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Member since:23.12.2003
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*** John Murray, born in West Cumbria in UK now lives in Brampton near Carlisle. A writer with reporting kind of talent, a lover of words, Murray in “Jazz etc” is intelligent and educativily informative. By now, he has published five critically honored novels and a collection of stories, “Pleasure”, which won the Dylan Thomas Award in 1988. His novels, “Radio Activity” (1993) and “Reiver Blues” (1996), were nominated as Books of the Year in The Spectator, The Independent and The Observer. In 1984 Murray founded the fiction magazine, “Panurge”, the magazine that celebrated a number of young writers. John Murray's previous novel, “John Dory”, was listed for the Lakeland Book of the Year and won the creative category, the first novel to receive such an award in the 19 years of the Awards.
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Vince Mori, an Italian Cumbrian, a character
of “Jazz etc”, is very passionate man, whatever the author meant by this term. And as it is, Mori is “obsessed” with women, the clarinet and his jazz band. His romantic son Enzo is “obsessed” with only one woman, a brilliant contemporary and the world-famous guitarist, Fanny Golightly. And Enzo wasn’t the only one obsessed with Funny. The worse obsession was having Funny’s father, who was sexually abusing her, coming to her bed drunk at night in her childhood. One big mess in other people’s lives. Yes, in other people’s lives, because in this novel no one cannot easily identify himself with characters. Everyone in this book is obsessed with something and the only person who is the victim of other people obsessions is poor Funny. Unfortunately for everybody else, single-minded Fanny only has eyes for a Portuguese music legend, Toto Cebola. “…You’ll meet plenty of disdainful neurotic little Dostoevskyan ice-blocks down there at Oxford, believe me. More than once mad Penelope would change from an afternoon of being vicious and abusive to an evening of being grotesquely and teasingly seductive…” [The piece from “Jazz etc” by J. Murray]
Welcome to Murray’s contemporary world of obsessions and jazz musicians. And ironically, this book full of obsessions of all kinds, represent such a good advert for jazz music. John Murray's novel ”Jazz.etc” is the ideal book for all those interested in the cosmopolitan music scene, big city life and love triangles, where no one is happy. But did you ever heard about really happy talented musician or legend?
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With the social upheaval in parochial England and its affectionate description of the confusion, burgeoning sexuality, arrogance and all kind of obsessions “Jazz Etc” revels in a free styling mind following structure, on a very playful linguistic and comic way. It's a story that sound very white, fancy and European. Jazz is the basis of this novel but it's not just that. It’s simply narrative “fictional biography” of a humorous and educational issue that doesn't even requires a much appreciation for the music, for jazz in this case. As very contemporary Murray dominance his ability to give us some “working out”, because reading this book demands full concentration as not being easy to follow. It is very thick demanding fiction that makes you think that you might have missed out something. Make you coming back few pages to check for the previous information, all along provoking laughter as well. Murray has distinctive gift to give the ordinary information a glowing gloss. I don’t know how much an ordinary reader can see beyond his core taking a real interest with jazz itself and I’m not sure whether he wanted this. Murray has a wordplay that makes the book a breezy read. As a guide to the nature of “white” jazz, Murray's novel serves well than any book about history of music. I think that Murray is an extraordinary writer and that this book is beautifully written. Some parts are absurd, making you stop reading, but only in the next part you recognize British wit that makes you keep on just an other page, ending up with entire book read, in no time. This book has no plot whatsoever, but the richness of the characters gives it warmth, intelligence and life. By his previous work, as well as book critics, he is more than good at parody. Maybe this book is just one big parody.
This is not the book for teenagers. Engaging enough to tease intellect and entertain at the same time. The book is avariable on Internet and in the book- shops all over UK.
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Enjoyed reading your op, a good review. This sounds like too much of a heavy read for me though! Ellie.
MALU 31.07.2004 14:00
In the second paragraph it's Fanny twice and Funny three times, a typo or different people? I don't suffer from non-British stupidity, but I couldn't understand the last paragraph, either.
magdadh 30.07.2004 10:16
Sorry for what might seem as a low rate but I got terribly confused by the review - Who's Funny? Who's Fanny? Same person or different? Italian? Parochial England? The last long paragraph had me going back to the previous sentence/phrase all the time and seemed to eerily resemble the book you were writing about - maybe it's the influence of author's style or maybe it's my non-British stupidity.
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