Literature

Based on a play by Puerto Rican playwright Rene marques, this video potrays the migration of a Puerto Rican family from the countryside to the San Juan ghetto and then to New York's Spanish Harlem.

This provocative and emotionally unsettling video examines the realities behind the myth of the Marquis de Sade (1740-1814), the French author who, charged with numerous sexual offenses, spent half of his adult life in prisons or asylums.

This entertaining documentary features a variety of African-American poets from all over America, who have gathered to perform at Kafe Kuumba in Indianapolis, a local cultural center sponsored by the Midtown Writers Association.

Tells the story of Joyce's epic novel, Ulysses, his most famous creation and certainly the most renowned work of fiction of the twentieth century. Filmed in Zurich, Trieste, New York and Dublin, the video portrays Joyce's own trials as a writer, his long struggle with his magnum opus, and his persistence in trying to have his "buke" made available to a mass audience.

Examines the role of black resistance to apartheid in South Africa through a look at two of the nation's leading cultural activists and popular performers--poet Mzwakhe Mbuli and writer/ performer Gcina Mhlophe.

This musical biography is a documentary-style recreation of the life of Thomas Moore (1779-1852), Ireland's greatest national lyric poet, whose melodies and poems were revered throughout 19th-century Europe.

Chronicles the life and literary career of a major black American poet, Dudley Randall, who has published six books of poetry and edited several anthologies of black poetry.

Portrays the life and career of this Italian husband and wife duo of actors and playwrights, who are best known for their satirical and politically radical theater presentations.

Examines the life and work of the Nobel Prize-winning poet. In an interview conducted shortly before his death, Neruda discusses his worldview and explains his writing methods.

Hosted by Cheech Marin, this documentary examines the work of several Hispanic- American writers and how their poems, short stories and novels reflect what it means and what it's like to grow up Hispanic in America.

A high school teacher and one of his students don Elizabethan garb and travel back in time to London in 1609 to have lunch with William Shakespeare at the Mermaid Tavern.

Set against a background of farming, saw-milling and moonshining activities in rural Kentucky during the Depression, this short film dramatizes the use of violence as a socially accepted form of "folk justice."

This docudrama portrays the life and work of the great Puerto Rican poet, from her impoverished childhood in Puerto Rico, to her political involvement as a young woman in the nationalist movement, to her subsequent exile in Cuba and New York where she died in 1953.

Celebrates the traditional art of storytelling through profiles of three storytellers--Judith Black, whose stories explore the Jewish immigrant experience; Michael Cotter, a Minnesota farmer whose stories focus on the extraordinary qualities of ordinary people; and Rex Ellis, whose stories deal with the historical period of enslavement of Afro- Americans.

Focusing on the beat poetry scene of the late Fifties, this film poem celebrates a colorful generation of American poets, featuring interviews with Stuart Perkoff, Aya, Jack Hirschman, Lawrence Ferlinghetti, and Allen Ginsberg, who read their poems and discuss what it means to be a poet in America.

Novelist Jane Rule's discussions of the craft and her philosophy of writing are blended with readings from Rule's novels and stories and an interview with Smith College professor Marilyn Schuster, who discusses plot, characterization and other aspects of fiction, moral statements in literature, and issues of freedom of expression and censorship.

Profiles the life and work of lesbian novelist, essayist, teacher and political activist Jane Rule. Blending interviews with archival footage and dramatic evocation's of Rule's writings, the documentary examines the author's lifelong interest in the intricacies and complexities of human relationships and communities, her continuing involvement in the struggle against censorship, and her conviction that we must all be able to live and love truthfully.

This video portrait of Chinua Achebe, one of Africa's greatest authors, examines how the Nigerian-born writer-and modern Africa itself-were shaped by a history of racism and colonialism. Achebe, best known as the author of Things Fall Apart (1958), the first great African novel in the English language, has also written other novels, poetry, children's stories, and criticism.

Portrays the day-long Bloomsday celebration, when James Joyce devotees annually recreate and relive, through role-playing and readings, the famous odyssey of Leopold Bloom around Dublin on June 16th, 1904, as immortalized in Joyce's classic novel, Ulysses.

Profiles the life and work of one of the world's greatest contemporary novelists, who in 1990 campaigned unsuccessfully for the Presidency of Peru.