A Love Supreme
by Kent Nussey
Mansfield Press, 2003
Reviewed by Aidan Baker
Kent Nussey's novel A Love Supreme, named after one of John Coltrane's
most popular albums, tells the story of musicologist Omar Snow attempting
to
write a book of jazz biographies covering Thelonius Monk, Charles Mingus,
and John Coltrane. The novel begins as Omar, having given up his newspaper
job, sold his computer, and moved into a small apartment near Little Italy
in order to focus exclusively on his book, nears the completion of the
Mingus section and starts thinking about the Coltrane section. Omar's
progress troubles him, largely because what he pitched to his editor as "a
straight-ahead biography of three seminal jazz figures" (p13) has become
a highly personal response to what he termed "the extra-musical
genius"
of these
legendary musicians.an increasingly metaphysical treatment of their
quest into
the realms of mystery and wonder, realms that were hard to enter by
way
of mere
logic and critical prose (p13).
Sounds like Omar's book might be interesting. Unfortunately we aren't
given
much of it to read. Instead, Nussey gives us a lot of description of Omar
trying to write with the odd bit of musical introspection thrown in, cut
with a vague romantic sub-plot. There are moments wherein Omar does talk
about music and what he writes about, making various claims about
Coltrane's
career and music, but seldom does he support any of these claims. For
example, Omar reads the liner notes for Coltrane's album A Love Supreme
and says to himself:
This text, he'd written in his new book, constituted a raw, genuine
document in
American cultural and religious history. As priceless and pivotal as,
say, Leaves
of Grass or Walden. A kind of American psalm that might, with the
music,
form the basis of a new faith in the new century (pp84-5).
A rather grand statement to make. Presumably in his book Omar would make
an
actual reference to those liner notes which would in some way back up his
claim. But Nussey, in his book, does not. This suggests to me that this
book
is not really about music, despite all its musical references. (One might
also note, in this regard, that the cover of the book is adorned with an alto sax and Coltrane was best known as a tenor player.)
As for the romantic sub-plot: Omar and Carrie, a beautiful actress who
lives
on the same street, go out on a few fairly unpleasant and/or uncomfortable
dates. Omar becomes obsessed with her, or perhaps the idea of her, or
perhaps with the idea of becoming part of her family. There is the
implication that this obsession will threaten his work on his book. But,
considering the time frame of the book spans a fairly lengthy period and
Omar only goes out with Carrie three or four times- and sometimes Omar
doesn't even think of her for months at a time- it is perhaps erroneous of
me to refer to Omar as obsessed. Perhaps it is erroneous of me to refer to
is as a romantic sub-plot.
Nussey's prose does possess a fluidity and a certain poetic quality -
stylistically reminiscent of Coltrane's 'sheets of sound' - but
unfortunately A Love Supreme lacks a definite plot. With both the musical sections and
the romantic sections of A Love Supreme I am left wanting more; more
insight, more action, more definition.
Aidan Baker is a
Toronto writer and musician.
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