Get Jazzed With This Bolden Novel (Coming Through Slaughter - Ondaatje Michael)

Member Name: TheChocolateLady

Product:	Coming Through Slaughter - Ondaatje Michael
Date:	18/12/05 (1201 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Beautifully written, interesting story, quick read

Disadvantages: Not a book that spoon - feeds the reader, you'll have to think about this one

The name Buddy Bolden probably means absolutely nothing to you. That is, unless you're a Jazz enthusiast or music historian. In which case, you'll probably know that Bolden was a cornet player in New Orleans at the turn of the previous century. You'll also know that he was a bit of a legend - not only for his coronet playing, but also because at the age of 31, he went crazy. But not before his music making in the Storyville district of that Louisiana town had found its place the annals of Jazz history. Just enough about Buddy Bolden survived to become the inspiration for Michael Ondaatje (Booker Prize winning author of The English Patient) to write the book, "Coming Through Slaughter".

The Author:
I really should say a word or two about Ondaatje. I first became familiar with his writing was when I bought a copy of "The English Patient". I was so bewitched by his poetic style, that I bought his first book of poetry, "The Cinnamon Peeler" - which I've been savoring ever since. Next, his last novel "Anil's Ghost" appeared in my library, and I fell in love with it so much I bought a copy for myself. Afterwards, a friend lent me "The Collected Works of Billy the Kid", his first novel, which surprised me with its unique style. Ondaatje has three more books of poetry published, as well as another novel called "In the Skin of a Lion" and a memoir "Running in the Family". Ondaatje was born in Sri Lanka and lives in Toronto, Canada. If someone asked me who was the best writer I've ever read, it would have to be Michael Ondaatje. "Coming Through Slaughter" was no disappointment for me, at all!

Background:
Who was Buddy Bolden? The information that can be found about this unusual man is sparse, at best. What you'll find is a mixture of contradictions, rumors and conjecture along with the apparent facts and lone surviving picture of the man. According to this book, and several sites I found on the Internet, aside from being a Jazz cornet player, he might also have been a barber. He also lived with one woman - Nora - as his wife, but disappeared to be with another woman - whom he also loved, despite her being married to someone else. Its also possible that he was an alcoholic, and that addiction may have played some part in his eventual insanity and death. Or perhaps, it was the taunts of Nora's ex-pimp that pushed him over the edge, causing him to cut up the pimps pretty face before he ran off to his other lover. Then again, it could have been the animal-wild Jazz music he played, which engulfed and enraptured his audiences, which took some toll on his mental stability.

The blurb on the rear cover of this book calls Bolden "one of jazz's legendary pioneers and martyrs". This, his being committed, his premature death and the song that survives today that still bears his name (‘Buddy Bolden's Blues', also known as ‘Funky Butt') seem to be the only things about Buddy Bolden that everyone can agree on. The mystery and myths behind this man's life easily stirs one's imagination. And who better a novelist/poet than Michael Ondaatje to take these scant but varied elements and write a truly inspiring book that mingles the few facts into a melodic collection of fiction.

The Book:
If you've read anything by Ondaatje, you'll know that he uses a very special style. For instance, in his "Collected Works of Billy The Kid" he mixes different types of writing to try to get inside the head of the character. In "Coming Through Slaughter" (CTS), he again uses this same unique story telling method - if slightly altered this time. In both books, Ondaatje puts together what seem like bits of conversations, recollections, letters, documents, poems and stories into a puzzle-like collection that the reader pieces together in order to get a full picture of who this character was. In Ondaatje's "Billy the Kid", this style gives one the feeling that this infamously famous character was so aloof that one can only get a faded charcoal sketch of who this man really was. But in CTS, Ondaatje takes this one step further, and this relatively unknown character seems to have much more flesh on him than his previous, more renowned, folklore subject.

How Ondaatje achieves this in such a slim volume (only 159 pages) is of constant amazement to me. Especially since there are pages in this book which are practically empty. But it is the poetry and imagery that Ondaatje is famous for that give us the feeling that there is more in this book than meets the eye. For instance, one page holds only the line "Passing wet chicory that lies in the field like the sky". This line is repeated later in the book as part of a poem called ‘Train Song'. In fact, this group of words are practically the whole poem itself - mixed and chopped and re-arranged to give the reader a ‘clickity-clack' quality that one would associate with a train.

The title of this book may seem to some a bit difficult to understand and possibly unattached to the subject matter. Of course, we know that the word slaughter is the killing of a living thing, which is sometimes done to obtain nourishment, which can also be done as part of a religious ritual. But Slaughter is also the name of a town between New Orleans and the East Louisiana State Hospital where Bolden was a patient from the time of his mental illness until he died. When he was committed, they brought him from New Orleans, "through Slaughter" to the hospital. And for his burial, they had to bring his body back "through Slaughter" to the cemetery. So, the title of this book is a metaphor for Bolden's life and music. His music, which probably helped kill him, also fed the Jazz movement in its earliest stages. And his insanity and death was his sacrifice to his art.

Part of this book follows what seems to be an investigation into Bolden's disappearance by an acquaintance of Bolden - a policeman by the name of Webb. I cannot tell if this is fact or fiction, but that doesn't really matter. Through Webb's tracking of Bolden, we are given more insights into the world that Bolden lived in, as well as the people and places that he was a part of. In other parts of this book, we can almost hear Bolden's voice, and listen to the inner workings of his brain. Often, Ondaatje builds these pieces with such a steady flow that he disregards convention and does without certain punctuation marks. While this might disturb some purists, the effect is one of smoothness and fluidity that might have been disrupted by the insertion of a comma or quotation mark.

Of course, this means that we, the readers, cannot lie back and be spoon-fed the contents of this book. We are forced to feel what Bolden might have felt. We are forced to experience and touch and hear a world that existed a century ago. Ondaatje achieves this, not through volumes of description and details, but through an atmosphere that is built up, with layer upon layer of poetic language and evocative phrases. All this, in short paragraphs and chapters and conversations that mimic the rhythm and beat of the music that Bolden was famous for playing.

Conclusion:
It is almost impossible for one to really write a review of this book. It isn't something that can be described in words. It is, however, something that must be experienced to be totally understood. I can only hope that I've given my readers here an inkling of what kind of a gem this book really is. This book is Jazz and Blues. It is a literary performance that will stir you to your very bones with the poetry and emotion and essence of a man that otherwise would never have come to your attention. What more can I say? This book is - to say the very least - extremely highly recommended.

Thanks for reading.

Davida Chazan © April, 2003 for Ciao - reprinted December, 2005 for DooYoo

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Technical Stuff:
Published by Random House (www.randomhouse.com), paperback ISBN 0-679-76785-1. I purchased it in the US for $10, but you can find it on Amazon.co.uk for £5.59, and its listed as being: Paperback, 160 pages (11 May, 1984) Picador; ISBN: 0330282522. I also see that Amazon.com is selling the same edition that I have for only $8.80, but I might have paid more in the end because of the shipping costs. Since I just happened to be in the US when I found it, I really don't mind that I paid a touch more. Its worth every penny!
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Summary: Beautifully written fictional account of the life Jazz coronet player Buddy Bolden