Short Story: The Corrector of Misconceptions


I was reading Kenneth Koch’s book of short stories, “Hotel Lambosa,” while listening to Art Tatum and suddenly got an idea for a short story of my own about a guy lecturing someone else, another guy about the same age, about Oscar Peterson and Nat King Cole. The guy is saying, No, Oscar Peterson’s style is mainly derived from Nat King Cole, a jazz piano virtuoso before (and after) he began his singing career. Sure, Oscar admired Tatum as well, but the real influence is Nat Cole. Then he says, No, the Divine Comedy is not a religious poem, it is a political poem.