William Faulkner
The writer who best represents 20th-century Southern narrative led an existence every bit as colorful and dramatic as his fictional sagas. This program beautifully recounts William Faulkner's life and the great literary works it produced, exploring ...
Alice Walker
"Being black, being a woman, and being a writer is just the most wonderful challenge. It's like having three eyes, three hearts, rather than one," says the author of The Color Purple in this profile, as she relives her journey from an impoverished c...
The life and legend of Sojourner Truth
As with many historic American figures of the 19th century, Sojourner Truth's story is incomplete and somewhat mythical, a fact compounded by her having been born a slave. This detailed program traces the lifelong odyssey of a woman who literally wa...
Everyday Einstein: Einsteinian physics at work and at play
In 1905, Albert Einstein released a series of groundbreaking papers on relativity, quantum theory, and Brownian motion. This program hosted by David Suzuki identifies technologies that have evolved from or were influenced by Einstein's revolutionary...
Picasso and his time
This superb documentary covers the long and extraordinary life of Picasso, beginning with the first period of his life in Malaga, La Coruna, and Barcelona (the time of his classic painting) and continuing in Paris, Vallauris, and Vouvenargue. This b...
Jeff Koons: a man of trust
One of the most controversial artists working today, Jeff Koons follows in the footsteps of Andy Warhol's entrepreneurship, perfectionism, and appropriation of pop culture icons. This program provides an extensive look at Koons's background, profess...
The Jayson Blair story: favoritism and plagiarism at The New York Times
African-American journalist Jayson Blair has been pilloried as the personification of affirmative action out of control. Was it race that fueled his rapid promotions at The New York Times and prompted management to essentially ignore reports of his ...
Henrik Ibsen: the master playwright
This program, narrated by Ibsen biographer Michael Meyer, charts the development of Henrik Ibsen's style over four periods: his early years of failure; his epic dramas; his sociological plays, such as A Doll's House, Ghosts, and Rosmersholm; and his...
Power of art: Rothko
Life, death, heroism, tragedy - subjects that, until the latter half of the 20th century, propelled the canon of Western art. How do the abstractions of Mark Rothko figure in that tradition? Are they, in a sense, its swan song? This program depicts ...
Johann Sebastian Bach: a documentary portrait
This first-class documentary biography of Bach shows us the places and the documents of his life: the houses in which he lived, the organs on which he played, the report cards he got in school, and the letters he wrote to excuse his innovations and ...