Closing chords

N. recounts an interview that he has about life and the cartoon balloons. The interviewer asks very specific and personal questions, but N. remains very calm and intelligent throughout the whole process: "Q: Does it [Djband] fear that the balloons might overshadow the music or even that they already have?...A: Of course, I'm tempted to say, but Djband, as with so much else, is of more than one mind when it comes to the balloons" (148). It seems that the press is making a big deal out of Molimo m'Atet's business and the strange things that follow behind the band. In another letter to Angel of Dust, N. is expressing his self-revelation about the balloon's image, which Dredj roughly sketched before; now, N. wonders if someone could photograph the balloons. N. questions, "What if, soul inscribed balloons' body, spirit to the inscribed balloon's letter, the sketch were a pneumatic outline shadowing autoinscriptive hush?" (163). The balloons actually have a very googly appearance, as shown before, but N. cannot explain why that is.

To close the novel, N. inserts another after-the-fact lecture/libretto (see #3), except this one is titled "Unit Structure (Beach Variance)" (the previous one is called "Orphic Shore ('Nansic Breach)"). He starts writing with "'Mistakes have been made and more mistakes will be made.' So declared the Hotel Didgeridoo Resurrection Project's Commission of Inquiry" (169). The Commission's chair, Bl'under, and a leading critic, Djbot, debate about the maintainibility about the hotel, which doesn't seem to be doing very well. Their argument also encompasses music and literature as well. N. states, "So went Bl'under and Djbot's thought war, raging as evidently it always would, the Kingdom's two most formidable houngans locked in head-to-head combat" (180). It seems that in the end, Djbot exploding in frustration and shoveling the ground until he reaches "a truly new world...far away, far over" (183). Wherever he goes, I'm sure it will be wonderful. And with that, the novel is over.

~ Outside Reading #6

Mackey, Nathaniel. Bass Cathedral. Grand Rapids: New Directions Corporation, 2008.