Educational Media Reviews Online

As poet Dudley Randall reads his haunting "Ballad of Birmingham," scenes of police dogs and fire hoses are juxtaposed against footage from the funerals following the bombing of the Sixteenth Street Baptist Church in 1963. Thus begins this understated documentary of the life and work of Dudley Randall, an important force in twentieth-century Black American literature. The core of The Black Unicorn is a 1981 videotaped "interview" with Randall in which he recounts the story of his life. Randall recalls his early exposure to poetry (being attracted not only to the words but to the "heft" of the books and their bindings), writing his first poetry at age nine (to impress a little girl in his neighborhood), deciding to become a poet at age thirteen, and having his poetry published in the Detroit Free Press in 1930 (for $1.00 a poem). He talks at length about his experiences during the 1943 race riots in Detroit.

In 1965, Randall established the Broadside Press to publish "Ballad of Birmingham" and preserve the copyright, in response to a request to set the poem to music. Broadside Press was an outgrowth of the Civil Rights Movement and became an important outlet for poets such as Nikki Giovanni, Gwendolyn Brooks, Etheridge Knight, and others whose work was probably more political than literary and who might not otherwise have been heard. Seamlessly intertwined with the 1981 reminiscence are scenes from the celebration in Detroit of the twenty-fifth anniversary of the founding of Broadside Press, including remarks by the Mayor of Detroit, Coleman A. Young. Other segments include comments and observations by literary figures such as Melba Joyce Boyd, Naomi Long Madgett, and Marvin Bell.

In addition to Randall reading his own poems ("George," "Poet," "Roses and Revolutions," "Profile on the Pillow"), he reads his translation of Pushkin's "I Loved You Once." Etheridge Knight reads his poem "The Idea of Ancestry" and poignantly relates the influence of Randall on his own life and work ("I would still be in prison if it weren't for Dudley.") The passages in which Randall reads his work are illustrated with well-chosen collages of still photographs and film.

Black Unicorn is a revealing look at a man who speaks as well as writes as a poet, who can place both his life and the events of the twentieth-century in the context of literature and history. Highly recommended for high school level and up, for literature, history, and Black studies collections.