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Sonnets for a Missing Key: And Some Others
These sonnets were inspired by the Preludes of Chopin.
Do keys matter? Do they speak to different parts of us? Inspired by the Preludes of Chopin and the piano solos of Art Tatum, these experimental sonnets seek to question timbre and tone. That's bullshit. They are just sonnets.
Do keys matter? Do they speak to different parts of us? Inspired by the Preludes of Chopin and the piano solos of Art Tatum, these experimental sonnets seek to question timbre and tone. That's bullshit. They are just sonnets.
- GenresPoetry
64 pages, Paperback
Published August 20, 2024
37 people are currently reading
2817 people want to read
About the author
Percival Everett
69 books8,143 followersPercival L. Everett (born 1956) is an American writer and Distinguished Professor of English at the University of Southern California.
There might not be a more fertile mind in American fiction today than Everett’s. In 22 years, he has written 19 books, including a farcical Western, a savage satire of the publishing industry, a children’s story spoofing counting books, retellings of the Greek myths of Medea and Dionysus, and a philosophical tract narrated by a four-year-old.
The Washington Post has called Everett “one of the most adventurously experimental of modern American novelists.” And according to The Boston Globe, “He’s literature’s NASCAR champion, going flat out, narrowly avoiding one seemingly inevitable crash only to steer straight for the next.”
Everett, who teaches courses in creative writing, American studies and critical theory, says he writes about what interests him, which explains his prolific output and the range of subjects he has tackled. He also describes himself as a demanding teacher who learns from his students as much as they learn from him.
Everett’s writing has earned him the PEN USA 2006 Literary Award (for his 2005 novel, Wounded), the Academy Award for Literature of the American Academy of Arts and Letters and the Hurston/Wright Legacy Award (for his 2001 novel, Erasure), the PEN/Oakland-Josephine Miles Award for Excellence in Literature (for his 1996 story collection, Big Picture) and the New American Writing Award (for his 1990 novel, Zulus). He has served as a judge for, among others, the 1997 National Book Award for fiction and the PEN/Faulkner Award for Fiction in 1991.
There might not be a more fertile mind in American fiction today than Everett’s. In 22 years, he has written 19 books, including a farcical Western, a savage satire of the publishing industry, a children’s story spoofing counting books, retellings of the Greek myths of Medea and Dionysus, and a philosophical tract narrated by a four-year-old.
The Washington Post has called Everett “one of the most adventurously experimental of modern American novelists.” And according to The Boston Globe, “He’s literature’s NASCAR champion, going flat out, narrowly avoiding one seemingly inevitable crash only to steer straight for the next.”
Everett, who teaches courses in creative writing, American studies and critical theory, says he writes about what interests him, which explains his prolific output and the range of subjects he has tackled. He also describes himself as a demanding teacher who learns from his students as much as they learn from him.
Everett’s writing has earned him the PEN USA 2006 Literary Award (for his 2005 novel, Wounded), the Academy Award for Literature of the American Academy of Arts and Letters and the Hurston/Wright Legacy Award (for his 2001 novel, Erasure), the PEN/Oakland-Josephine Miles Award for Excellence in Literature (for his 1996 story collection, Big Picture) and the New American Writing Award (for his 1990 novel, Zulus). He has served as a judge for, among others, the 1997 National Book Award for fiction and the PEN/Faulkner Award for Fiction in 1991.
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February 15, 2025
‘But, man, there’s no boundary line to art’
—Charlie Parker
Poetry and jazz have always had an abstract affinity in my mind. With words like notes on a scale, both mediums experiment with form and tone, winding their way through ideas to arrive where the journey towards meaning is
‘Jazz is rhythm and meaning,’ said artist Henri Matisse and much the same can be said about poetry. Inspired by the Preludes of Frédéric Chopin and the piano solos of American jazz artist Art Tatum comes Percival Everett’s Sonnets For a Missing Key, a collection of experimental sonnets that ‘seek to question timbre and tone’ as the book states, going on to add ‘that's bullshit. They are just sonnets.’ Such playfulness marks this collection where ‘the story is told with symbols’ as it taps out rhythms of words in expressions on language, art, and simply surviving another day in this world. Experimental yet never overly elusive, this is a delightful and brief selection that shows Everett can awe in any voice he sets his heart on and makes for a musically marvelous read.
B♭ Major
Joy cannot be ignored,
Though almost illogical
Left confuses right
Confuses left with
Simplicity? What meaning
Is definitive?
There is no confession here,
But song, sing, song
Like an indecisive bird
That has made up its mind.
Percival Everett has such a sardonic wit that is endlessly charming and engaging. He refers to himself as ‘pathologically ironic,’ a fitting joke for anyone who has read his demeanor in interviews dodging questions and providing deep insights without ever taking himself too seriously. While better known for his novels—his 2024 novel James was recently the recipient of the National Book Award—Everett has also published several volumes of poetry. ‘I might have published a couple of volumes of poetry, but — I’m using my cowboy accent here — I ain’t no poet,’ he quipped in an interview with The White Review, ‘I write poetry to prove I can’t write poetry.’ Yet, for all his insistence he is not a poet, Everett can craft a fine verse that has a playful uniqueness to it that captures his signature voice in poetic form just as well as his novelistic prose. Such as E♭ Minor where he writes:
Pour this garden into a glass, while
explaining to me the difference between a creek
and a stream, an ocean and a sea,
a lie and a confession of love.
Each poem takes its title from a different note and, like a jazz song, it winds through moments of morose minor keys into more jubilant verse that ricochettes around the page. If you think of the words as notes in a song, you can hear the way it bounces like jazz. In jazz ‘it's not the notes you play, it's the notes you don't play,’ as the quote commonly attributed to Miles Davis goes, and Everett embraces the gaps between words and poetic enjambment in a way that feels very much like jazz improvisation. It uses language akin to how Nina Simone found that jazz ‘was dedicated to freedom, and that was far more important’ than a robust structure. Everett’s words bounce back and forth, cycling around like the end of a song full of repetition and wordplay until you can hear lines like ‘Last words always sound like / last words always sound like last / words always sound like this’ wind through a closing crescendo. It’s pretty fun.
‘The shapes fall away from the core,
the thing becomes a thing.’
It is through the abstract that Everett probes for meaning and shows that this search for meaning is what, inevitably, grants meaning to life. In his poems its ‘the meaning pointing to’ rather than directly addressing. And much of the collection looks at language itself. In F Major, Everett more or less instructs us how to read his own collection:
What is received is scaffolding, is a lattice of
bone and boards and screws and posts that give our
feet places to square, our fingers lips to grasp,
but nowhere to lean our backs.
One can understand this much like the loose structure of the words, more scaffolding than anything, but one in which he has the freedom to let words loose like doves to fly towards meaning. It is for us to participate with him climbing language like this scaffolding.
We climbed at the language, the idea that
one climbs down. With a little practice, you
said, we could, if we wanted, fall up.
We see language as ‘little tongues piled on top of anxious silence,’ much like chairs piled up against a door to brace it. And we are there to pile the chairs along with him. Everett references dancers at several moments, dancers moving to the rhythm of music, trading places and swirling together. Take a look:
C♯ Minor
1.
These dancers transpose. There is no
other way to stay in step. The dancers
sign their names in time, with time. They
are dancers after all, after all
2.
is said and done, after all is
leapt and bounded, unbounded and
taken for granted like a mule that
always pulls, always takes his pack.
3.
These dancers, all twisted up,
without meaning to fold this way and
that on this moving surface
These dancers: we love them,
we hate them, watch as the tie rhythm to
key to motion to dawn and dusk.
One can think of the dancers as the reader, the “you” addressed in the poem, the speaker of the poem, and Everett himself as the writer and throughout the collection we all dance together, sometimes trading places, everyone being both the creator, the created and the reader. It’s a rather powerful effect.
‘In the trampled meadow of our poverty,
some of us can find no clover at all.’
Though not all is abstract analysis of language and rhythm through the concepts around jazz. Everett probes more weighted topics around life, death, God (a rather indifferent God who ‘signs to us’ but it is more like ‘a gang sign from a gang with no members’), maturation and simply getting by in the world. ‘A sad and great evil is among us,’ he writes in E♭ Major:
A blank and gray history is between us,
folding like a map with countries that
no longer exist, that no longer have governments,
but only confused people once citizens
There is always such power in his prose and here, with poetic intent, he winds his way into our hearts with rollicking rhythms and minor key emotion. Sonnets For a Missing Key won’t be for everyone, but it is an impressive collection and shows Everett at an experimental venture that satisfies in fresh ways. A lovely little collection from a master of literature.
3.5/5
‘The fable is so slowly revealed,
the shadow of it persistent, if unconnected,
like theorems proved by intuition, like
intuitions justified by experience.’
—from C♯ Major
—Charlie Parker
Poetry and jazz have always had an abstract affinity in my mind. With words like notes on a scale, both mediums experiment with form and tone, winding their way through ideas to arrive where the journey towards meaning is
‘Jazz is rhythm and meaning,’ said artist Henri Matisse and much the same can be said about poetry. Inspired by the Preludes of Frédéric Chopin and the piano solos of American jazz artist Art Tatum comes Percival Everett’s Sonnets For a Missing Key, a collection of experimental sonnets that ‘seek to question timbre and tone’ as the book states, going on to add ‘that's bullshit. They are just sonnets.’ Such playfulness marks this collection where ‘the story is told with symbols’ as it taps out rhythms of words in expressions on language, art, and simply surviving another day in this world. Experimental yet never overly elusive, this is a delightful and brief selection that shows Everett can awe in any voice he sets his heart on and makes for a musically marvelous read.
B♭ Major
Joy cannot be ignored,
Though almost illogical
Left confuses right
Confuses left with
Simplicity? What meaning
Is definitive?
There is no confession here,
But song, sing, song
Like an indecisive bird
That has made up its mind.
Percival Everett has such a sardonic wit that is endlessly charming and engaging. He refers to himself as ‘pathologically ironic,’ a fitting joke for anyone who has read his demeanor in interviews dodging questions and providing deep insights without ever taking himself too seriously. While better known for his novels—his 2024 novel James was recently the recipient of the National Book Award—Everett has also published several volumes of poetry. ‘I might have published a couple of volumes of poetry, but — I’m using my cowboy accent here — I ain’t no poet,’ he quipped in an interview with The White Review, ‘I write poetry to prove I can’t write poetry.’ Yet, for all his insistence he is not a poet, Everett can craft a fine verse that has a playful uniqueness to it that captures his signature voice in poetic form just as well as his novelistic prose. Such as E♭ Minor where he writes:
Pour this garden into a glass, while
explaining to me the difference between a creek
and a stream, an ocean and a sea,
a lie and a confession of love.
Each poem takes its title from a different note and, like a jazz song, it winds through moments of morose minor keys into more jubilant verse that ricochettes around the page. If you think of the words as notes in a song, you can hear the way it bounces like jazz. In jazz ‘it's not the notes you play, it's the notes you don't play,’ as the quote commonly attributed to Miles Davis goes, and Everett embraces the gaps between words and poetic enjambment in a way that feels very much like jazz improvisation. It uses language akin to how Nina Simone found that jazz ‘was dedicated to freedom, and that was far more important’ than a robust structure. Everett’s words bounce back and forth, cycling around like the end of a song full of repetition and wordplay until you can hear lines like ‘Last words always sound like / last words always sound like last / words always sound like this’ wind through a closing crescendo. It’s pretty fun.
‘The shapes fall away from the core,
the thing becomes a thing.’
It is through the abstract that Everett probes for meaning and shows that this search for meaning is what, inevitably, grants meaning to life. In his poems its ‘the meaning pointing to’ rather than directly addressing. And much of the collection looks at language itself. In F Major, Everett more or less instructs us how to read his own collection:
What is received is scaffolding, is a lattice of
bone and boards and screws and posts that give our
feet places to square, our fingers lips to grasp,
but nowhere to lean our backs.
One can understand this much like the loose structure of the words, more scaffolding than anything, but one in which he has the freedom to let words loose like doves to fly towards meaning. It is for us to participate with him climbing language like this scaffolding.
We climbed at the language, the idea that
one climbs down. With a little practice, you
said, we could, if we wanted, fall up.
We see language as ‘little tongues piled on top of anxious silence,’ much like chairs piled up against a door to brace it. And we are there to pile the chairs along with him. Everett references dancers at several moments, dancers moving to the rhythm of music, trading places and swirling together. Take a look:
C♯ Minor
1.
These dancers transpose. There is no
other way to stay in step. The dancers
sign their names in time, with time. They
are dancers after all, after all
2.
is said and done, after all is
leapt and bounded, unbounded and
taken for granted like a mule that
always pulls, always takes his pack.
3.
These dancers, all twisted up,
without meaning to fold this way and
that on this moving surface
These dancers: we love them,
we hate them, watch as the tie rhythm to
key to motion to dawn and dusk.
One can think of the dancers as the reader, the “you” addressed in the poem, the speaker of the poem, and Everett himself as the writer and throughout the collection we all dance together, sometimes trading places, everyone being both the creator, the created and the reader. It’s a rather powerful effect.
‘In the trampled meadow of our poverty,
some of us can find no clover at all.’
Though not all is abstract analysis of language and rhythm through the concepts around jazz. Everett probes more weighted topics around life, death, God (a rather indifferent God who ‘signs to us’ but it is more like ‘a gang sign from a gang with no members’), maturation and simply getting by in the world. ‘A sad and great evil is among us,’ he writes in E♭ Major:
A blank and gray history is between us,
folding like a map with countries that
no longer exist, that no longer have governments,
but only confused people once citizens
There is always such power in his prose and here, with poetic intent, he winds his way into our hearts with rollicking rhythms and minor key emotion. Sonnets For a Missing Key won’t be for everyone, but it is an impressive collection and shows Everett at an experimental venture that satisfies in fresh ways. A lovely little collection from a master of literature.
3.5/5
‘The fable is so slowly revealed,
the shadow of it persistent, if unconnected,
like theorems proved by intuition, like
intuitions justified by experience.’
—from C♯ Major
March 5, 2025
4.5 "rhythm and meanin" stars !!
2024 Honorable Mention Read
Thank you to Netalley, the poet and Red Hen Press. This collection will be released August 2024. I am providing a little poem as my review.
Percy, Chopin and Artie Tatum are three really cool cats
Move over move over and let me sway with the rhythm
Groove and shove it just groove with the meanin
Swaying and drifting with beauty and passion and
way way
way
way down
aRTistry
scat a tat a tat with three cool cats
Meeeeeow and lot of wow - Jaidee
Here is a little excerpt from the Chopin sequence and my favorite....
E minor
1
Pour this garden into a glass, while explaining to me the difference between a creek and a stream, an ocean and a sea, a lie and a confession of love
2
Consort with the airs I do not wear, with endless stories I have not told, between blossoming branches and dead wood. Befriend the wind.
3
Resist the belief that we understand any hard rain that washes clean exterior walls and the hooves of horses.
Whatever is purely tactical, is what we should, ought, can, will do. The rain still filling some glass.
2024 Honorable Mention Read
Thank you to Netalley, the poet and Red Hen Press. This collection will be released August 2024. I am providing a little poem as my review.
Percy, Chopin and Artie Tatum are three really cool cats
Move over move over and let me sway with the rhythm
Groove and shove it just groove with the meanin
Swaying and drifting with beauty and passion and
way way
way
way down
aRTistry
scat a tat a tat with three cool cats
Meeeeeow and lot of wow - Jaidee
Here is a little excerpt from the Chopin sequence and my favorite....
E minor
1
Pour this garden into a glass, while explaining to me the difference between a creek and a stream, an ocean and a sea, a lie and a confession of love
2
Consort with the airs I do not wear, with endless stories I have not told, between blossoming branches and dead wood. Befriend the wind.
3
Resist the belief that we understand any hard rain that washes clean exterior walls and the hooves of horses.
Whatever is purely tactical, is what we should, ought, can, will do. The rain still filling some glass.
March 13, 2025
I did not know that Percival Everett was a poet.” Sonnets for a Missing Key” fills that gap in my knowledge.Readers of Everett’s novels will recognize his range of moods and eclectic subject matter when reading this collection.
Poetry and music have always been linked for me. Poetry has an economy of expression that stimulates feelings and flights of imagination. Poems have a unique rhythm that aligns with musical composition. Each medium relies on choral and tonal variations to work through and express ideas. Everett’s poems have a rhythm and feeling linked to jazz, the unique American art form that blends African rhythms with European musical influences.
I have read that Everett’s sonnets were inspired by Chopin’s “Preludes” and Art Tatum’s piano solos. Yet as I wandered through this collection, I heard echoes of Thelonious Monk.No one put fingers on piano keys quite like Monk.He is immediately identifiable from the first note as his flat striking gains attention, hinting at variety of tone and eclectic exploration of the keyboard.His signature improvisations feature dissonance with melodious interludes, augmented by furious percussion followed by moments of silence and hesitation.
I find Everett’s literary style similar to Monk’s musical style. Everett is wide ranging in his exploration of subjects and feelings as he traverses the spectrum of human foibles and triumphs. He juxtaposes dissonance and harmony in his writing, keeping the reader slightly off kilter but always engaged. The same qualities are evident in his poetry. One example is “ Molto Allegro C#Minor.
“ Contrite vocalization,
Penitent whistling
Conversation between lovers,
between enemies
With god? The friend?
Help-meet of survival
Sighs,disappointment,
Never reaching
The circle contains it all,
Though dour, woeful and wretched
No light consuming
No light”
The gentle riffs and percussive rumblings present in this sonnet remind me of Monk’s genius even while I bask in Everett’s literary experiment. Having read the collection, some might not leave with “ Round Midnight” ringing in their ears.Yet they might find their heads bobbing to some other tune that stirs the soul.
Poetry and music have always been linked for me. Poetry has an economy of expression that stimulates feelings and flights of imagination. Poems have a unique rhythm that aligns with musical composition. Each medium relies on choral and tonal variations to work through and express ideas. Everett’s poems have a rhythm and feeling linked to jazz, the unique American art form that blends African rhythms with European musical influences.
I have read that Everett’s sonnets were inspired by Chopin’s “Preludes” and Art Tatum’s piano solos. Yet as I wandered through this collection, I heard echoes of Thelonious Monk.No one put fingers on piano keys quite like Monk.He is immediately identifiable from the first note as his flat striking gains attention, hinting at variety of tone and eclectic exploration of the keyboard.His signature improvisations feature dissonance with melodious interludes, augmented by furious percussion followed by moments of silence and hesitation.
I find Everett’s literary style similar to Monk’s musical style. Everett is wide ranging in his exploration of subjects and feelings as he traverses the spectrum of human foibles and triumphs. He juxtaposes dissonance and harmony in his writing, keeping the reader slightly off kilter but always engaged. The same qualities are evident in his poetry. One example is “ Molto Allegro C#Minor.
“ Contrite vocalization,
Penitent whistling
Conversation between lovers,
between enemies
With god? The friend?
Help-meet of survival
Sighs,disappointment,
Never reaching
The circle contains it all,
Though dour, woeful and wretched
No light consuming
No light”
The gentle riffs and percussive rumblings present in this sonnet remind me of Monk’s genius even while I bask in Everett’s literary experiment. Having read the collection, some might not leave with “ Round Midnight” ringing in their ears.Yet they might find their heads bobbing to some other tune that stirs the soul.
August 26, 2024
An Unsophisticate at the Tasting Table
Percival Everett is remarkable. I have been treated to a number of his works in the past few years, including the brilliant “James,” “The Trees,” and “Erasure.” His wit, insight, and humor just serve to delight.
Sonnets? I am totally unqualified to judge this collection. I have been exposed to very little poetry, let alone sonnets. I feel like an amateur at a vintage wine tasting event. These pieces were paired with the works of Chopin and Art Tatum– um, okay (?)
What I was able to do was savor bits and pieces of these works. I had to slow down, reread most of these more than once, not rush. So many quick ideas and musings hit home… and then vanished.
Some of my favorites:
“We climbed at the language , the idea that one climbs down. With a little practice, you said, we could, if we wanted, fall up.”
“When you told me you were sick I didn’t believe you and then of course, of course I did. When they told me you were dead I didn’t believe them, and I didn’t and I didn’t and I didn’t I did when you told me. When you told me you were dead I believed you. Even then I had my doubts.”
And, addressing my viewpoint…
“I wanted to see it. I wanted to be free enough to see it…I wanted to be that smart, that free.”
I enjoyed these rich creations, as much as anyone who is intimidated by the art form.
Thank you to Red Hen Press, NetGalley, and Edelweiss for providing an advance reader copy in exchange for an honest review. #SonnetsforaMissingKey #NetGalley
Percival Everett is remarkable. I have been treated to a number of his works in the past few years, including the brilliant “James,” “The Trees,” and “Erasure.” His wit, insight, and humor just serve to delight.
Sonnets? I am totally unqualified to judge this collection. I have been exposed to very little poetry, let alone sonnets. I feel like an amateur at a vintage wine tasting event. These pieces were paired with the works of Chopin and Art Tatum– um, okay (?)
What I was able to do was savor bits and pieces of these works. I had to slow down, reread most of these more than once, not rush. So many quick ideas and musings hit home… and then vanished.
Some of my favorites:
“We climbed at the language , the idea that one climbs down. With a little practice, you said, we could, if we wanted, fall up.”
“When you told me you were sick I didn’t believe you and then of course, of course I did. When they told me you were dead I didn’t believe them, and I didn’t and I didn’t and I didn’t I did when you told me. When you told me you were dead I believed you. Even then I had my doubts.”
And, addressing my viewpoint…
“I wanted to see it. I wanted to be free enough to see it…I wanted to be that smart, that free.”
I enjoyed these rich creations, as much as anyone who is intimidated by the art form.
Thank you to Red Hen Press, NetGalley, and Edelweiss for providing an advance reader copy in exchange for an honest review. #SonnetsforaMissingKey #NetGalley
September 13, 2024
Just the name Percival Everett can get 10 Stars from me any day!! ❤️ 🌟 ❤️
This is a Collection of Sonnets with various themes "weighted" of GOLD with its Purpose of Exploring Love, Human Experiences, etc. Readers will actually feel the tone of the sonnets shifting as they read, without a break . Another Beautful one from Percival!
I was so Overjoyed reading this new release...
He is the Magnificent author who has made sonnets
vigorous once again!! 💛
Loved It So Much!! ❤️
This is a Collection of Sonnets with various themes "weighted" of GOLD with its Purpose of Exploring Love, Human Experiences, etc. Readers will actually feel the tone of the sonnets shifting as they read, without a break . Another Beautful one from Percival!
I was so Overjoyed reading this new release...
He is the Magnificent author who has made sonnets
vigorous once again!! 💛
Loved It So Much!! ❤️
June 23, 2024
This collection was not for me. I don't think I have read enough sonnets to know if this was good or not, so if you are a sonnet reader/expert please take my review with a grain of salt. As a casual poetry reader I know I struggled to understand these sonnets. However, its is a fast read that you can finish pretty quickly.
Side note: The text formatting in the ARC was off, sometimes it was hard to know when a sonnet began and ended.
Thanks to NetGalley, Red Hen Press, and Percival Everett for a free ARC copy in exchange for an honest review.
Side note: The text formatting in the ARC was off, sometimes it was hard to know when a sonnet began and ended.
Thanks to NetGalley, Red Hen Press, and Percival Everett for a free ARC copy in exchange for an honest review.
January 6, 2025
bro. 🤯
August 30, 2024
Everett deserves praise for the challenge he undertakes with these experimental pieces attempting to articulate, through the use of poetic verses, the tone and rhythm from Chopin’s Preludes and Art Tatum’s piano solos. I commend his efforts, and the first half of the collection titled “Sonnets” is engaging with its flashes of strong stanzas, whereas the book’s second half titled “Others” comprises a series of snippet poems that don’t resonate with much meaning.
Focusing on the sonnets, I marked several verses that were memorable. What Everett captures in “A Minor” stanza “3” is quite vivid:
Even the plants die only
after death, brittleness and brown
clinging to that former condition.
The trees are now black, yet water
finds the ground at those roots, still
good, but too late.
One of his best verses can be found in “F# Major” stanza “2” when he reminds us of this truth:
When I believe finally that I am grasping
it, it lets go and withdraws what is most yours.
I am rendered free, dismissed, where
the thought of us had once been welcomed.
He expresses a philosophical conundrum with imagistic pondering in “Eb Minor” stanza “1” when he muses about love:
Pour this garden into a glass, while
explaining to me the difference between a creek
and a stream, an ocean and a sea,
a lie and a confession of love.
Perhaps his strongest verse is delivered in “Eb Major” stanza “1” when he confronts destructive forces perpetuating across time:
A sad and great evil is among us,
lapping at water we have poured for the dogs.
Twist the end of my tie and make me wear clothes that
would have fit me in another era.
Although the totality of Sonnets for a Missing Key: And Some Others is not spectacular poetry, I appreciate the vision and experimentation Everett pursues with trying to postulate language that expresses the ineffable nature of music. He makes an admirable effort in the sonnets, while the poems in the latter half of the book contribute very little to book.
Focusing on the sonnets, I marked several verses that were memorable. What Everett captures in “A Minor” stanza “3” is quite vivid:
Even the plants die only
after death, brittleness and brown
clinging to that former condition.
The trees are now black, yet water
finds the ground at those roots, still
good, but too late.
One of his best verses can be found in “F# Major” stanza “2” when he reminds us of this truth:
When I believe finally that I am grasping
it, it lets go and withdraws what is most yours.
I am rendered free, dismissed, where
the thought of us had once been welcomed.
He expresses a philosophical conundrum with imagistic pondering in “Eb Minor” stanza “1” when he muses about love:
Pour this garden into a glass, while
explaining to me the difference between a creek
and a stream, an ocean and a sea,
a lie and a confession of love.
Perhaps his strongest verse is delivered in “Eb Major” stanza “1” when he confronts destructive forces perpetuating across time:
A sad and great evil is among us,
lapping at water we have poured for the dogs.
Twist the end of my tie and make me wear clothes that
would have fit me in another era.
Although the totality of Sonnets for a Missing Key: And Some Others is not spectacular poetry, I appreciate the vision and experimentation Everett pursues with trying to postulate language that expresses the ineffable nature of music. He makes an admirable effort in the sonnets, while the poems in the latter half of the book contribute very little to book.
July 9, 2024
4.5 Stars
A lovely collection of sonnets, of brief glimpses into a moment, first words and last ones, of life, and music, shared as if they are with the coming and going of tides. Of creatures that roam the forests, of rhythm and dancers, music. Of moments that are calm, of memories, of times throughout history, countries and governments. Of finding comparisons between what is and what it might resemble, of time, of death, of truth, of last breaths and sorrow. Of solace. Of peace. Of Life.
Pub Date: 20 Aug 2024
Many thanks for the ARC provided by Red Hen Press
January 25, 2025
I wish it had been just the sonnets without ‘and some others’
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September 8, 2024I am very unfamiliar with sonnets but I enjoy getting out of my comfort zone. Will not be reviewing because I simply do not have the knowledge to review something like this! Won this in a giveaway!
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April 18, 2025Let's just say that I know what all of the words in this book mean... individually. But together! Went right over my smooth little brain.
I have no clue what I just read. Apparently this was not the place to start with Everett.
I have no clue what I just read. Apparently this was not the place to start with Everett.
September 18, 2024
I received a copy of this book through a Goodreads giveaway. Thank you to both Red Hen Press and the author.
This is my first experience with Percival Everett, and what a lovely one it was! I enjoyed the rhythm and flow of these poems very much. “G Minor” made me catch my breath; because of that I’ll name it my favorite. Slim but mighty, every one of these poems demand rereading, which I’ll be happy to do. I highly recommend this to others.
This is my first experience with Percival Everett, and what a lovely one it was! I enjoyed the rhythm and flow of these poems very much. “G Minor” made me catch my breath; because of that I’ll name it my favorite. Slim but mighty, every one of these poems demand rereading, which I’ll be happy to do. I highly recommend this to others.
August 19, 2024
Thanks to Red Hen Press for the ARC, based on an entry to the Goodreads Giveaway for Percival Everett’s Sonnets for a Missing Key (I never win!). My exposure to Percival was his recent book James; my experience with sonnets is a notch above nothing. I do love the music of Chopin and Tatum, which these sonnets and poems draw inspiration from. So there’s my connection to the near 50 pieces of imagination contained in the beautiful and slender book. I thoroughly enjoyed the sonnets and poems in two sittings, one with coffee in the morning and the other with some hot chocolate in the evening. I recommend it for all the poets out there and for anyone who could use something inspired and a little different.
February 18, 2025
Despite my great fondness for jazz, Chopin’s Preludes, the sonnet form, and Percival Everett, I found this recent project of his to be rather tiresome and unnecessarily elusive. It’s not long—two poems for each of the Preludes, if I puzzled it out correctly—and not only are sonnets only 14 lines, but these are abbreviated sonnets at best, if you want to call them sonnets at all—but I put it down for a few weeks, returning to see if I could appreciate it any better after time had passed.
But no. And I approached the read with some anticipation, as I have always been a great fan of the Preludes, a few of which I played as a lad. I suppose it’s the same quibble I have with most contemporary poetry, vague and inaccessible and frustratingly difficult. The best I could do was intuit Everett’s shifts in tone and mode, especially based on the handful of Preludes I studied back in the day. I even opened the piano and played a couple of them, which is a rarity for my old hands these days. Originally, I had this grand plan of listening to each Prelude as I read along, but I ended up deciding it wasn’t going to shed any additional light on Everett’s sonnets.
Oh well, I’m reading Telephone right now, and enjoying it tremendously. So I’m not going to let this book get in my way of appreciating Everett.
But no. And I approached the read with some anticipation, as I have always been a great fan of the Preludes, a few of which I played as a lad. I suppose it’s the same quibble I have with most contemporary poetry, vague and inaccessible and frustratingly difficult. The best I could do was intuit Everett’s shifts in tone and mode, especially based on the handful of Preludes I studied back in the day. I even opened the piano and played a couple of them, which is a rarity for my old hands these days. Originally, I had this grand plan of listening to each Prelude as I read along, but I ended up deciding it wasn’t going to shed any additional light on Everett’s sonnets.
Oh well, I’m reading Telephone right now, and enjoying it tremendously. So I’m not going to let this book get in my way of appreciating Everett.
September 27, 2024
Publishing date: 20.08.2024
Thank you to Netgalley and Red Hen Press for the ARC. My opinions are my own.
I expected: A musical collection of poems about loss
I got: Sonnet style poems about loss and identity
The book left me: Wanting to write a sonnet for my darling
Poetry style:
Poems are written like sonnets, but a little more experimentally
Amount of poems: 23 poems in the first section, 24 in the second
Features:
Two sections with very different poems, themes of loss, identity, creativity, meanings of things, uncertainty, and denial
Final ranking and star rating?
3 stars, B tier. This is a beautifully written collection of poems. The style is wildly different than what I had read earlier. Sadly this style was a little harder to read for me (in terms of speed). I found the themes relatable and well written into the poems.
Favorite poems:
A Major
E Major
F# Major
15 Sostenuto
4 Largo
Thank you to Netgalley and Red Hen Press for the ARC. My opinions are my own.
I expected: A musical collection of poems about loss
I got: Sonnet style poems about loss and identity
The book left me: Wanting to write a sonnet for my darling
Poetry style:
Poems are written like sonnets, but a little more experimentally
Amount of poems: 23 poems in the first section, 24 in the second
Features:
Two sections with very different poems, themes of loss, identity, creativity, meanings of things, uncertainty, and denial
Final ranking and star rating?
3 stars, B tier. This is a beautifully written collection of poems. The style is wildly different than what I had read earlier. Sadly this style was a little harder to read for me (in terms of speed). I found the themes relatable and well written into the poems.
Favorite poems:
A Major
E Major
F# Major
15 Sostenuto
4 Largo
August 20, 2024
I can appreciate the concept of this poetry and the way it explores language through musical elements. I know this collection won’t be for everyone, but I would definitely recommend it to anyone looking to experience more conceptual and structured poetry, especially the music lovers and musicians I know! There were some lines that landed so strongly and had this rippling effect, lingering with you, causing you to go back to them—while a lot of the other lines were just well-written, but not as emotive. While I think some of these works might not be completely understood by some readers, there will be readers for whom this book radiates.
August 30, 2024
Percival Everett has become one of my authors in the recent years.
I was very intrigued by Sonnets for a Missing Key, but I have to admit it wasn't for me.
There were parts I enjoyed and admired, but overall I couldn't fully connect to it.
It's very inventive and I enjoyed the way language was explored through music and sonnets.
Huge thanks to Netgalley and the publisher for a digital ARC of this book in exchange for my honest review.
I was very intrigued by Sonnets for a Missing Key, but I have to admit it wasn't for me.
There were parts I enjoyed and admired, but overall I couldn't fully connect to it.
It's very inventive and I enjoyed the way language was explored through music and sonnets.
Huge thanks to Netgalley and the publisher for a digital ARC of this book in exchange for my honest review.
November 17, 2024
Everett Is one of the best living writers I can think of who makes language work for him. In his novels, he controls prose by manipulating style and genre in a unique way. The same thing happens here. The Joycean wordplay, the reinvention of sonnet form, the light and playful, the hauntingly dark. So while I appreciated the craft, I never really connected on a personal or emotional level with the stories these sonnets told.
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February 4, 2025glad i read this for the sake of it being a part of the percival everett literary pantheon, but i wish i was smart enough to understand it lol
July 26, 2025
The titles of each of these poems frame it musically so that it feels like a 1950s Beatnik coffeehouse reading. After each one, I felt like snapping my fingers.
October 31, 2024
I’m sure this deserves a higher rating, but I didn’t understand a lot of it
June 2, 2024
★★★★
This was my first time reading any of Everett’s works, so I didn’t know what exactly to expect, but now I know to keep my eye on this writer!
Everett is a genius when it comes to using language and form to conjure lovely sound and interesting meaning. He is skilled at creating juxtaposed ideas and images in so few words. I had fun reading these sonnets, repeating each several times in my head and aloud, fascinated at how expertly-crafted they were.
My favorite sonnets:
Bb Major
Eb Minor
Ab Major
C# Minor
B Major
E Major
C Minor
I wasn’t so much a fan of the latter half of the book. Whether that was because it took me out of my reading flow from the first half— I enjoyed this work so much I read it in one sitting!— or because I truly couldn’t comprehend a lot of meaning, I’m not sure. I did, however, enjoy Everett’s use of vivid, wacky imagery and repetition. This made this section feel surreal and overall moody.
Additional comment: I was a bit distracted by the background design on the pages. I think a lower opacity would help. Otherwise, I find it intriguing!
Thank you Red Hen Press and Net Galley for the e-ARC! This title will be available August 20, 2024.
This was my first time reading any of Everett’s works, so I didn’t know what exactly to expect, but now I know to keep my eye on this writer!
Everett is a genius when it comes to using language and form to conjure lovely sound and interesting meaning. He is skilled at creating juxtaposed ideas and images in so few words. I had fun reading these sonnets, repeating each several times in my head and aloud, fascinated at how expertly-crafted they were.
My favorite sonnets:
Bb Major
Eb Minor
Ab Major
C# Minor
B Major
E Major
C Minor
I wasn’t so much a fan of the latter half of the book. Whether that was because it took me out of my reading flow from the first half— I enjoyed this work so much I read it in one sitting!— or because I truly couldn’t comprehend a lot of meaning, I’m not sure. I did, however, enjoy Everett’s use of vivid, wacky imagery and repetition. This made this section feel surreal and overall moody.
Additional comment: I was a bit distracted by the background design on the pages. I think a lower opacity would help. Otherwise, I find it intriguing!
Thank you Red Hen Press and Net Galley for the e-ARC! This title will be available August 20, 2024.
September 25, 2024
My rating reflects not "how good a book" I think this is, but my enjoyment of it. Usually these two things are pretty close to identical for me. But here I feel unwilling to make my judgment (especially one this harsh) on this book's quality, given its opacity. It's a kind of opacity that does not pull me in and inspires no struggle, as something like a Geoffrey Hill or a Wallace Stevens poem might. Nor was there a sense that the poems were articulating that they could not articulate something interesting, like the poems of erasure and stasis I encountered in my literature of trauma class. I had the sensation of being tasked with climbing a skyscraper made entirely of clean flat panes of glass. Handholds did appear here and there: moments of concrete image or music- but they appeared briefly, rarely, and set adrift.
Everett has characterized his poetry as experimentation with “pure form” and said in a Paris Review interview that he writes poetry to prove that he can’t. I don't know that that means, and I'm not sure what the experiment is.
If it sounds like I have indeed made a judgment on the 'quality' of this collection, well maybe it's impossible not to do so to some degree. I am interested in reading Everett's fiction, and should it inspire me, perhaps this book will make more sense upon return. Til then, :|
Everett has characterized his poetry as experimentation with “pure form” and said in a Paris Review interview that he writes poetry to prove that he can’t. I don't know that that means, and I'm not sure what the experiment is.
If it sounds like I have indeed made a judgment on the 'quality' of this collection, well maybe it's impossible not to do so to some degree. I am interested in reading Everett's fiction, and should it inspire me, perhaps this book will make more sense upon return. Til then, :|
September 2, 2024
This book of poetry is ekphrasis at its finest! The collection is short, efficient, and structured like the art forms that inspired it: Italian sonnets, Art Tatum's jazz piano solos, and Chopin's famous Preludes. The slim 62-page book contains 47 poems. No poem is longer than a page. The first half of the book is sonnets, specifically Petrarchan sonnets. The second half is short couplet-based poems that end up forming quintets or sestets. All of the poems tie in with one of Chopin’s 24 preludes via their title, except Prelude No. 1 in C-Minor which ends up being the "Missing Key" from the title. Like Chopin's Preludes, the poems are a little discordant—touching on really sad stuff then switching up quickly to something that feels more playful and high energy.
I like the second half of the collection a lot. The poems read like jazz, and I think this is the section that is mostly closely linked to Art Tatum’s piano solos. The quintets and sestets are very stream of consciousness and fast paced. They have nice repetition and are pretty to read out loud.
One of the most surprising things about this collection was the repeated allusions to Lewis Carroll's Through the Looking Glass. I delighted in these unexpected references. Everett always has a surprise up his sleeve.
I like the second half of the collection a lot. The poems read like jazz, and I think this is the section that is mostly closely linked to Art Tatum’s piano solos. The quintets and sestets are very stream of consciousness and fast paced. They have nice repetition and are pretty to read out loud.
One of the most surprising things about this collection was the repeated allusions to Lewis Carroll's Through the Looking Glass. I delighted in these unexpected references. Everett always has a surprise up his sleeve.
September 29, 2024
I recommend reading these poems (particularly the second half) while listening to their corresponding Chopin preludes!
The first half of the book was harder for me to get through -- as I often find with poetry, certain lines or stanzas resonated with me, but whole poems were hard to wrap my head around.
Then the second half! These poems, written more experimentally than the sonnets in the first half, really worked for me. Because I listened to the Chopin preludes simultaneously, I experienced just how well Everett evoked the emotions and the ideas in each prelude, each key. This section also felt more attuned to Art Tatum and jazz improvisation, and I thoroughly enjoyed following threads in each poem as well as going back to the first section to look for parallels - they weren't always there, but it was wonderful when they were.
This book was somewhat unexpectedly in conversation with Toni Morrison's "Jazz," which I also read this month. It's so interesting to see what different authors do with the idea of writing improvisationally.
The first half of the book was harder for me to get through -- as I often find with poetry, certain lines or stanzas resonated with me, but whole poems were hard to wrap my head around.
Then the second half! These poems, written more experimentally than the sonnets in the first half, really worked for me. Because I listened to the Chopin preludes simultaneously, I experienced just how well Everett evoked the emotions and the ideas in each prelude, each key. This section also felt more attuned to Art Tatum and jazz improvisation, and I thoroughly enjoyed following threads in each poem as well as going back to the first section to look for parallels - they weren't always there, but it was wonderful when they were.
This book was somewhat unexpectedly in conversation with Toni Morrison's "Jazz," which I also read this month. It's so interesting to see what different authors do with the idea of writing improvisationally.
July 24, 2024
Well, these poems are very different. Free, expressionist, more like jazz than the Chopin Preludes they reference. Each of the sonnets is designated by a key–E b, B minor, D Major, etc.
Some lines grabbed me.
“Time still hunts us, does it not?”
“…the truth is but a series of contingent statements.”
“We project deities onto the night sky, drawings of mammals in the stars, sketches of crabs, of scorpions because they scare us.”
Several poems stood out. B Minor with a child’s drawing and the poet insisting there was an elephant in the scribble-scrabble, not really seeing it but wanting to see it.
Like most poetry, this collection isn’t something to whiz through. Pick it up and read it little by little, opening yourself up without expectations, not needing to command it, just allow yourself to be led where it takes you.
Thanks to the publisher for a free book through NetGalley.
Some lines grabbed me.
“Time still hunts us, does it not?”
“…the truth is but a series of contingent statements.”
“We project deities onto the night sky, drawings of mammals in the stars, sketches of crabs, of scorpions because they scare us.”
Several poems stood out. B Minor with a child’s drawing and the poet insisting there was an elephant in the scribble-scrabble, not really seeing it but wanting to see it.
Like most poetry, this collection isn’t something to whiz through. Pick it up and read it little by little, opening yourself up without expectations, not needing to command it, just allow yourself to be led where it takes you.
Thanks to the publisher for a free book through NetGalley.
August 21, 2024
I played the Chopin piece that accompanies each poem, and that added an extra level of fun and mystery. Did the music and poem work together? Sometimes yes, sometimes no, which made me even more curious. Ultimately I decided it doesn't matter, because the best result of this experience was to decide for myself the why of music choices, the why of the word choices. The structure of the sonnets in the first part created its own music. And the musical instructions in the Other Modes part of the book underscored the mood.
I received "Sonnets for a Missing Key" through a Goodreads giveaway. Thank you! It wouldn't have occurred to me otherwise to linger over poems with specific music. The book jacket says, "That's bullshit. They are just sonnets." But whether or not that's true, the depth of Percival Everett's spare, precise poetry was a thoughtful invitation into deeper meaning.
#RedHenPress
I received "Sonnets for a Missing Key" through a Goodreads giveaway. Thank you! It wouldn't have occurred to me otherwise to linger over poems with specific music. The book jacket says, "That's bullshit. They are just sonnets." But whether or not that's true, the depth of Percival Everett's spare, precise poetry was a thoughtful invitation into deeper meaning.
#RedHenPress
April 30, 2025
Most of the poems in this collection don't have a clear theme (perhaps a few do, such as 9 Largo). Instead, the language brings our attention to the interesting rhetorical devices Everett employs, such as repetition, questions, sing-song, and use of the imperative. Many phrases are very abstract ("circling a radius never spanned"). There is even a certain formality to the poems.
Pleasing the sensitive reader is a delicate achievement in a style like this. I like, for instance, how Everett compares "Wandering sorrow" to "an invitation to a party without music," but he overwhelms that moment with the unnecessary phrase "nothing but death," which is unduly heavy.
Like many modern poems with the "sonnet" moniker, the ones in this book just gesture toward the classic sonnet forms—for instance, possessing two quatrains followed by two triplets. The final lines often recall earlier words.
Pleasing the sensitive reader is a delicate achievement in a style like this. I like, for instance, how Everett compares "Wandering sorrow" to "an invitation to a party without music," but he overwhelms that moment with the unnecessary phrase "nothing but death," which is unduly heavy.
Like many modern poems with the "sonnet" moniker, the ones in this book just gesture toward the classic sonnet forms—for instance, possessing two quatrains followed by two triplets. The final lines often recall earlier words.
September 4, 2024
Lit Major
1
"Confounding!" I cried to Constance (my wife
and steady reading companion). "I might
withhold my rating. I'm afraid, despite
my education, elucidation's causing strife."
2
With pen in hand, the Preludes of Chopin
cascading in my ear, set to dissect
stubborn quatrains and elusive tercets,
'til slowly laying bare the master plan.
3
Such sweeping themes that teased me out of thought!
Clever chiasmus, playful reversals,
internal rhyme with caesurical pause,
Everett's bundles of truths universal,
tones bound to music have earned my applause!
But mass appeal ... remains controversial.
Education Minor 19 Mosso Allegro
You nearly got me
With that "Swede" metaphor
Sticking out like
a sore thumb
At the end of "D Minor".
The way it connects
To the wound up springs
Of line four.
Of course you're referring
to God.
1
"Confounding!" I cried to Constance (my wife
and steady reading companion). "I might
withhold my rating. I'm afraid, despite
my education, elucidation's causing strife."
2
With pen in hand, the Preludes of Chopin
cascading in my ear, set to dissect
stubborn quatrains and elusive tercets,
'til slowly laying bare the master plan.
3
Such sweeping themes that teased me out of thought!
Clever chiasmus, playful reversals,
internal rhyme with caesurical pause,
Everett's bundles of truths universal,
tones bound to music have earned my applause!
But mass appeal ... remains controversial.
Education Minor 19 Mosso Allegro
You nearly got me
With that "Swede" metaphor
Sticking out like
a sore thumb
At the end of "D Minor".
The way it connects
To the wound up springs
Of line four.
Of course you're referring
to God.
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