Ilse Aichinger, 1948
Lilly Axster
Katherine Klinger
Conversations
Hannah Arendt, 1950
Hannah Fröhlich
Nicola Lauré al-Samarai
Conversations
Simone de Beauvoir, 1949
Dagmar Fink
Tom Holert
Conversations
Billie Holiday, 1939
Jamika Ajalon
Reference text Holiday
Rúbia Salgado
Conversations
Adrian Piper, 1983
Belinda Kazeem
Anna Kowalska
Conversations
Yvonne Rainer, 1990
Monika Bernold
Shirley Tate
Conversations
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 Strange Fruit
Billie Holiday, 1939
play song
Southern trees bear a strange fruit
Blood on the leaves and blood at the root
Black bodies swinging in the Southern breeze
Strange fruit hanging from the poplar trees
Pastoral scene of the gallant South
The bulging eyes and the twisted mouth
Scent of magnolia sweet and fresh
Then the sudden smell of burning flesh
Here is a fruit for the crows to pluck
For the rain to gather, for the wind to suck
For the sun to rot, for the tree to drop
Here is a strange and bitter crop.
/
Strange Fruit was written in 1939 by Abel Meeropol (alias Lewis Allen) and given to Billie Holiday to sing at the legendary Café Society. The song made Holiday world famous. Radio stations in the USA and Britain long refused to play it, and in apartheid South Africa it was officially banned. Strange Fruit was first recorded on 20 April 1939 by Commodore Records (526) and reissued in 1972 by Atlantic (SD1614). See: Angela Y. Davis, Blues Legacies and Black Feminism, New York 1998 and: www.youtube.com/watch?v=h4ZyuU... |
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