One of the most innovative composers of his generation. Mikel Rouse is known for a trilogy of operas that includes Dennis Cleveland and a gift for superimposing pop vernaculars onto avant-garde music. This memoir channels Rouse's high energy personality into an xuberant account of the precarity and a pleasures of artistic creation. Raconteur and starving artist, witty observer and acclaimed musician Rouse emerged from the legendary art world of 1980s New York to build a forty-year career defined by stage and musical successes, inexhustible creativity and a support network of famous faces, loyal allies and high-art hustlers. Rouse guides readers through a working artists hardscrabble life while illuminating the unromantic truth that a project's reception may depend on a talented cast and crew but can depend on reliable air conditioning. Candid and hilarious. The World Got Away is a one-of-a-kind account of a creative life fueled by talent, work, and luck.