What’s great about the film is that it’s an hour and a half revel in the music of Leonard Cohen a true testament to his genius. (Personally, I’d count Suzanne and Hallelujah as the most transporting of his tunes played; I kind of missed Bird on a Wire, though -- thought that final line, “I have tried in my way to be free,” would have been the perfect ending. What intrigues Coral Press about Cohen and his film is how he has tried in his own way some of what we’re here to do: To blend written literature with music and song to create a new literature. Of course, Cohen did it differently from us. He wrote a novel first (Beautiful Losers), then poetry, and then he set his poem/lyrics to song. I remember when I bought his first LP when it first came out that it seemed odd to have a serious poet trifle with pop music (we were still getting around the notion that a song such as Dylan’s Like a Rolling Stone could appear in the top 10); now, of course, it seems that Cohen’s songs will endure and win fans far longer than many of his contemporary poets.
We’ve often said that the purpose of Coral Press is to hit a unique nexus of music and literature, and though we publish novels about music, we wouldn’t exist if writers such as Dylan, Cohen, Paul Simon, etc. hadn’t shown us that true literature could turn up in the structure of a Top 40 song. For me, it’s a kind of miracle that crappy rock ’n’ roll has enduring power; and it’s a joy that, as we hurtle into our new century, more and more writers are writing on the ways rock ’n’ roll, both mindless and bountifully mindful, can be great art. And so we here at Coral Press hope to make it all take another turn: To find stories in music that are timeless and great, and make literature out of them.
A line might run Serious Young Novelist writes novel (Cohen; Richard Farina); Serious Young Novelist explores similar or greater themes in song; songs turn out to bear greater brilliance, in turn inspiring rock songs that have the power of literature; and then, going full circle, inspiring novels that hope to capture great music and great stories in prose. Or something like that.
I’d love to read further thoughts on how song and literature have come/can come together. Please post here.
