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"What makes something 'Kafkaesque?'... It's not the absurdity of bureaucracy alone." This TED-Ed animated short film, created by educator Noah Tavlin and narrated by Addison Anderson, explains the combination of external circumstances and human tendencies that characterize a situation as truly "Kafkaesque."
This clip is taken from the opening sequence of Orson Welles's 1962 film adaptation of Franz Kafka's 1925 novel, The Trial. The scene, narrated by Welles and animated by Alexandre Alexeieff, depicts the book's opening parable, "Before the Law."
"To me, poetry is one of the highest, most abstract, most fulfilling forms of communication. We've always needed poets." In this recording from 1976, Patti Smith talks to journalist Mick Gold about censorship, her creative habits and inspirations, and recounts her first exposure to the poetry of Arthur Rimbaud. Animated by Patrick Smith, the video is part of PBS Digital Studios' Blank on Blank series.
"The moon barely showed itself, the river cut a trail between the fields, the cold changed to numbness the deeper I went in." In this book trailer, an excerpt of Michelle Hoover's new novel, Bottomland (Grove Press, 2016), is animated by Laura Harrison.
In this short film, part of the Poetry Everywhere series produced in association with the Poetry Foundation, a poem by James Tate is animated by Steven Wells.
Artist Andrew Kolb pays homage to David Bowie and his famous song "Space Oddity" in the form of an illustrated children's book. This animated version by Andrew Ruttan is set to the song that inspired the book.
"The point of fiction is to cast a spell, a momentary illusion that you are living in the world of the story." In this TED-Ed animated video, author Nalo Hopkinson highlights examples from Kelly Link and Tiphanie Yanique, and shares ideas on how to get readers immersed into stories that engage the senses.
"Your life is your life. / know it while you have it. / you are marvelous / the gods wait to delight / in you." In this short film, Charles Bukowski's poem "The Laughing Heart," from his poetry and story collection Betting on the Muse (Ecco, 2002), is read by Tom Waits and animated by Bradley Bell.
"The snow was dancing like cotton wool in the light of the street lamps. Aimlessly, unable to decide whether it wanted to fall up or down..." The opening lines of Jo Nesbø's most recent novel, Blood on Snow (Knopf, 2015), translated from the Norwegian by Neil Smith, are read in the audio edition by Patti Smith.
"A writer is lucky because he cures himself everyday." In this recorded talk from November 1970, Kurt Vonnegut shared his thoughts on writing as a guest speaker for a class at New York University. This animated video by Patrick Smith is part of PBS Digital Studios' Blank on Blank series.
