Jazz by Toni Morrison

Jazz
Toni Morrison
Originally 1992, I read Plume 1993
229 pages, drama, literary fiction
FOUND: Half Price Books, Hamilton, OH, USA

A middle-aged man shoots his 18-year-old lover, and then his wife attacks the body at the funeral. But what came after, and what before? In this beautifully lyrical novel, told in Toni Morrison’s signature style, an anonymous narrator tells how this event came to be and what each character’s past and future holds – and how the City has come to shape each of them and their expectations of each other.

I have been fascinated by Toni Morrison’s writing since I first read Beloved in a high school English class. That book was a bit too gory and explicit for my teenaged self, so I waited a few years before reading more. This book is the second in a loose trilogy, following Beloved and followed by Paradise – all of which contain similar themes about the history of African Americans in the USA, particularly the role of Black women in that history.

Grief and Guilt

Joe, the man who killed his lover, is filled with grief in that action’s aftermath. He cries and cries and is unable to do anything else. And it seems that he’s not just mourning for his young, dead lover: he’s mourning for himself, for his past, and for who he used to be.

Sirena Selena by Mayra Santos-Febres, translated by Stephen A. Lytle

Sirena Selena
Mayra Santos-Febres
Translated by Stephen A. Lytle (from Spanish)
First published 2001, I read kindle version
224 pages, LGBT+, drama

Miss Martha Divine, an old veteran of the Drag Queen scene in New York and Puerto Rico, has found her ticket to glory: a 15-year-old with a voice like an angel, who takes on the artist name of Sirena Selena. Miss Martha takes her young protege to the neighboring Dominican Republic, in an attempt to sell the act to one of the fancy tourist hotels there - where they won't mind that the performer is underage.

After seeing Sirena Selena's audition, one very wealthy businessman, Hugo Graubel, is captivated by the young star - in her enchanting performance, he thinks that he has finally found the person that he can love "as I have always wanted to love a woman" (p. 175). Filled with desire, Hugo arranges to have Sirena Selena come to his house, to perform for his business associates at a dinner he will be throwing later that week. His wife, unsatisfied with her husband's continued disinterest in her, is not pleased to have a travesti in the house. Hugo doesn't care what his wife thinks; even if she decides to divorce him over it, he just wants to have Sirena Selena for his very own.

Interspersed with Miss Martha Divine's reminiscences about the gay scene in Puerto Rico and New York and a tangentially related look at the friendship between two young boys, this novel questions the stability of gender, sexuality, and dress in the hot Caribbean world of travestis.

I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings by Maya Angelou

Source: Goodreads

I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings
by Maya Angelou
Originally 1969, I read 1993
291 pages, Memoir

A Lyrical Memoir

A beautiful memoir in which Maya Angelou recounts her experiences growing up in the American South before the Civil Rights Movement, from her earliest years until she has a baby three weeks after graduating from high school at the age of 17. Contains some explicit material about childhood sexual abuse.

Read a sample or buy from Amazon: 

I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings