Can you tell the stories of the dead, really?
Monday Motion: A celebration of Ken Burns - A storyteller for and of all time
In the course of the past couple years probably, I’ve begun to investigate my genealogy.
Appointing yourself as a would-be family historian certainly offers lots of opportunities, from seeking out cemeteries to just talking to your family about bygone days and times that, for you, are worlds away.
Sometimes the people who you would have loved to have sat down and talked to pass away before you make the time to.
And sometimes you come across photographs of people who are separated from you by generations, who you never would have had the chance to talk to.
It sparks a fantasy - you imagine becoming a time traveling documentarian, going back to watch and survey the lives our forbears lived.
The idea sparks an empathetic sentimentality.
It also makes you realize how wider your perspective could be stretched if you could turn back the clock to times we can only reconstruct with pictures and films.
Documentarian Ken Burns has presented massive epics chronicling some of the most poignant and elating moments in our nation's history.
He has covered everything from the wars we've fought to the sports that we dedicate our time to.
He introduced us to colossal figures and taken us down musical backroads.
No matter the subject, Ken Burns always finds a way to make us feel as if we're right there in the room with him, living and breathing every moment his subjects have seen.
60 Minutes did a wonderful piece on him, and I think it captures a lot of Burns’ motivations well.
Ken Burns is one of the most prolific documentary filmmakers of our time.
He has told some of the most important stories, from the Civil War to the Roosevelts.
And he’s an innovator, with the famous “Ken Burns effect” now used by other filmmakers to give photographs life as you watch.
He has a gift for making his documentaries feel like you are right there alongside him, living and breathing every moment.
And, in doing so, he has given us a fresh perspective on who we are and how we got here.
While media may help us remember things have happened, it will always pale to immediate experience.
Still, it serves such an important role.
Not only to spark old memories when we see photographs or video of loved ones, but also to give something of the lives that have left us.
Burns tells these stories using media to bring people to life who have been dead for years and years.
From his very first documentary, Brooklyn Bridge (1981), to one of his most recent, Ben Franklin (2022), Ken Burns has always strived to tell the most accurate and compelling stories possible.
And he has a creative approach to our engagement with these primary sources he works on, using now-normalized techniques that bring out the stories and characters in his subject matter.
The many subjects of Burns' works are long, long dead.
How do you bring Ben Franklin back to life - a man who never got to be photographed or be caught on video or have his voice recorded?
Through the creative use of artistic renderings of Franklin (paintings and woodcuts) and through the vocal work of Mandy Patinkin, the biography is woven together with the primary sources.
In short, Ken Burns has given us a new way of experiencing history.
He puts still photos to work in a medium where they’d otherwise be unlikely to hold the audience’s attention. But they do.
He has shown us that there is more to these images than what we spot in a textbook.
And we can be grateful for that.
Burns is proud of the nation's dream but keenly aware of when the dream headbutts the shortcomings.
And like any great storyteller, what he is conveying matters to him.
Whether we are rethinking the medium to be more conducive to our story, or we are simply dedicating our time and energy to those things we love, Burns is an encouraging example to creatives.
And he makes us stop and think about piecing togethers stories, whether they’re in the history books or in our family tree.
I agree with all of this. Ken Burns is a master. I also deeply enjoy genealogy research. I highly recommend anyone who enjoys nuance and fresh perspective to investigate these treasures. It costs little, and the knowledge is lifechanging.