![]() However, music can also be restorative, as Felice facilitates the healing process between Joe and Violet by bringing over her records and watching them dance.įor the entire novel, music is the weapon that the city wields to control its citizens. ![]() When he stalks and shoots Dorcas, it is at a party where loud music is being played to incite passion, “boil” the blood and “encourage” misbehaviour. The passion and pleasure that Dorcas and violet find in the music is contrasted with the musical treatment of Joe’s crime. Alice Manfred and the Miller sisters interpret Jazz music as the anthem of hell. Music also speaks to the individual characters on a deep level, as when Alice Manfred worries about the sinful powers of the music. Both the city and the woods of Virginia are described as having their own music and rhythm and the pace of narrator’s storytelling ranges from upbeat and fast to slow and “bluesy”. The Jazz music of the 1920s situates the narrative in a specific cultural and historical moment, when a black aesthetic style was gaining ground in New Orleans and New York. As the name of the novel implies music operates both thematically and formally to provide structure to the book. ![]() ![]() The novel borrows its title from Jazz music and the idea of music is discussed throughout the novel. ![]()
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