Amazon.com Review
Dogs Bark, but the Caravan Rolls On: Observations Then and Now, Frank Conroy's first nonfiction work since his acclaimed memoir
Stop-Time, contains thoughtful pieces on jazz, writing, his father, and fathering. In addition to directing the Iowa Writers' Workshop, Conroy is a jazz pianist of some skill, as he proudly notes in this collection, taken primarily from articles published in
Esquire and
GQ. Profiles of Keith Jarrett, Wynton Marsalis, and the Rolling Stones are complemented by pieces about Conroy's own musical background, including a wonderful story of the Harlem club where Conroy became a regular, and of playing piano at a club without his bass player, who was late, only to have Charles Mingus arise from dinner and sit in.
On writing, there are some useful pieces regarding the process itself, particularly in "The Writers' Workshop." Conroy is direct and engaging, and he humbly discusses his childhood truancy, his flawed writings, and his family life. While some writers mythologize or sepia-coat their lives, Conroy tells it like it is, or was, but with careful thought and personal meaning to which readers can relate. As Conroy humbly jams with Marsalis, he confesses: "I feel like a child who has the skills to ride a pony but has been mistakenly mounted on Man o' War." After his first experience with Mingus, the great bassist said, "'You are ... an authentic primitive. That is true.' He leaned forward and lowered his voice. 'But you swing.'" Conroy's writings swing, too, and Dogs Bark, but the Caravan Rolls On has something for everyone, especially writers and jazz enthusiasts. --Michael Ferch
From Publishers Weekly
Conroy (Body & Soul) delivers a running commentary on life in this collection of articles and essays, at once subtle and dazzling, written over the past 25 years. His observations range from warmly intimate (ruminations on sex and love, shooting pool as a kid) to anonymously civic (the meaning and vitality of smalltown America). In the first half of the book, he grapples with the memory of his remote father, embraces fatherhood himself and peruses the mysteries of life especially those he finds in reading ("escape") and writing ("experiment"), and even riffs on his position as chair of the famed Writers' Workshop at the University of Iowa. The second half leads readers into a foray of pieces Conroy has written on his second and well-known love, jazz. He trips into jam sessions with the Rolling Stones, waxes on his evolution as a pianist and profiles the great provocateurs in jazz. His exploration of Wynton Marsalis at 23 and later at 34 minutely reflects the arc of developments in the author's own life. Curiously, key moments in the essays resurface within each other as if in coda; the overlapping details makes reading them even more enjoyable.
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