THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1996, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Sunday, May 19, 1996 TAG: 9605200208
SECTION: COMMENTARY PAGE: J2 EDITION: FINAL
TYPE: Book Review
SOURCE: BY JACKIE R. BOOKER
LENGTH: Medium: 81 lines
Literature and the blues are the primary interests of 79-year-old Albert Murray, retired U.S. Air Force major, former professor, novelist and autobiographer. Released simultaneously, his latest contributions to both, The Blue Devils of Nada and The Seven League Boots, complement each other in several ways.
In The Blue Devils of Nada, a collection of essays, Murray praises and criticizes the literary theories of Mark Twain, Ernest Hemingway, Albert Camus and other giants in the field. He even takes on Ralph Ellison, his Tuskegee Institute roommate during the 1930s. If there is a central theme to the work, it is that literature as an aesthetic transcends race, class and sex. It establishes a common ground for all human understanding.
The Blue Devils of Nada provides a conceptual framework for The Seven League Boots, a blues novel that is at once black and white, conscious and unconscious, orchestrated and improvised. Like the music, the novel carries its own vamp, chords and rhythm.
Told in the first person, The Seven League Boots is the last in a trilogy (Train Whistle Guitar, The Spyglass Tree) involving Schoolboy, affectionately called Scooter. The novel is set during the Swing era of the 1940s.
After graduating from an Alabama college, Scooter accepts a temporary job as a bassist in the famous blues band of legendary jazz musician and composer, Bossman. (Shades of both Count Basie and Duke Ellington.) As he travels with the band from New York to Chicago to Los Angeles, and to countless one-night stops in smaller towns, Scooter gains an education that transcends the music.
Milo, Old Pro, Joe States and other band members cajole, criticize and otherwise instruct Scooter on every nuance of the profession. They warn him, for example: to avoid shaking hands because fingers are too valuable; to get paid before he plays; and to not have sex without getting something in return. He manages to fail these and other lessons but nevertheless gains the respect of the band for his musical ability and his educational achievement.
Scooter becomes involved with a wealthy white Hollywood actress named Jewel Templeton, a one-night stand who blossoms into more. Templeton is impressed with Scooter's musical skills and his knowledge of art, and he easily mixes with her friends. Through one of them, Scooter signs a contract to compose music for a Broadway play. But rather than demanding the money up front, he accepts the producer's promise - yet another lesson learned.
Scooter's misadventures in love and business become material for the blues. As its title suggests, the novel is a seven-league adventure across the United States, filled with one exciting gig after another.
While The Blue Devils of Nada showcases Murray's teaching skills, honed at Tuskegee Institute, The Seven League Boots, his eighth book, firmly establishes him as one of America's best writers. His previous books include both fiction and non-fiction. The Alabama native's autobiography is titled South to a Very Old Place.
Murray is one of the last links to a blues era that attracted a universal audience. Those unfamiliar with some of the blues singers and artists that he mentions will be overwhelmed by the countless names and nicknames.
There is some repetition in the novel but otherwise it is what Murray intended: a long, smooth journey through blues alley, a melodic trip to another time when blues musicians were not only respected for their craft but nearly worshipped. MEMO: Jackie R. Booker, formerly a professor at Norfolk State University, is
an associate professor of history and director of African American
studies at Western Connecticut State University in Danbury, Conn.
ILLUSTRATION: Graphic
THE BLUE DEVILS OF NADA
A Contemporary American Approach to Aesthetic Statement
ALBERT MURRAY
Pantheon. 238 pp. $23.
THE SEVEN LEAGUE BOOTS
A Novel
ALBERT MURRAY
Pantheon. 369 pp. $25.
by CNB