Theme Park at its Darkest

http://apps.facebook.com/theguardian/books/2012/sep/15/moby-dick-captures-stars-big-read?post_gdp=true

Moby Dick will be read in its entirety and broadcast over the internet.

Moby Dick is a monolithic novel; not only in size, but in scope. It’s different from a novel like Ulysses, however, in that it is built around a conventional narrative which is like a boy’s own adventure – on steroids. It also has the greatest ending of anything I’ve read.

Ornette Coleman, experimental jazz musician explained his approach thus:

“If you put a conventional chord or rhythm under my note, you limit the number of choices I have for my next note. If you do not, my melody may move freely with far greater choice of directions. The theme you play at the start of a number is the territory and what comes after, which may have very little to do with it, is the adventure.”

In this sense, Moby Dick is a monolithic adventure. Prepare yourself.

http://www.mobydickbigread.com/

This entry was posted on September 25, 2012 at 4:35 pm and is filed under Reading with tags 'Jazz', Free Jazz, Ken Burns, Moby Dick, Ornette Coleman, The Guardian UK, Ulysses. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.