In eight poetically charged vignettes, Geoff Dyer skillfully evokes the music and the men who shaped modern jazz. Drawing on photos, anecdotes, and, most important, the way he hears the music, Dyer imaginatively reconstructs scenes from the embattled lives of some of the greats: Lester Young fading away in a hotel room; Charles Mingus storming down the streets of New York on a too-small bicycle; Thelonius Monk creating his own private language on the piano. However, music is the driving force of But Beautiful, and Dyer brings it to life in luminescent and wildly metaphoric prose that mirrors the quirks, eccentricity, and brilliance of each musician's style.
- ISBN10 0865475083
- ISBN13 9780865475083
- Publish Date 26 June 1997 (first published 13 June 1991)
- Publish Status Out of Stock
- Out of Print 13 July 2011
- Publish Country US
- Imprint North Point Press
- Format Paperback
- Pages 227
- Language English