End and Beginning. Meeting Wislawa Szymborska

Description

After every war, someone has to clean up...someone has to push the rubble to the side of the road so the corpse-filled wagons can pass, writes Wislawa Syzmborska in "The End and the Beginning." Called the Mozart of poetry, she is known for her use of deceptively simple language that slowly builds to a powerful revelation, especially in poems that were inspired by wartime events in her native Poland. This compelling program acquaints viewers with the charismatic Syzmborska as she reads from her works, including "Hitler's First Photograph" ("And who's this little fellow in his itty-bitty robe?"), discusses the role of politics in poetry, and recalls her reaction to winning the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1996. The video also features a tour of the poet's Krakow haunts, and footage of Polish singer Kora performing her 1994 hit - a rendition of Syzmborska's "Nothing Twice" set to punk rock music.

Runtime

55 min

Subjects

Contributor

Geography

Genre

Date of Publication

[2013], c2011

Database

Films on Demand

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