A Night in Tunisia - Hardcover

Norman Weinstein is a widely published poet and critic whose books include Gertrude Stein and the Literature of the Modern Consciousness (Ungar) and Nigredo: Selected Poems 1970-1980 (Station Hill). His jazz criticism has been published in The Village Voice, Jazziz, and Downbeat. He has won an ASCAP-Deems Taylor award for excellence in music criticism.

Norman Weinstein has crafted a valuable work that, with its adherence to scholarship and careful analysis stands as the most successful attempt to address the enduring influence of African imagination on American Jazz. Norman Weinstein has written an animated and intelligent examination of what in American jazz reflects African origins and imaginings. He lets the text develop naturally, with sound scholarship and psychological cunning. ... Weinstein cuts through the gristle to reveal the bone of racismand appropriation working in counterpoint to the authentic esthetic and cultural history of the music. This psychological approach with its debt to Jung and Bachelard, gives A Night in Tunisia compelling contextual depth lacking in most jazz scholarship.-- Joseph Murphy, Earshot Jazzz (Jazz Now)

...intriguing...points the way for further discussions of jazz from a strategy of textual interpretation... (Iajrc Journal)

...he may be the Stephen Hawking of jazz criticism....a fascinating book....an extremely valuable overview of the music... (The Beat)

clever and entertaining...not just for students of jazz. (Multicultural Review)

...a book of both keen scholarship and fine tribute...exceptional... (Morning Star)

...may interest serious jazz fans--if only so they can argue with it. (Library Journal)

Norman Weinstein has crafted a valuable work that, with its adherence to scholarship and careful analysis stands as the most successful attempt to address the enduring influence of African imagination on American Jazz. Norman Weinstein has written an animated and intelligent examination of what in American jazz reflects African origins and imaginings. He lets the text develop naturally, with sound scholarship and psychological cunning. ... Weinstein cuts through the gristle to reveal the bone of racism and appropriation working in counterpoint to the authentic esthetic and cultural history of the music. This psychological approach with its debt to Jung and Bachelard, gives A Night in Tunisia compelling contextual depth lacking in most jazz scholarship.-- Joseph Murphy, Earshot Jazz (Jazz Now)