ARCHIVE: The Writer in America. Annotated unpublished interview transcript, with film and audio reels. [3 bankers boxes]
THE WRITER IN AMERICA
UNEDITED AND UNPUBLISHED INTERVIEW
TAPES AND TRANSCRIPT
[Morrison, Toni. The Writer in America. Produced and directed by Richard O. Moore. Photographed and edited by Philip Greene. Sound recording by Gene Doherty. Production assistant Ruth Moore. New York: Educational Broadcasting Corporation, 1978.]
4to.; annotated photocopy typescript; in folder with binder clip, labeled “Toni Morrison”; approximately 84 pp. in total, including dialogue transcription (67 pages), index (one page), and reading excerpts photocopied from several novels (16 pages); production notes throughout in pencil, red pencil, and ink; some minor creasing and wear at edges.
Together with two bankers boxes of related audio reels.
The 67-page unedited and unpublished audio transcript of Toni Morrison’s October 1977 interview with Richard Moore for The Writer in America, a late-1970s documentary series that Moore, a filmmaker, also produced and directed. The interview, which includes Morrison’s commentary on her life and writing as well as readings from her first three novels, was given over several days as the crew followed her and filmed in a variety of locations (including “driving thru Rockland with Toni Morrison” and “Toni leaving Random House”).
The video footage and standalone audio track were ultimately edited down to a running time of 28 minutes.
Annotations in the margins throughout the transcript include cues for reading (e.g., “Sula start,” “transition to Sula,” “end of Sula”) as well general one- or two-word summaries of subject matter (e.g., “her writing,” “Sammy,” “new book”); some text is bracketed or underlined. Within the transcript are passages photocopied from The Bluest Eye (1970), Sula (1974), and The Song of Solomon (1977).
The Writer in America series began in 1975 and featured interviews with Janet Flanner, John Gardner, Ross Macdonald, Toni Morrison, Muriel Rukeyser, Eudora Welty, and others. Moore also produced and directed the 1960s Poetry USA series, which included interviews with John Ashbery, Robert Creeley, Allen Ginsberg, Kenneth Koch, Denise Levertov, Robert Lowell, Frank O’Hara, Charles Olson, Ed Sanders, Anne Sexton, and many more.
(#4655846 and #4657870)
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