Kali Nihta, Socrates

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You You One afternoon without warning tradition died I Wrang the bell that heralded those 40 days of Lent How was I to know what they would hold that the serene security and tying bond of tradition was to snap You Building by building Land clearance devoured our neighborhood The temples and the oracles that I had wandered through playing at Odysseus Were that spring? but half dusty ruins As Odysseus I faced the Cyclops Zeus with ankle clips and silver studded sword But never the lotus eaters who lived beyond the wall of our little Greece.

I Had never dared to look on them For I had been schooled Alas those Greeks who tasted that honey sweetness of the lotus thought no more of home and Forgot the privilege of their birth You They were Greek The people who kept their shops and lived along our gallery Away from the rest of the city They were Greek the people who taught me to dance Hasapiko simbeco to walk Who made the pastry passed our laws That was it so suddenly so small a message dropped Even had I read it could I have fully understood what that 40 -day eviction notice meant Our building our home would be next So frost on the ground chill in the air yet bud studied what trees survived That early spring held a change more violent than temperate Hear Maria was Athena a Goddess of wisdom with eyes that were trained only on what had been Jealousy, gostoms and possessions she had brought from Greece Her refusal to accept the assimilation into this new city her taboos fostered in me a fascination for the new The magic of the days when we had any word from Greece or any gift But the embroidery of things That was the way it was that day New shawl and then that message from the land clearance office Oh Oh Oh I But did not understand the importance of our moving from Socrates As head of the family pop who would have to come home to read the news Was at the table he had occupied for 20 years This was one of the few times I had seen and smelled the inside of the cappanillo It was the world of men a world of which I was not yet a member The world that I would be expected to join The Faces changed little from spring to spring the topic of discussion politics and Turkish coffee Changed not at all I Hadn't entered the room while even phrase Whose path led to the struggling tree that only one spring ago had stood so proudly in the yard of his barber shop I I I I I The streets that had often extended the magic of security now twisted beneath my feet I counted to 204 times or did I count to 402 times? By slow degrees I thought I could forget Socrates Street, but I was wrong Highway construction building destruction bobbing in the wake of the new faceless invaders.

Where was I to turn? What would do desi's have done I I My walk that led to no decisions led me to the playground of the school Until that spring I had been cradled far from this place In fact, I rather think I was afraid no The stories I had heard about Americans American I did not know then that I would ever become one I I I I I I Can't remember which building fell when only strange machines The machines inside the people screaming to Can't we be saved? This is the only life we know The Faces of that spring are reflection The voices and music are the memory of a memory Grown strong again with love Oh I've seen buildings torn down since and new buildings built and Then the workers all sitting down for lunch But it's not the same as it was those 40 days The glass wintered 20 ways smaller the trains were 20 ways meaner 20 ways taller I I I Children still like women still sing But there is something missing a Harmony a melody.

I can't put my finger on it It isn't there The The bugs turn brown drop into the rubble piles leaving the branches naked In Other years during the week before Easter the boys had practiced their dances in the court behind pop whose old barbershop that spring We danced on roofs where gardens had been The Store of mr.

Dom That was to be the last time I'd smell the lamb and how laughter border coat But it was as it had been the first time as it had always been To gather everything of Greece that we could carry with us to our new home That was what fear Maria had me do that afternoon before the end Oh Yeah scrolling Oh .

Identifier

F.2004-01-0975

Date Of Production

1962

Abstract

"Kali Nihta, Socrates" ("Good Night, Socrates") is a story-documentary film about the destruction of a small Greek community in Chicago to make way for urban renewal. As the film was being shot, Chicago's Greektown was being razed to make space for the Kennedy Expressway and the new campus of the University of Illinois at Chicago. It captures the real-life destruction of buildings and culture as seen through the eyes of a ten-year-old boy of Greek descent.

Description

The film was made by Maria Moraites and Stuart Hagmann, who had recently graduated from Northwestern University, with a grant from the North Shore Film Society. It went on to win awards internationally, including the Targa Leone di San Marco for Best Narrative Short Film at the Venice Biennale's 13th Venice International Documentary Film Festival.

Run Time

0:34:27

Format

16mm

Extent

1,240 feet

Color

B&W

Sound

Optical

Reel/Tape Number

1/1

Has Been Digitized?

Yes

Language Of Materials

English

Element

Genre

Documentary

Form

Amateur

Subject

Greek Americans
City planning
Religions
Manners and customs
Emigration and immigration

Related Collections

Chicago Public Library Collection

Related Places

North America ➜ United States ➜ Illinois ➜ Chicago ➜ Near West Side

Main Credits

Moraites, Maria (is director)

Hagmann, Stuart (is director)

Additional Credits

Moraites, Maria (is writer)

Moraites, Maria (is cinematographer)

Hagmann, Stuart (is cinematographer)

Hagmann, Stuart (is contributor)

Brown, Mooyeen (music)

Strachan, Mary (is writer)

Participants And Performers

Mitchell, Charles (is actor)

Moraites, Maria (is actor)

Coleris, John (is actor)

Sterne, Richard (is narrator)

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