South Carolina ETV

"The World of Julia Peterkin: Cheating the Stillness" Premieres on Public Television in Spring 2010

For Immediate Release
March 29, 2010

Columbia, SC…The one-hour documentary, “The World of Julia Peterkin: Cheating the Stillness,” makes its world premiere on ETV Thursday, April 15 at 9 p.m., with an encore broadcast on Sunday, April 18 at 6 p.m.

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The film chronicles the controversial life of South Carolina author and Converse College alumna Julia Peterkin, the white wife of a plantation owner who won a 1929 Pulitzer Prize for her book, Scarlet Sister Mary, a sensitive portrayal of the lives of rural African Americans in the early 20th century.

Produced, directed and written by Converse College alumna Gayla Jamison, the program is presented by South Carolina ETV and distributed nationally by NETA in Columbia, SC.

The following FREE community events complement ETV’s broadcast premiere:

• A theatre premiere will be held at 8 p.m. on Thursday, April 22, in Twichell Auditorium at Converse College, 580 East Main Street, Spartanburg, SC. The event is free and open to the public, but a ticket is required for admission. To reserve a free ticket, call 864-596-9725 or e-mail Kathy Worley at kathy.worley@converse.edu.

• A community screening will be held on Wednesday, April 28, at the Charleston County Public Library, 68 Calhoun Street, Charleston, SC. The reception begins at 5:15 p.m., followed by the documentary presentation at 6:00 p.m. A discussion following the film will be led by Producer Gayla Jamison and Editor Deanna Nowell. This event is free and open to the public. Sponsors of the occasion are the Charleston Public Library, Friends of the Library, South Carolina Historical Society, Center for Women and a Donor-Advised Fund of the Coastal Community Foundation.

“The World of Julia Peterkin: Cheating the Stillness” tells the story of this remarkable woman who revolutionized American literature and rebelled against what was expected of a Southern lady. Her story unfolds against the backdrop of 20th century African-American history – the era of Jim Crow, the Harlem Renaissance and the early achievements of the Civil Rights Movement. Brought to life through dramatizations of her groundbreaking literature, haunting images of the South Carolina countryside, evocative archival photographs, and through interviews with writers, scholars and others who probe the paradoxes of this controversial woman, a fearless and unapologetic narrative unfolds.

Peterkin’s book, Scarlet Sister Mary, is the gritty tale of a fiercely independent single mother set in a South Carolina African-American farming community. The novel was a best-seller at a time when American readers – white or black – weren’t interested in rural African-American life.

So accurate was her portrayal, many who read the book wondered about the race of its author. According to African-American scholar and activist W. E. B. DuBois, she was a Southern white woman with “the eye and the ear to see beauty and to know truth.”

At the turn of the 20thcentury, Julia Mood married William Peterkin and became mistress of Lang Syne, a cotton plantation located near Fort Motte, South Carolina, about 40 miles southeast of the state capital of Columbia. The farm was home to 400 black workers, whose hardscrabble lives and African heritage Peterkin would later chronicle with a sensitivity and sympathy rare in the era of Jim Crow.

It wasn't until the she reached the age of 40 that she began writing as a way “to cheat the stillness” of the countryside. Her startling tales of struggling black families captivated American readers just as the Harlem Renaissance gained momentum. But with fame came a double life –the bold, witty, and much sought-after writer at New York cultural events, and the plantation mistress who many back home felt had betrayed her race, class and gender.

She could not have both lives. She had to choose; and the choices she made tell much not just about her life, but what it meant to be black or white, male or female, in 20th-century America.

Copies of this program are available for purchase by calling 1-800-553-7752 or by visiting the ETV Store at www.etvstore.org.

ETV is South Carolina’s statewide network with 11 television stations, eight radio stations and a closed-circuit educational telecommunications system in more than 2000 schools, colleges, businesses, and government agencies.

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For more information, contact Dana McCullough at (803) 737-3212 or dmccullough@scetv.org.

Photos may be downloaded for the sole purpose of publicizing this program. To download an image, click on the picture below. A new Web page will open containing the hi-res version. Right click on the hi-res image, and select "Save As" or "Save Picture As."
“Cheating the Stillness” Premieres on Public Television in Spring 2010
Julia Peterkin. Photo used with the permission of the Ruth and Maxwell Aley Family.
“Cheating the Stillness” Premieres on Public Television in Spring 2010
Photo credit: Bayard Wootten, used with permission of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, North Carolina Collection.

“Cheating the Stillness” Premieres on Public Television in Spring 2010
Photo credit: Bayard Wootten, used with permission of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, North Carolina Collection.
“Cheating the Stillness” Premieres on Public Television in Spring 2010
Photo credit: Bayard Wootten, used with permission of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, North Carolina Collection.

Photos may be downloaded for the sole purpose of publicizing this program. To download an image, click on the picture below. A new Web page will open containing the hi-res version. Right click on the hi-res image, and select "Save As" or "Save Picture As."

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