Jazz

諾貝爾文學獎得獎作家Toni Morrison作品　

　　《Jazz》以鮮明熱烈的音樂為背景，敘述一對戀人Joe與Violet因著夢想來到大都會生活，當Joe愛上一個年輕女子卻又殺了她，而Violet企圖在葬禮上拿刀去割死者的臉，讓這段充滿妒嫉的三角戀情蒙上荒謬色彩。

　　作者透過愛情悲劇深入探討了性別、種族與城鄉的糾葛，如同爵士樂狂野、渾沌的曲調，交織著過去記憶的回想與未來無知的期盼。

From the acclaimed Nobel Prize winner, a passionate, profound story of love and obsession that brings us back and forth in time, as a narrative is assembled from the emotions, hopes, fears, and deep realities of Black urban life. With a foreword by the author.

＂As rich in themes and poetic images as her Pulitzer Prize-winning Beloved.... Morrison conjures up the hand of slavery on Harlem’s jazz generation. The more you listen, the more you crave to hear.＂ --Glamour

In the winter of 1926, when everybody everywhere sees nothing but good things ahead, Joe Trace, middle-aged door-to-door salesman of Cleopatra beauty products, shoots his teenage lover to death. At the funeral, Joe’s wife, Violet, attacks the girl’s corpse. This novel ＂transforms a familiar refrain of jilted love into a bold, sustaining time of self-knowledge and discovery. Its rhythms are infectious＂ (People).

＂The author conjures up worlds with complete authority and makes no secret of her angst at the injustices dealt to Black women.＂ --The New York Times Book Review

Toni Morrison is the author of eleven novels, from The Bluest Eye (1970) to God Help the Child (2015). She received the National Book Critics Circle Award, the Pulitzer Prize, and in 1993 she was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature. She died in 2019.