMichel Basquiat Keith Haring Jeff Koons and Kiki Smith but Strombeck argues that neighborhood writers also played a role. Drawing on archival research and original author interviews he examines the innovative work of Kathy Acker David Wojnarowicz Miguel Piero Sylvre Lotringer Lynne Tillman and others and concludes that these writers still have much to teach us about changes in the nature of work and the emergence of a doityourself ethos. DIY on the Lower East Side shows how place and politics shaped literature and how New York City policies adopted at the time continue to shape our world.