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American literature History 19th century Authors Authorship British literature British literature History 19th century English literature 19th century History and criticism Irish literature Appreciation Philosophy, Modern 19th century Philosophy, Modern, in literature World politics in literatureFilter By Series
Famous authorsSummary: This program from the Famous Authors series introduces the rich imaginative life of Charlotte, Emily, and Anne Brontë, exposed to the world of literature by their father Patrick Brontë priest, examiner, and writer. The family struggled with poverty, and the family home Haworth and moorland provided inspiration for the daughters. Charlotte and Emily were educated at Cowan Bridge School, later...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2011
View online at AVOD
Summary: This overview of Charles Dickens' life and work from the Famous Authors series discusses the author's happy childhood, during which he was close to his father and went to school. However, financial troubles later forced the family to move to London, and Dickens began absorbing the bustling city couched in fog where his novels would be set. Due to his father's debt, he could no longer attend...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2011
View online at AVOD
Summary: In this overview of D.H. Lawrence's life and work from the Famous Authors series, viewers are introduced to the conditions of the mining town in England in which Lawrence was born and to his relationship with his mother, both which reappear in Sons and Lovers and his other fiction. The film follows Lawrence and his wife Frieda through their many moves, the inspiration he gained from their...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2011
View online at AVOD
Summary: This program from the Famous Authors series takes a close look at the life and literature of Franz Kafka. Contextualizing Kafka's upbringing in turn-of the-century Prague, the video illuminates how the politics of the Austro-Hungarian Empire and coming from a Jewish family shaped his life. Young friends Hugo Bergmann and Oskar Pollak were important influences and the first readers for the young...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2005
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Summary: In this introduction to George Orwell's life and work from the Famous Authors series, viewers follow Orwell through his privileged education, during which he nurtured his writing talents from an early age. He joined the Burmese military police but grew disillusioned with his role as an oppressor, returned to depression-era England, and committed himself to writing, notwithstanding stints in...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2005
View online at AVOD
Summary: This program from the Famous Composers series offers an overview of the life and work of composer and pianist Johannes Brahms beginning with an introduction to Brahms' family and hometown, the nineteenth century seaport city of Hamburg. The film follows Brahms' musical education with teachers Otto Cossel and Eduard Marxsen, his days of playing in bars and teaching to earn money, and his...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2006
View online at AVOD
Summary: This introduction to the life and work of Jonathan Swift from the Famous Authors series explores the political messages and social critiques in Swift's work, including the famous Gulliver's Travels and its public reception. The video begins with Swift's childhood and education in Dublin and England, and reviews the circumstances of the English monarchy, the Whigs and Tories, and other political...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2011
View online at AVOD
Summary: This program from the Famous Authors series offers an overview of the biography and works of Thomas Hardy. The film introduces the writer’s hometown of Dorchester, which was a strong part of his identity and the model for the fictional land of Wessex where most of his stories were set. Insights into his lower class upbringing, waning religious conviction, and the major relationships in his...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2006
View online at AVOD
Summary: In this introduction to Edgar Allan Poe's life and work from the Famous Authors series, the viewers follow Poe's early life and fortunate adoption by the Allans. Poe's relationship with Frances Allan was tender, but he and John Allan did not get along. His stepfather sent him away to university and then cut him off completely. In response, Poe went to Boston and joined the army, but persisted...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2011
View online at AVOD
Summary: This overview of George Bernard Shaw's life and work from the Famous Authors series starts in Dublin, introducing Shaw's family and his mother's voice teacher and influential family friend, George Vandeleur Lee. The film discusses Shaw's experience as a Protestant in Ireland. Eventually Shaw moved to England, where his mother had started giving singing lessons, and set off writing. There he...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2011
View online at AVOD
Summary: This overview of Henrik Ibsen's life and writing from the Famous Authors series contextualizes Ibsen's upbringing in tight-knit, strictly religious communities in isolated Norway. As a young man, he left his family home in a desire to break away from the staid and religious environment, and worked toward university and made friends that supported his talents. While he failed to pass...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2005
View online at AVOD
Summary: This installment of the Famous Authors series offers overviews of Jane Austen’s life and works. The video profiles Austen’s family and their connections to England’s society. Austen, born in 1775 and raised in the rectory of Steventon, had five brothers and a sister, all known for their cleverness and humor. She had no formal education but was well-read and came to admire Fanny Burney,...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2005
View online at AVOD
Summary: This program from the Famous Authors series offers an overview of Robert Burns’ life and major works, including occasional poems, reflective poems, dramatic poems, and lyrics. Beginning with a reading of “To a Mouse,” the video introduces Burns parents, William and Agnes Burns, who, though poor farmers, supported the writer’s education and surrounded him with Scottish folk songs. As he grew...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2000
View online at AVOD
Summary: In this program from the Famous Authors series, viewers are introduced to the biography and work of the French writer Voltaire. The video discusses conditions and politics of 18th century France, and reviews important tenents of the Enlightenment, both critical to understanding the writer's work. Voltaire was often in trouble, and sometimes imprisoned, for voicing his controversial views and...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2011
View online at AVOD
Summary: This overview of the biography and fiction of William Faulkner from the Famous Authors series introduces the major themes of Faulkner's poems, plays, short stories, and novels. The film contextualizes life in the American south in the first half of the 20th century; Faulkner's southern upbringing, family history, and race relations in the wake of the Civil War were a major influence on his...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2011
View online at AVOD
Summary: This introduction to William Shakespeare's life and works from the Famous Authors series begins at the author's childhood home in Stratford and tours the institutions of the town and country that would have been part of Shakespeare's life. The film follows the 23-year-old writer to London, providing a picture of the city in Elizabethan and Jacobean England when Shakespeare went to make his...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2011
View online at AVOD
Summary: This overview of the life and literature of Emily Dickinson from the Famous Authors series offers an insight into the reclusive author of 1,775 poems and a valuable collection of letters. The video depicts Dickinson's story as that of an individual in a society that smothers individuality and discusses the struggle of a female poet among male contemporaries. She did, however, know of and admire...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2011
View online at AVOD
Summary: This introduction to Herman Melville's life and work from the Famous Authors series begins by introducing the city of New York, Melville's hometown, and the influence living in the busiest maritime port in the world had on his work. Melville eventually left home to work on a sail boat, and soon went to New Bedford, Massachusetts to become a crew member on a whaling ship, an experience that he...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2011
View online at AVOD
Summary: This program from the Famous Authors series introduces the audience to the high society and cultural advancements of Paris in which Proust lived from childhood on. The film walks through Proust's life while highlighting significant influences, connections to his major novel, The Remembrance of Things Past, and possible models for his characters. This masterpiece draws heavily on the author's...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2005
View online at AVOD
Summary: This program from the Famous Authors series provides an overview of Mark Twain's life and work, starting with life in nineteenth century Hannibal, Missouri, Twain's childhood home and a major influence on his writing, including The Adventures of Tom Sawyer and The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn. Twain started writing as a newspaper employee in Hannibal, and he joined a militia group there early...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2011
View online at AVOD
Summary: This program from the Famous Authors series provides an overview of the life and writings of Victor Hugo, author of the novels The Hunchback of Notre Dame and Les Miserables. The video contextualizes Hugo's childhood as the son of an officer in Napoleon's army during the French Revolution. As a schoolboy, Hugo began cultivating his talents as a journalist and poet, and his older brother...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2005
View online at AVOD
Summary: This overview of the biography and writing of F. Scott Fitzgerald from the Famous Authors series traces Fitzgerald’s life and influences from his birth in St. Paul, Minnesota, to his university days at Princeton and literary celebrity and frivolity in New York, to his status as social purveyor of modernists in Paris, and his tumultuous marriage to the talented but troubled Zelda Sayre...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2005
View online at AVOD
Summary: This overview of the life and literature of George Eliot from the Famous Authors series follows Eliot's comfortable childhood through the several phases of her education and religious development, during which she discovered major influences like Sir Walter Scott, Shakespeare, and evangelism. Later in ife, she moved away from her evangelist views, eventually leaving the Church of England all...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2011