Americans have long seen their soul, their failures, and their triumphs through
their writers. No other country has produced such a noble body of literature
as the United States. Hello I'm Jane Kazmerich and welcome to the Great
American Authors Series. This generation of writers witnessed and
participated in World War II, Korea, the Cold War, the Civil Rights Movement, and
Vietnam. These experiences shaped them intellectually, spiritually, and
emotionally in ways that were translated into their writing.
With the Civil Rights Movement in full swing black Americans were uncertain as
to who they were. No one better expressed this limbo than Lorraine
Hansberry and her play, "A Raisin in the Sun."
You haven't even looked at him. You haven't even looked at it and you don't even have to speak on it again?
Well you tell that to my boy tonight when you put him to sleep on the living
room couch and you tell it to him in the morning when his mother goes out of
here to take care of somebody else's kids. I tell it to me when we want some
curtains or some drapes and you sneak out of here and go work in somebody's
kitchen. All I wanted to make a future for this family, all I wanted to be able
to stand in front of my boy like my father never was able to do to me and
tell him that he would be somebody in this world besides the servant and the
chauffeur. Help me that in. No public expression better captured the angst and
dilemma facing American blacks and the American black male in particular then
Lorraine Hansberry's play, "A Raisin in the Sun." When her play opened in New York
City on March 11, 1959 it achieved a number of firsts. It was the first play
written by a black woman to be produced on Broadway. It won the New York drama
critics circle award and Hansberry was the youngest writer and the first black
to receive this award. Lorraine Hansberry was born on May 19, 1930 in Chicago, the
daughter of a well-known real estate broker. She grew up in Woodlawn on
Chicago south side. Her parents were intellectuals and activists providing
her with diverse experiences of life. After attending the University of Wisconsin
for two years she went to New York where she studied with W.E.B. Du Bois and wrote
for Paul Robison's Freedom magazine. Her marriage in 1953 to Robert Nemeroff, a
white writer and activist, helped further to awaken her writing passion. Six years
later her masterpiece was ready for its debut. Historically Hansberry's play
told an empirical truth. America's black community from PhD to welfare
recipient were bound together by the fact that all were ordered to ride at the
back of the bus but with desegregation blacks knew who they weren't. They
weren't sons and daughters of slaves and they weren't Africans. When the
affluent and the professional moved into integrated suburbs and their children
attended integrated schools the sense of community and ethnicity based on Jim
Crow laws dissolved. What the play so prophetically showed was the need for as
black author James Baldwin put it a profound articulation of the black
tradition by new black leaders. When Lorraine Hansberry wrote Raisin in the Sun
the basic question before African Americans was integration. Now 50 years
later African Americans the African American community is divided along
political and generational lines that Lorraine Hansberry could not have
imagined. Two years after the play debuted on Broadway it was made into a
movie with a brilliant James Dean like performance from Sidney Poitier.
Tragically Lorraine Hansberry died from cancer at the age of 34. Depriving
Americans of all the tremendous stories she might have written. Perhaps even
contributing more to that articulation Baldwin called for.
The next three writers became American icons pop figures in their own right
they were Joseph Heller Kurt Vonnegut and Truman Capote. Authors were now
media celebrities in their own time.
His novel catch 22 has sold more than 12 million copies and was inspired by the
authors own World War II experiences as a bombardier in Europe. Oddly it became
the anthem for the anti-war movement seven years later as the US got mired in
Vietnam. The author of this singular book was Joseph Heller. Heller was born
in May 1st 1923 in Brooklyn New York. He was a leader of the black humor
movement of post World War II literature. Black humor writers satirized serious
subjects with a dark comic style in voice. In catch 22 Heller pointed out the
absurdities of military bureaucracy against the terrifying confusion of war.
He did this through his anti-hero Yossarian and a squadron of mad and
eccentric characters whose outrageous antics and actions had never been seen
before in American literature. The title catch 22 was derived from an
incoherent military regulation invented by Heller. Indeed the expression catch
22 has entered the English language as a term for an absurd and contradictory
situation or bureaucratic rule. There was only one catch and that was catch 22
which specified that a concern for one's own safety in the face of dangers that
were real and immediate was the process of the rational mind or was crazy and
could be grounded. All he had to do was ask and as soon as he did he would no
longer be crazy and would have to fly more missions. If he flew them he was
crazy and didn't have to but if he didn't want to he was sane and had to.
At some catch that catch 22 Yossarian observed it's the best there is. Dr.
Neek agreed. Catch 22 was such a popular book that it was made into a movie starring
Alan Arkin in 1970. Other authors also used dark comedy to satirize American
ideals and images. In his 1960 novel Rabbit Run John Updike pointed out the
ironies of the so-called perfect suburban life and Philip Roth's Port
Noise Complaint in 1969 ridiculed men's sexual neuroses. Heller's other novels
written in the same deeply ironic and darkly satiric voice include something
happened good as gold *** knows and catch 22 sequel closing time. Heller died on
December 12th 1999.
Truman Capote's most inspiring and most imitated book was In Cold Blood.
It was a book that would change the landscape of American media in the 20th
century by combining journalism with narrative fiction. Capote was born in
New Orleans on the 30th of September 1924. He was a part of the post-World War 2
dark style of writing that placed eccentric characters in unusual
situations. His early novels Other Voices, Other Rooms written in 1948 and
Breakfast at Tiffany's written in 1958 showcased his polished style that captivated
readers and critics alike. Indeed every baby boomer young woman wanted to be the
free-spirited Holly go lightly played by Audrey Hepburn in the movie of the same
title. But it was his gripping quasi fictional novel In Cold Blood that
captured the imagination of the country. A blend of fiction and historical fact the
book tells the chilling true-life story of two drifters who brutally murdered a
Kansas farm family in 1959. Published in 1966 its new docudrama style blending
fact and fiction enthralled all who read it. In 1967 it was made into a movie
starring Robert Blake. In describing his reasons for writing the book with its
journalistic voice which was quite different in style and voice from his
other works Capote said. I spent four years on and off in that part of Western
Kansas there during the research for the book and then the film. The reason was I
wanted to make an experiment in journalistic writing and I was looking
for a subject that would have sufficient proportions. I'd already done a great deal
of narrative journalistic writing in this experimental vein in the 1950s for
the New Yorker. But I was looking for something very special that would give me
a lot of scope. Capote's originality and polished writing for In Cold Blood
would lead to a host of imitators trying in vain to match his historical
docudrama style of writing. Indeed his quasi scholarly style would lead to
imitators in many media genres including endless movies of the week based on
real-life happenings. Openly gay Capote infamous for celebrity parties lived a
publicly troubled life. Capote died on August 25th 1984.
He is perhaps best remembered for his dark comedic style, rye voice, fantastic
and realistic elements. He is author Kurt Vonnegut. Vonnegut was born on
November 11th 1922 in Indianapolis, Indiana. He fought in World War II and was
captured spending part of the war in Dresden, Germany. He was there in February
1945 when 1,000 Allied planes bombed the city and obliterated it. This
experience deeply shaped Vonnegut's worldview. A worldview that echoed the
European existential tradition. A worldview that essentially saw all of
human activity as inescapably destructive.
Returning home after the war, Vonnegut became a science fiction writer but that
would change in his transitional novel Cats Cradle with its mysterious Ice Nine
substance. After that, like fellow author Joseph Heller, Vonnegut was a member of
the dark comedy school of writing using satire to point out the flaws in life.
Yet Vonnegut also developed a unique style in voice. A style in voice as unique as
19th century humorist Mark Twain's. A style in voice as unique as a fingerprint.
Vonnegut blended space travel and fantastic inventions with fantasy to
create memorable characters and places. His most inventive and significant novel,
Slaughterhouse Five, contains a host of memorable characters including Billy
Pilgrim. A man who has become unstuck in time and can travel from one part of his
life to another like walking through a door.
Slaughterhouse Five rests squarely on Vonnegut's Dresden experience and
reveals Vonnegut's gloomy view of humanity. Meeting hit on with what he sees as
humanity's appetite to destroy itself, Vonnegut moralizes that humanity's only
hope for survival lies in a comic awareness of human folly.
Written in 1969, Slaughterhouse Five seemed written not only to expose the
destructive potential of the Cold War, but also as an anti-Vietnam war
exclamation. As a result, it became a rallying cry for the baby boomer
generation. Vonnegut's other novels include Breakfast of Champions, Dead Eye
****, and Galapagos. Kurt Vonnegut died April 11th 2007.
If the Holden Coughfield character and J.D. Salinger's Catcher in the Rye had
grown to old age, he would have become the main character in John Updike's
famous rabbit series.
From the beginning, he appeared destined to write. Born at the height of the
lost generation era, his mother encouraged his writing talent. In college, he was
president of Harvard's National Lampoon. Immediately upon graduation, he went to
work for the New Yorker magazine where he honed his lyrical prose style. He has
authored John Updike. Updike was born March 18th 1932 in Chillington, Pennsylvania.
An area that would become the setting for his most famous novels, his rabbit
series. Rabbit Run, Rabbit Redux, Rabbit is Rich, and Rabbit at Rest.
These four novels paint a bleak picture of American suburban life through their
main character, Harry Rabbit Angstrom, who mirrors the dominant version of the
American dream after World War II. It is the story of a nation's great
contradiction with wealth come security, but at the same time alienation and a
lack of individual meaning in life. Updike's rabbit series debuted in 1960 with
Rabbit Run. Using Updike's innovative present tense writing style, the tagline
from the movie poster. Three months ago, Rabbit Angstrom ran out to buy his wife
cigarettes. He hasn't come home yet. Captures the essence of this novel.
Rabbit Redux, written in 1971, and set against the backdrop of the Vietnam War,
racial unrest, and drug use, mirrors a nation that doesn't know what to do with
the problems it faces in the late 60s.
Rabbit is Rich, his Updike's finest rabbit creation, and it won him a Pulitzer
Prize in 1982. Once again, Rabbit's problems are the problems of America's
aging baby boomers, a generation that is becoming the wealthiest generation the
world has ever seen, yet is spiritually unfulfilled.
In Updike's final novel, Rabbit at rest. Rabbit, now in retirement, once again is
confronted with problems. He runs away in despair, and while hiding, he dies.
"People today would gas a dollar a gallon. I'm going to want these eight
cylinder inefficient gosars just to feel the wind in their hair. Kid, you're
living in a dream world." Updike's novels are a comment on the potential
shallowness of American life in the last half of the 20th century. Indeed, the
series follows the evolution of the baby boomer generation from the 60s to the
end of the 20th century. John Updike and the 21st century continue to write from
his home in Beverly Farms, Massachusetts.
In the next two segments, we shall see how ethnic American authors expand the
American literary voice.
Throughout most of U.S. history, America's largest cities have harbored smaller
ethnic enclaves. For many Americans, the most mysterious of these many cities
were Asian, referred to by names such as Chinatown, Japan Town, Little Korea, and
Little Vietnam. In them, life continued remarkably unchanged from the old
country. Here, visitors were surrounded by unfamiliar languages, exotic food, and
foreign customs. Here, where East met West, it seemed as though Asian cultures
would remain forever separate from U.S. society. Then, in 1989, a young woman
published an exceptional book that opened up Asian cultures to all Americans. The
book, The Joy Luck Club, the author Amy Tan. Chinese immigrants first arrived in
California during the Gold Rush of 1848. They stayed to build railroads and
established businesses. At the turn of the century, the Japanese also arrived,
providing cheap labor for sugar plantations in Hawaii and farms along the
Pacific coast. Following the Korean and Vietnam wars, refugees from those
countries settled in America's cities. In each case, families also brought with
them a tradition of female subservience. In the latter part of the 20th century,
Asians still congregated in their own communities, kept mostly to themselves
and carried on in their old ways. But at the same time, they sent their children
to public schools and watched American television and movies. Out of the second
generation, came a young author, a woman who, with remarkable skill and
compassion, revealed the inner workings of Asian society undergoing generational
changes. Amy Tan was born in 1952 in Oakland, California. Her father was a
Chinese-born Baptist minister. Her mother was the daughter of an upper-class
family in Shanghai. Graduating from college, Tan became a freelance business
writer and prospered. But Tan sought an outlet for her creative energies and
turned to fiction writing. In 1989, she released the Joy Luck Club. It was an
instant success, a must-read among American women. Four years later, it was
made into a blockbuster movie. For the first time on a large scale, Asians were
perceived as true Americans. At the same time, Tan's remarkable literary
achievements also opened the door for young Asian American women to forgo
traditional roles and pursue careers. As of 2002, 18% of Asian and Asian American
women pursue work in business, finance, and other professions. As for Tan herself,
she has added to her literary legacy, publishing children's books, and new
novels, including "The Kitchen ***'s Wife", "The Hundred Secret Senses", and "The
Bone Setter's Daughter".
Between them, these black authors have won four Pulitzer Prizes, seven Tony
Awards, and a Nobel Prize for Literature. They've shown us new ways of looking at
black history, of redefining the black experience. There are late 20th century
black American writers Toni Morrison, Alice Walker, and August Wilson.
Rejecting the Harlem Renaissance's glorification of black life as well as the
outrage accounts of discrimination in racism by Ralph Ellison, James Baldwin,
Malcolm X, and Stokely Carmichael. The new black writers such as Morrison,
Walker, and Playwright Wilson began rewriting black experience from a
modern perspective. As an editor for the prominent publisher
Random House in the 60s, Toni Morrison saw a chance to write with a new voice,
a voice that was an American voice. Her first novels "The Bluest Eye",
"Sula", "Song of Solomon", and "Tar Baby", written from 1970 to 1981,
tell of problems all Americans face. And her later novels Beloved,
written in 1987, and jazz written in 1992, examine black history as an
American, not as a black American. Indeed, she won a Nobel Prize for
Literature in 1993. Alice Walker was the youngest of eight
children of black sharecroppers. She would use this experience in her
family's history to create strong women characters,
characters who would become powerful leaders in their communities.
Indeed, her positive philosophy about being black and a woman
is one of the strongest points of her writing.
But just as important, her novels seldom blamed whites for the tragedies in
her characters' lives. Her best-known novel "The Color Purple"
won the Pulitzer Prize for Literature in 1983.
August Wilson was born in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, April 27, 1945.
He was self-educated by reading at the Carnegie Library.
Early on, he knew he wanted to become a writer.
He started his own theater company in Pittsburgh and began to write plays about
black life. He is best known for his Pittsburgh
cycle. Ten plays each set in a different decade,
giving a unique snapshot of the comedy and adversity of black life
in 20th century America. His plays have won two Pulitzer's
and seven Tony Awards. He died on October 2, 2005 from liver cancer.
Morrison, Walker, and Wilson are a new generation of black authors
building a bridge to a new century. And like other ethnic authors,
they're helping America to integrate itself in this new century.
Cormac McCarthy captured the worst fears expressed by American writers
since the beginning of the 20th century. In his Pulitzer prize-winning novel "The
Road," his characters are like the literature of the 21st century.
At a crossroads, waiting to see what will happen.
[Music]
Cormac McCarthy's novel "The Road" is an inventive and brilliant literary
masterpiece. But "The Road" is more than that.
"The Road" is a continuation of the gifted, innovative writing that has
characterized American literature since the beginning of the 20th century.
Marking McCarthy as the literary descendant worthy of the last century's most
illustrious pioneering writers; Tennessee Williams, Jack Kerouac, and Truman
Capote. And just as importantly, "The Road's
apocalyptic story of a son and father on the road to nowhere"
is a fitting culmination of that century's two great literary themes.
First, there is no home anymore. And second, the nation's flaws leave you
wandering in an emotional and intellectual desert.
Born in 1933, McCarthy grew up in Tennessee.
Throughout the last half of the 20th century, McCarthy wrote books that were
acclaimed by critics but achieved only modest financial success.
But in 1992, his all the pretty horses garnered national acclaim
and became a best-seller. But it is McCarthy's 10th novel "The Road"
which won him his first Pulitzer Prize in 2007.
Cormac McCarthy's groundbreaking style and voice in "The Road"
point the way for the next generation of writers who will tell America's story
in the 21st century.
The next generation of American authors will have grown up during the end of the
Cold War, the Cyber Revolution, the events of 9/11,
the failed preemptive war in Iraq. It was a time when the American spirit reached
the highest of highs and the lowest of lows.
With this background, what will they be able to tell us about who we are now?
What will be the next expression of the American voice?
The legacy of Whitman, Twain, Wharton, Hemingway, Capote, Morrison and Vonnegut
has now been passed to these unknown authors of the future.
Thanks for joining me for this eight-part series "Great American Authors"
since 1650 as we traveled through 350 years of American literary greatness.
I'm Jane Kasmerik.
(dramatic music)