Outlandish Blues: 150 Years of Opera, Concert and Ballet in Montevideo

Winner of the Harper Lee Award (2018)

Fierce and sensual, the poems in Outlandish Blues merge everyday speech with a shimmering lyricism and burst from the page into song. Honor e Fanonne Jeffers sees the blues, what she terms the "shared 'blue notes, ''' as an important intersection between the secular and the divine, and between the various African American vernacular traditions, from spirituals to jazz. Part Nina Simone, part Bessie Smith, her poems are filled with a sweaty honesty, moving from the personal to the collective experience. This movement is often accomplished through the use of personae, concentrated here in a stunning series of poems on the Biblical figures of Hagar and Sarah. Whether about a contemporary domestic scene, a slave ship, or Aretha Franklin, these are poems that speak to the soul of experience.

Binding Type: Paperback
Publisher: Wesleyan University Press
Published: 04/29/2003
ISBN: 9780819565846
Pages: 72
Weight: 0.21lbs
Size: 8.66h x 5.64w x 0.21d

Review Citations: Booklist 02/15/2003 pg. 1038
Black Issues Book Review 03/01/2003 pg. 30
Publishers Weekly 04/21/2003 pg. 59
Univ PR Books for Public Libry 01/01/2004 pg. 70 - Recommended/Special Interest