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Book Cover for: Notes from the Field, Anna Deavere Smith

Notes from the Field

Anna Deavere Smith

Paperback
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"Smith's powerful style of living journalism uses the collective, cathartic nature of the theater to move us from despair toward hope." --The Village Voice

Anna Deavere Smith's extraordinary form of documentary theater shines a light on injustices by portraying the real-life people who have experienced them. "One of her most ambitious and powerful works on how matters of race continue to divide and enslave the nation" (Variety).

Smith renders a host of figures who have lived and fought the system that pushes students of color out of the classroom and into prisons. (As Smith has put it: "Rich kids get mischief, poor kids get pathologized and incarcerated.")

Using people's own words, culled from interviews and speeches, Smith depicts Rev. Jamal Harrison Bryant, who eulogized Freddie Gray; Niya Kenny, a high school student who confronted a violent police deputy; activist Bree Newsome, who took the Confederate flag down from the South Carolina State House grounds; and many others. Their voices bear powerful witness to a great iniquity of our time--and call us to action with their accounts of resistance and hope.

Book Details

  • Publisher: Anchor Books
  • Publish Date: May 21st, 2019
  • Pages: 192
  • Language: English
  • Edition: undefined - undefined
  • Dimensions: 7.90in - 5.10in - 0.70in - 0.45lb
  • EAN: 9780525564591
  • Categories: • American - African American & Black• Women Authors

About the Author

Anna Deavere Smith is an actress, teacher, playwright, and the creator of the acclaimed On the Road series of one-woman plays, which are based on her interviews with diverse voices from communities in crisis. A recipient of the National Humanities Medal from President Obama and two Obie Awards, her work also been nominated for a Pulitzer and two Tonys. Onscreen, she has appeared in many films and television shows, including Philadelphia, The West Wing, Black-ish, and Nurse Jackie. She is University Professor in the department of Art & Public Policy at NYU, where she also directs the Institute on the Arts and Civic Dialogue. In 2019, she was elected to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.

More books by Anna Deavere Smith

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Book Cover for: Twilight: Los Angeles, 1992, Anna Deavere Smith
Book Cover for: Talk to Me: Travels in Media and Politics, Anna Deavere Smith
Book Cover for: Let Me Down Easy (TCG Edition), Anna Deavere Smith
Book Cover for: Talk to Me: Listening Between the Lines, Anna Deavere Smith
Book Cover for: Fires in the Mirror, Anna Deavere Smith
Book Cover for: Twilight: Los Angeles 1992, Anna Deavere Smith
Book Cover for: House Arrest and Piano: Two Plays, Anna Deavere Smith

What people are saying

Mentioner image for: Augustin
Augustin
@allaugustin
6 years

I never tweet and I never learn.

Urging you all to go see #NotesfromtheField, an amazing monologue by @AnnaDeavereS at the @royalcourt as part of @LIFTfestival. Unlike anything I’ve ever seen and so haunting and beautiful. A tour-de-force! Until next Saturday, book now!!! https://t.co/U5NX34HXwD https://t.co/vyIj4IkCEJ

twitter.com
Mentioner image for: Royal Court
Royal Court
@royalcourt
6 years

The writers' theatre. (This account is monitored from 10am - 6pm, Monday - Friday)

'Ms. Smith [is] invaluable... American theater's most dynamic & sophisticated oral historian.' Read @nytimes review of @AnnaDeavereS's #NotesFromTheField, coming to the Royal Court as part of @LIFTfestival in June: https://t.co/A3uhN70hxs https://t.co/9cBv89lfof

twitter.com
Mentioner image for: SafetyPinBox
SafetyPinBox
@safetypinbox
7 years

A now closed monthly subscription box for white people striving to be allies in the fight for Black Liberation.

ICYMI Anna Deavere Smith debuted her one woman show "Notes From The Field" which delves into real life stories... https://t.co/B8Cw4qOFW2

twitter.com
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Praise for this book

"Invaluable. . . . Absorbing. . . . Dazzling." --The New York Times

"Deeply moving. . . . Dazzling stagecraft meets dazzling spectacle. . . . Magnificent. . . . Wonderful." --Newsday

"Moving. . . . Smith is an effective and supremely talented conduit." --Los Angeles Times

"Anna Deavere Smith has created one of her most ambitious and powerful works on how matters of race continue to divide and enslave the nation." --Variety

"Devastating. . . . Astonishing. . . . Unquestionably great theater." --Vulture

"Brilliant. . . . Anna Deavere Smith may be the most empathetic person in America." --HuffPost

"[A] masterpiece. . . . Smith's powerful style of living journalism uses the collective, cathartic nature of the theater to move us from despair toward hope." --The Village Voice

"Urgently timely. . . . Audacious and mind-opening." --Time Out New York

"This is captivating political theatre, a devastating document of racial inequality and the most rousing of rallying calls. Everyone should watch it." --The Guardian

"A tour de force. . . . A coruscating indictment of the school-to-prison pipeline." --Financial Times

"Stirring. . . . Powerful. . . . The scope is almost Shakespearean: the voices range from policy professionals to people on the street. If there's an overarching thrust . . . it lies in the suggestion that the struggle for civil rights is ongoing: the legacy of segregation, its trauma too, endures and reasserts itself." --The Telegraph (London)

What people are saying

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