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Explore Nobel Prize winners impact on American literature in “The Adventures of Saul Bellow” on AMERICAN MASTERS – Dec. 12 at 8 pm
< < Back toAmerican Masters Presents Broadcast Premiere of The Adventures of Saul Bellow December 12 on PBS
American Masters: The Adventures of Saul Bellow premieres nationwide Monday, December 12 at 8 p.m. on PBS, pbs.org/americanmasters and the PBS Video App.
Explore the Nobel and Pulitzer Prize winner’s impact on American literature in the first-ever major documentary on the writer. American Masters: The Adventures of Saul Bellow illuminates how Bellow transformed modern literature and navigated through the issues of his time, including race, gender and the Jewish immigrant experience, through rare archival footage and interviews with Philip Roth, Salman Rushdie and many others.
The film traces Bellow’s rise to eminence and examines his many identities: reluctant public intellectual, “serial husband,” father, Chicagoan and Jewish American. It also sheds light on his willingness to confront social issues, his criticisms of American society and materialism and his provocative political view.
Interviewees:
Martin Amis, novelist
James Atlas, biographer
Adam Bellow, son of Alexandra Tschacbasov and Saul Bellow
Alexandra Bellow, professor of mathematics and ex-wife of Saul Bellow.
Daniel Bellow, son of Susan Glassman and Saul Bellow
Gregory Bellow, son of Anita Goshkin and Saul Bellow
Joel Bellow, nephew of Saul Bellow
Stanley Crouch, culture critic and novelist
Janis Freedman-Bellow, literary scholar and widow of Saul Bellow
Charles Johnson, novelist
Vivian Gornick, author and literary critic
Philip Grew, activist and former student of University of Chicago
Zachary Leader, professor of literature and biographer
Katie Roiphe, author and professor or journalism
Philip Roth, novelist
Salman Rushdie, novelist
Margaret Staats Simmons, journalist
Leon Wieseltier, literary critic
Hana Wirth-Nesher, professor of literature
Ruth Wisse, professor of literature