Book Vs Movie
Beloved
The Toni Morrison Pulitzer Prize-Winning Novel Vs. the Oprah Winfrey Movie
It’s African American History Month and the Margos are eager to start with Toni Morrison’s 1987 widely-acclaimed novel Beloved which was turned into a movie with the help of Oprah Winfrey in 1998.
This novel is a story about an escaped slave, Sethe (played by Winfrey in the film) who when was threatened with capture, killed her daughter rather than have her face a life of being in chains. Her other children survive and eventually, they live a life as free people in Cincinnati.
Sethe lives with her daughter Denver while two of her sons have long ago runaway. Sethe and Denver believe their home is haunted by the spirit of her dead daughter. They rarely leave home and Denver is shy and lonely. Paul D. is a former slave of Sweet Home which is where Sethe and her family were kept before their escape across the Ohio River.
He catches up with Sethe in Cincinnati and convinces her and Denver to enjoy an evening out when they come across “Beloved”–the spirit of her dead child in a woman’s form. Beloved is feral and causes a great deal of strife in Sethe’s life.
The themes of the book cover everything from racism, sexism, class, spirituality, and the mother-daughter family dynamics and it won the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction in 1988 and was a runner up for the National Book Award that year. (This caused quite a bit of controversy in the African American literary community!)
It is now considered one of Morrison’s best work while concurrently being banned from high school curriculums across the country.
In this episode, we talk about the many differences between the original book & the movie to decide which we like better.
In this ep the Margos discuss:
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- The incredible life of Toni Morrison
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- The more controversial aspects of the book and why it is banned from so many schools
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- The basic differences between book & movie.
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- How Oprah Winfrey finally brought the adaptation to life
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- The cast of the movie including Danny Glover (Paul D.,) Kimberly Elise (Denver,) Thandie Newton (Beloved) and Hill Harper as Halle.
Clips Featured:
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- Beloved trailer
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- Paul D. & Sethe get closer
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- Young Sethe (Lisa Gay Hamilton) meets Amy Denver (Kessia Embry)
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- Outro music “Storise Khoro Goliamo” by Mita Stoychera
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Margo D. @BrooklynFitChik www.brooklynfitchick.com [email protected]
Margo P. @ShesNachoMama https://coloniabook.weebly.com/
