Mumbo Jumbo

Published in 1973, Ishmael Reed’s Mumbo Jumbo is a novel that decenters the Westernized, Judeo-Christian historical perspective and compels the reader to see history through a more Afrocentric lens. The novel incorporates nontraditional storytelling techniques such as linear distortion, footnotes, photographs, and charts. It is often affiliated with postmodernism and Afrofuturism.

The story begins in 1920. There is an outbreak of Jes Grew, which is spreading toward Harlem, where the novel is primarily set. Those who catch Jes Grew show symptoms like dancing and lusting. Protagonist Papa LaBas, a voodoo priest (houngan), views Jes Grew as an “anti-plague” that advances Black culture.

The Wallflower Order of the Atonist Path hires Hinckle Von Vampton, a centuries-old member of the Knights Templar, to stop Jes Grew and promote Western civilization. LaBas, along with Black Herman and their associates at the Mumbo Jumbo Kathedral, fight against Atonism and hope to find Jes Grew’s sacred text.

Abdul Hamid, a Black Muslim magazine editor, receives Jes Grew’s text and works on translating it from hieroglyphics. Von Vampton and his assistant, Gould, enter Abdul’s office and kill him.