Jazz (Masterplots II: African American Literature Series)
At a glance:
- Author: Toni Morrison
- First Published: 1992
- Type of Work: Novel
- Type of Plot: Psychological realism
- Time of Work: 1926, with flashbacks to pre-Civil War times
- Setting: Harlem, New York, and Virginia
- Principal Characters: The Narrator, Violet Trace, Joe Trace, Dorcas Manfred, Alice Manfred, Felice
- Genres: Long fiction, Psychological fiction, Social realism
- Subjects: African Americans, New York, North America or North Americans, Northeast, U.S., United States or Americans, Blacks, Murder or homicide, South or Southerners, New York City, Harlem Renaissance, 1920’s, Adultery
- Locales: Virginia, Harlem, NY
The Novel
Jazz is an account of both the personal and the historical. While focusing on the lives of Joe and Violet Trace, the novel also provides an account of African American life in the South from the mid-nineteenth century through the Great Migration that brought millions north beginning in the 1870’s and continuing in a steady stream into the twentieth century. The story of the Traces’ move in 1906 from Virginia to Harlem is part of the African American story.
The novel opens and closes with the puzzling relationship of Joe, Violet, and Felice. The...
[The entire page is 3246 words long]
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