Chapters 52
I have been honestly lost on why Ishmael Reed wrote Mumbo Jumbo with two chapters 52. Before we read it, my first assumption was that it would be an exploration of two alternate paths the plot could take. Instead, it ended up being a two chapter retelling of Egyptian mythology and the Book of Exodus with a similar contagious dance to Jes Grew. There is no real break in the story between the chapters besides the narration slightly shifting to Moses a few pages before chapter 52 #2 and shifting back to the 1920s a few pages before chapter 53 (Reed, 374, 398). I don’t see any clear interpretation behind this besides vague connections. You can make the argument that there are some patterns showing each chapter as a separate arc of the overall story of Mumbo Jumbo. The first is of the contagious art and dance spreading and the second is of people trying, and failing, to imitate it (whether to devalue it or to get success). Reed might be splitting the two up to present the two as patterns that happen separately, as the stories of Osiris and Set first appear around 2400 BCE and Moses appears around 1500 BCE. Each chapter would follow the first and second wave of this spread of cultural tradition, following the same waves of Jes Grew. With this, he retells the story in the setting of the religion that the future atonists subscribe to. While Moses and the Old Testament is commonly looked up to by Christians and Jews (or Knights Templar and other 1920s subscribers of Christianity), Reed explains that it and Moses’s journey was inspired by Ancient Egypt and black spiritual traditions, those of which are then considered brash and animalistic to those characters. He makes the point that the cycle has occurred before, also going in those two waves. Though, a part of me believes the best chance is that this interpretation is unintended and that chapter 52 #2 is just a typo to represent the Talking Android method of devaluing art. With Reed’s use of the number 1 to mean “one” or the chapter before the title page, the whole book could be meant as an example of how the Jes Grew epidemic is portrayed (44). Chapters 52 is a parody of the mistakes that Atonists believed African Americans would make and it would make the content within the chapters irrelevant to the distinctions between them. As much as I dislike not having my own clear interpretation of the novel, I am torn between the explanation of it having to do with the Talking Android method or an example of the two separate waves. In the end though, Ishmael Reed wrote Mumbo Jumbo with much more ambiguity than Doctorow’s Ragtime and intended his telling of history to be interpreted in multiple different ways. Works Cited Reed, Ishmael. Mumbo Jumbo. Scribner, 1972.
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ReplyDeleteHi Diza, chapters 52 were some of my favorite chapters and I think you did a great job of analyzing them and exemplifying how significant and also how slippery this part of the book is.
ReplyDeleteI thought that your point of highlighting the fact that Reed employs the legend of Moses, who was highly regarded by Atonists, to reveal its African origins. It was very deep how that fit in your "two-wave" model of how there is always cultural expression being born and then suppressed.
One might even suggest that your uncertainty is productive, since that is a trait that Mumbo Jumbo thrives on. Great work!
Hii Diza! I agree with you on how the duplication of chapter 52 is one of Reed's representations of all the ways Atonists have wronged the African Americans throughout history. I also think having this chaotic setup is very post-modernist (which echoes with the time this book was published). I think the ambiguity left by Reed embraces postmodernism as it allows multiple parallel interpretations from the reader. Very interesting blog!!
ReplyDeleteHi Diza, I really like the way you analyzed how important the writing of both chapter 52's were. I can see heavily how the additional 52 represents the long and additional ways that the African American community had been wronged, though I had never fully thought of it that way!
ReplyDeleteIt certainly is possible that Reed was writing this book and getting carried away with his meta-historical narrative about the origins of Jes Grew, and he simply lost count of the chapters. I don't know if there's any "deep" explanation for the two chapters 52, and it could just be one more goofy metafictional joke, where the author flaunts his control over the conventions of the narrative--why NOT have two chapters 52? There's no law against it! I also think of it as a kind of acknowledgement or "wink" to the reader--"Yeah, I know this chapter is going on really long, let's take a quick pause--but we're STILL in chapter 52, so don't get any ideas. Here we go again . . ."
ReplyDeleteI never did spell out my theory about the book's many typos in class, but you've intuited it: at one point Reed lists "undermining their publications with typos" as one of the ways that the Atonists have marginalized and delegitimized Black cultural voices for generations--the "gatekeeper" role in the academies and culture industries--and it occurred to me once that Reed may have sprinkled his own text with typos to suggest that the Atonists have gotten to it. He can't be right about all this stuff if there are words spelled wrong! Or if his "partial bibliography" misconstrues an author's name or two! Why, this book is just a bunch of . . . mumbo jumbo! (It's a rather "meta" theory, but in this book, anything is possible. It's not much weirder than simply having two chapters 52!)
Hi Diza! Honestly, I had never even really thought to question why Reed wrote two chapters 52, and assumed that he just did that to be silly for no reason. But that's what he would want you to think isn't it. Look at me just reiterating his thesis that people don't pay enough attention to things they don't take seriously. Anyway, I think you bring up some really interesting points and I'm impressed how much more thought you put into these chapters than I did. Great blog!
ReplyDeleteGreat blog! I honestly didn't think much into the chapter 52, but I think your beliefs on the meaning of it make a lot of sense. I also wonder if this is Reed trying to show that there are many facets to the same story that are kind of parallel to each other, making them unable to be pulled apart from each other, but needing to still be told separately. Overall this is a super interesting topic and I think that there is a lot below the surface that you unpacked really well!
ReplyDeletehi diza! I honestly think this is a great topic and one of the most interesting choices Reed made about Mumbo Jumbo, so I was interested in your view of it. Your analysis of why he may be separating these two chapters makes a lot of sense. Its like hes showing similarity and difference at the same time, which I think is really cool. Great blog!
ReplyDeleteHi Diza, I really enjoyed your blog post!!! When first reading chapter 52, I really didn't think much about it. After reading your post, I completely agree with you that having two chapter 52s was completely unnecessary. I think that your analysis of why he separated the two chapters is very well done. I never thought that it could be connected to African Americans. Good Job!!!!
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