Throughout the 20th century, Paris became a favored destination for Black American musicians, offering an alternative to the racial discrimination faced at home and a more welcoming environment to experiment artistically. Spring 2024 Visiting Fellow Adam Shatz is a New York-based author and critic currently researching the legacy of Black American jazz musicians in Paris. During his residency at the Library, he will investigate the cultural and aesthetic exchanges that Paris made possible, and which helped to transform the work of expatriate musical artists.
Shatz will appear in conversation with Paris-based author Jake Lamar, whose recent novel, Viper’s Dream, explores the jazz world of mid-century Harlem. Together, Shatz and Lamar will consider the creative dialogue between New York and Paris, their shared heritage of artistic innovation, and the social and political force of jazz from the early twentieth century to today.
The Visiting Fellowship is supported by The de Groot Foundation.
About the speakers:
Adam Shatz is the US editor of The London Review of Books and a contributor to The New York Review of Books, The New Yorker, and other publications. He is the author of The Rebel’s Clinic: The Revolutionary Lives of Frantz Fanon, and of Writers and Missionaries: Essays on the Radical Imagination. He is the host of the podcast “Myself with Others,” and the recipient of the 2024 Guggenheim.
Jake Lamar is the award-winning author of a memoir, seven novels and a play. His most recent work, Viper’s Dream, is a crime novel set in the jazz world of Harlem between 1936 and 1961. Born and raised in the Bronx, New York, Jake Lamar has lived in Paris since 1993. He is a professor of creative writing at Sciences Po.
