This event is part of Birkbeck Arts Week 2019 - see the full programme here. Please contact the organiser if you have any additional access requirements.

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This remarkable film directed by Manthia Diawara, tells the story of the making and performance in Mali of poet and dramatist Koulsy Lamko’s Bintou Wéré: A Sahel Opera. Roger Malbert introduces with Marina Warner.

Monika Szewczyk writes: 'Diawara’s cameraman captured the dramatically lit and ritualized scenes of village elders and proletarians—among them the Bintou Were herself, pregnant with child and protecting herself from suitors who, like the man who raped her, wish to take advantage by claiming fatherhood—as well as the smuggler who seduces these desperate people northward…In the course of the film, one crosses into the world of opera from the tradition of sung wisdoms and sentiments, which has characterized West African culture for centuries... [Manthia] asks us to tremble together, upholding the words of the Martinican poet, philosopher, and his dear friend, Édouard Glissant.'

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