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The American Collection
''The American Collection'' was a spinoff series of '' Masterpiece Theater'', which ran from 2000 to 2003, for the former series' 30th anniversary. It was funded originally by Exxon Mobil (later Mobil); however, funding for both series was withdrawn in 2005. It aired on PBS. This was a widely acclaimed limited run program. History This program featured film adaptations by renowned works by American literary giants, and debuted in October 2000. The films are produced by WGBH and ALT films. Theme music The theme for this series was created by John Williams, and featured cellist Yo-Yo Ma. It can be listened to here: https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/masterpiece/americancollection/music.html Title design Karin Fong, Dana Yee and Grant Lau won a 2001 Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Main Title Design for their work on this series. Programs * Thornton Wilder's ''Our Town'' * Esmeralda Santiago's '' Almost a Woman'' * James Agee's ''A Death in the Family'' * Eudora Welty's ''The Ponder H ...
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Masterpiece (TV Series)
''Masterpiece'' (formerly known as ''Masterpiece Theatre'') is a drama anthology television series produced by WGBH Boston. It premiered on Public Broadcasting Service (PBS) on January 10, 1971. The series has presented numerous acclaimed British productions. Many of these are produced by the BBC, but the line-up has also included programs shown on the UK commercial channels ITV and Channel 4. Overview ''Masterpiece'' is known for presenting adaptations of novels and biographies, but it also shows original television dramas. The first title to air was ''The First Churchills'', starring Susan Hampshire as Sarah Churchill. Other programs presented on the series include '' The Six Wives of Henry VIII;'' ''Elizabeth R;'' ''I, Claudius;'' '' Upstairs, Downstairs;'' ''The Duchess of Duke Street;'' ''The Citadel;'' '' The Jewel in the Crown;'' '' Reckless;'' ''House of Cards;'' ''Traffik,'' and ''Jeeves and Wooster''. More recent popular titles include ''Prime Suspect,'' ''The Fo ...
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Eudora Welty
Eudora Alice Welty (April 13, 1909 – July 23, 2001) was an American short story writer, novelist and photographer who wrote about the American South. Her novel '' The Optimist's Daughter'' won the Pulitzer Prize in 1973. Welty received numerous awards, including the Presidential Medal of Freedom and the Order of the South. She was the first living author to have her works published by the Library of America. Her house in Jackson, Mississippi has been designated as a National Historic Landmark and is open to the public as a house museum. Biography Eudora Welty was born in Jackson, Mississippi, on April 13, 1909, the daughter of Christian Webb Welty (1879–1931) and Mary Chestina (Andrews) Welty (1883–1966). She grew up with younger brothers Edward Jefferson and Walter Andrews. Her mother was a schoolteacher. Welty soon developed a love of reading reinforced by her mother, who believed that "any room in our house, at any time in the day, was there to read in, or to be read t ...
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2003 American Television Series Endings
3 (three) is a number, numeral and digit. It is the natural number following 2 and preceding 4, and is the smallest odd prime number and the only prime preceding a square number. It has religious or cultural significance in many societies. Evolution of the Arabic digit The use of three lines to denote the number 3 occurred in many writing systems, including some (like Roman and Chinese numerals) that are still in use. That was also the original representation of 3 in the Brahmic (Indian) numerical notation, its earliest forms aligned vertically. However, during the Gupta Empire the sign was modified by the addition of a curve on each line. The Nāgarī script rotated the lines clockwise, so they appeared horizontally, and ended each line with a short downward stroke on the right. In cursive script, the three strokes were eventually connected to form a glyph resembling a with an additional stroke at the bottom: ३. The Indian digits spread to the Caliphate in the 9th ...
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The Ways Of White Folks
''The Ways of White Folks'' is a collection of fourteen short stories by Langston Hughes, published in 1934. Hughes wrote the book during a year he spent living in Carmel-by-the-Sea, California.  The collection addresses multiple dimensions of racial issues, focusing specifically on the unbalanced yet interdependent power dynamics between Black and White people. According to Hughes, the short stories are inspired either by his own lived experiences or those of others he encountered. Background He finished the book in the year he spent in Carmel, California, immediately upon return from an extended trip to Russia. While working, he primarily lived in a cottage, fondly known as “Ennesfree.” The cottage was provided by Noel Sullivan, one of several of Hughes’ patrons. Hughes’ stay in Carmel is marked by notable sense of deep community connection and sustenance. In a letter to close friends, Matt and Evelyn "Nebby" Crawford, he laments: "A few months ago I was worried ...
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Cora Unashamed
''Cora Unashamed'' is a 2000 American made-for-television drama film from The American Collection directed by Deborah Pratt, starring Regina Taylor and Cherry Jones. The film was shot on location in October 1999 in central Iowa. Cities such as Ames, Cambridge and Story City were used. The movie is based on a short story by the same name in ''The Ways of White Folks'', a 1934 collection of short stories by Langston Hughes. Cinematographer Ernest Holzman won an American Society of Cinematographers (ASC) Award, for Outstanding Achievement in Cinematography in Movies of the Week/Mini-Series'/Pilot for Network or Basic Broadcast TV, for his work on this film. David Herbert Donald called the short story "a brilliantly realized portrait of an isolated black woman in a small Middle Western town, who stoically survives her own sorrows but in the end lashes out against the hypocrisy of the whites who employ her." Synopsis This adaptation of Langston Hughes' powerful tale, set in the ...
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Langston Hughes
James Mercer Langston Hughes (February 1, 1901 – May 22, 1967) was an American poet, social activist, novelist, playwright, and columnist from Joplin, Missouri. One of the earliest innovators of the literary art form called jazz poetry, Hughes is best known as a leader of the Harlem Renaissance. He famously wrote about the period that "the Negro was in vogue", which was later paraphrased as "when Harlem was in vogue." Growing up in a series of Midwestern towns, Hughes became a prolific writer at an early age. He moved to New York City as a young man, where he made his career. He graduated from high school in Cleveland, Ohio, and soon began studies at Columbia University in New York City. Although he dropped out, he gained notice from New York publishers, first in ''The Crisis'' magazine and then from book publishers, and became known in the creative community in Harlem. He eventually graduated from Lincoln University. In addition to poetry, Hughes wrote plays and short s ...
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The American (novel)
''The American'' is a novel by Henry James, originally published as a serial in ''The Atlantic Monthly'' in 1876–77 and then as a book in 1877. The novel is an uneasy combination of social comedy and melodrama concerning the adventures and misadventures of Christopher Newman, an essentially good-hearted but rather gauche American businessman on his first tour of Europe. Newman is looking for a world different from the simple, harsh realities of 19th-century American business. He encounters both the beauty and the ugliness of Europe, and learns not to take either for granted. The core of the novel concerns Newman's courtship of a young widow from an aristocratic Parisian family. Plot In 1868, Christopher Newman, an American businessman, visits Europe on a Grand Tour. Having worked for a living since age ten (interrupted by service in the Union Army during the American Civil War), he has made a large fortune and retired in his thirties, and is now looking to settle down an ...
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Henry James
Henry James ( – ) was an American-British author. He is regarded as a key transitional figure between literary realism and literary modernism, and is considered by many to be among the greatest novelists in the English language. He was the son of Henry James Sr. and the brother of philosopher and psychologist William James and diarist Alice James. He is best known for his novels dealing with the social and marital interplay between ''émigré ''Americans, English people, and continental Europeans. Examples of such novels include '' The Portrait of a Lady'', '' The Ambassadors'', and '' The Wings of the Dove''. His later works were increasingly experimental. In describing the internal states of mind and social dynamics of his characters, James often wrote in a style in which ambiguous or contradictory motives and impressions were overlaid or juxtaposed in the discussion of a character's psyche. For their unique ambiguity, as well as for other aspects of their composition, ...
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The Song Of The Lark (novel)
''The Song of the Lark'' is a novel by American author Willa Cather, written in 1915. It is her third novel to be published. The book tells the story of a talented artist born in a small town in Colorado who discovers and develops her singing voice. Her story is told against the backdrop of the burgeoning American West in which she was born in a town along the rail line, of fast-growing Chicago near the turn of the twentieth century, and of the audience for singers of her skills in the US compared to Europe. Thea Kronborg grows up, learning herself, her strengths and her talent, until she reaches success. The title and first edition cover art comes from an 1884 painting of the same name by Jules Breton, part of the collection of the Art Institute of Chicago. Plot introduction Set in the 1890s in Moonstone, a fictional town in Colorado, ''The Song of the Lark'' is the self-portrait of an artist in the making. The ambitious young heroine, Thea Kronborg, leaves her hometown to g ...
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Willa Cather
Willa Sibert Cather (; born Wilella Sibert Cather; December 7, 1873 – April 24, 1947) was an American writer known for her novels of life on the Great Plains, including '' O Pioneers!'', '' The Song of the Lark'', and '' My Ántonia''. In 1923, she was awarded the Pulitzer Prize for ''One of Ours'', a novel set during World War I. Willa Cather and her family moved from Virginia to Webster County, Nebraska, when she was nine years old. The family later settled in the town of Red Cloud. Shortly after graduating from the University of Nebraska–Lincoln, Cather moved to Pittsburgh for ten years, supporting herself as a magazine editor and high school English teacher. At the age of 33, she moved to New York City, her primary home for the rest of her life, though she also traveled widely and spent considerable time at her summer residence on Grand Manan Island, New Brunswick. She spent the last 39 years of her life with her domestic partner, Edith Lewis, before being diagno ...
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The Ponder Heart
''The Ponder Heart'' is a novella written by Eudora Welty and illustrated by Joe Krush, originally published in ''The New Yorker'' in 1953, and republished by Harcourt Brace in 1954. The plot of ''The Ponder Heart'' follows Daniel Ponder, a wealthy heir, and is told through the narration of Edna Earle Ponder, Daniel's niece. In 1956, the story was made into a Broadway play by Joseph Fields and Jerome Chodorov. Una Merkel won the Tony Award for Best Featured Actress in a Play for her portrayal of Edna Earle Ponder in the Broadway play. Plot The novella is set in fictional rural Clay County, Mississippi, home to the Ponders, the richest family in the county. Daniel Ponder, a "mildly retarded man" according to literary scholars, is the heir to his father Sam Ponder's wealth. As Daniel generously gives away his possessions, including a gas station and heirloom watches, his father and his niece, Edna Earle Ponder, try to save their family fortune by having Daniel institutionalized to a ...
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