Atet A.D. [Paperback]

Nathaniel Mackey (Author)

Book Description

Series: From a Broken Bottle Traces of Perfume Still Emanate | Publication Date: August 1, 2001

The letters in Atet A.D. span a seven-month period from shortly after Thelonious Monk's death to the former Mystic Horn Society's recording an album on John Coltrane's birthday. Written by composer and multi-instrumentalist N., this imaginative work transcibes black music into a kind of postmodern narrative: part philosophy, part confessional folklore.

Nathaniel Mackey, recipient of a 1993 Whiting Writer's Award, is the author of Eroding Witness, School of Udhra, Whatsaid Serif, Bedouin Hornbook, and Djot Baghosus's Run, as well as Discrepant Engagement: Dissonance, Cross-Culturality, and Experimental Writing. He teaches literature at the University of California at Santa Cruz.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

This third volume of Mackey's From a Broken Bottle Traces of Perfume Still Emanate series returns to the story of the Mystic Horn Society, a musical outfit that seem to court supernatural disaster at every turn. Like its predecessors, Bedouin Hornbook and Djbot Baghostus's Run, Atet A.D. is composed mostly of letters by composer/musician "N." addressed to a mysterious correspondent, "Angel of Dust," to whom N. recounts odd events, giving them an equally odd interpretive spin. The central turn in this volume occurs at a performance in Seattle in which one of the horn players, Penguin, suddenly acquires for an evening the ability to project cartoon-like thought balloons, text and all, out of his oboe. As with all of Mackey's prose fiction, his hermeneutic speculations are advanced as much by the power of puns as by syllogistic reasoning. For all the wordplay, Mackey manages to cover a lot of ground in this neo-novel, which is not so much about "characters" as it is about ideas and themes like gender equality, the survival of African customs and spiritual values in America, and the play of dreams within our waking realities. Most idiosyncratically, Mackey, with his nuanced knowledge of jazz, convinces the reader that music operates like a language, with all the power to convey, say, a specific feminist critique of male-centered jazz culture, or to acquire levels of symbolism that would make Dante wonder if he should have taken up sax. (Nov.)Forecast: Mackey is an editor of the Library of America's anthology of 20th-century poetry, a professor at the University of California at Santa Cruz, and a well-known figure in experimental writing circles. The Broken Bottle titles have already begun showing up on syllabi; if kept in stock and displayed together, expect solid browser-based sales.

Copyright 2001 Cahners Business Information, Inc.

Review

"The real triumph of the book ... is the texture of Mackey's form and language itself..." -- Rain Taxi Review of Books, December 2002

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Paperback: 192 pages
• Publisher: City Lights Publishers; 1 edition (August 1, 2001)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0872863824
• ISBN-13: 978-0872863828
• Product Dimensions: 8 x 5 x 0.6 inches
• Shipping Weight: 7.7 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,149,655 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

2 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Language as Jazz and Jazz as Language...What a trip!, November 18, 2005

By 

Duane Deterville (The Afriscape) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Atet A.D. (Paperback)

It is really criminal that there is only one other reader's review of Nathaniel Mackey's brilliant novel. I use the term "novel" for convenience only, because it is so much more than that. Atet AD chronicles the creative journey of a band of musicians and how the music is intertwined with their perspectives on the world. We readers have the pleasure of experiencing these events through letters written by the enigmatic musician N. to the even more enigmatic "Angel of Dust". He writes letters detailing not just their performances and rehearsals but the philosophical implications of their creative endeavors. The topics range from the music of John Coltrane, Rahsaan Roland Kirk and Pharaoh Saunders to Alejo Carpentier, CLR James, Toussaint L'overture and Congolese Mbuti rituals. I loved being taken on this thrilling journey through the intertwined relationships between music, language, history and ritual! If you want a simple minded linear narrative, look elsewhere. However, if you want something that will stimulate and challenge you; if you want language as Jazz and Jazz as language then don't hesitate to pick up Atet AD! Also recommended are the first two installments in this series, Bedouin Hornbook and Djbot Baghostus's Run in addition to his two books of essays Discprepant Engagement and Paracritical Hinge. All have profound takes on the African Diaspora, literature and music.

3 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars Esoteric, June 6, 2005

By 

Mr. Steiner (New York) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)   

This review is from: Atet A.D. (Paperback)

I was pleased to hear upon completing this book that Nathaniel Mackey has more or less given himself over to writing poetry which I think is a smart move because his srange writing style (which places emphasis on sound) is far more suitable for poetry than prose. This novel, is the third installment of a trilogy about a traveling jazz band that is presented in letter form and has an off the wall weird mixture of music, myth, etymology, and surrealism. Unfortunately, for readers like me de-emphasis on story and character is always a serious handicap. It seems that Mackey is most interested with proving to his readers that he's an intellectual. Perhaps I just misunderstood this book, and maybe I would like it better if I read it again, but I just f ound it overly pretentious and ultimately unapproachable. There is a large following of literature buffs who swear it is masterful, but I can't imagine the average casual reader being anything but annoyed by this one.