Audio · Visual
National Portrait Gallery, Smithsonian Institution; gift of Danica, Celefio, and Lien Barboza © Anthony Barboza
Obie Award Winner, Ntozake Shange
words by Pacifica Radio Archives
Feast your ears on this incredible recording of two-time Obie Award-winning poet, playwright, and novelist Ntozake Shange at an important point in her literary career. This was recorded while Shange was on tour for her first novel, Sassafrass, Cypress & Indigo at Cody’s Bookstore in Berkeley, California. It was produced and narrated by longtime KPFA producer Ginny Z. Berson in 1982. Included is a thoughtful interview mixed into the reading.
This recording was digitized as part of the American Women Making History and Culture: 1963-1982 project, funded in part by the National Historical Publications and Records Commission.
Thanks to an Archiving and Preservation Grant (2007) from the GRAMMY Foundation, the Pacifica Radio Archives has preserved and digitized 300 reel-to-reel masters of historic Pacifica Radio station broadcasts of exceptional cultural, social, and artistic value. This recording was selected to be made freely available by stream and podcast.
Learn more about this recording
Photo by John D. Kisch/Separate Cinema Archive/Getty Images
Ntozake Shange’s official archives are housed at Barnard College in New York City. To learn more about the collection, visit the finding aid online. The school’s Digital Shange Project has made available a series of videos featuring the distinguished alumna. To learn more, visit The Digital Shange Project.
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