Filmmaker Michael Maglaras will premiere his latest film, Ralph Waldo Emerson: Give All to Love, on September 30 at 2:00 PM. 

The screening has been moved from the Library to the Umbrella Arts Center, across the street at 40 Stow Street, to accommodate seat demand. After the screening, a reception with the filmmakers will be held at the Concord Free Public Library.

Read “Ralph Waldo Emerson: Give All to Love” Director’s Statement

Michael Maglaras and his Executive Producer and artistic partner Terri Templeton are known for their “essays in film” on the subject of the great cultural heritage of America. Written, narrated, and directed by Michael Maglaras, Give All to Love is less a documentary… and more a history of the personal discovery of the deep importance of Emerson’s writing and thinking and his example of a life well lived. Give All to Love, filmed in and around Concord, including, over two days, at the Emerson House, will provide a new and deeply personal perspective on Emerson, his writing, his life, and his importance to contemporary life.

About Michael Maglaras

       

Filmmaker Michael Maglaras, the founder of 217 Films, is the only living filmmaker in America who has been honored with six individual film premieres at the National Gallery in Washington, D.C. A filmmaker dedicated to telling the story of America’s cultural heritage and creative excellence, Maglaras and his executive producer and artistic partner Terri Templeton have been celebrating America for more than 18 years through their creative film work dedicated to telling the artistic and cultural story of our country. About their film O Brother Man: The Art and Life of Lynd Ward, the Journal of American History called it “a beautiful introduction to Ward and his work…unforgettable.” About the first-ever documentary film about the great painter Marsden Hartley Visible Silence, the words used by the Naples Daily News were “elegiac and insightful” and by the Georgia Museum of Art, “This film is, simply put, a beautiful film.” About Maglaras’s performance in his film Cleophas and His Own (based on a story by Marsden Hartley), Peggy Parsons of the National Gallery in Washington wrote, “Virtuoso filmmaking…this film holds the viewer spellbound from start to finish!” Michael Maglaras has pioneered the concept of an “essay in film” – a special sort of filmmaking and storytelling, incorporating visual imagery, story-like narrative detail, and deep personal involvement with the subject. "Give All to Love" features the author and editor James Marcus, whose new and probing book on Emerson Glad to the Brink of Fear, A Portrait of Ralph Waldo Emerson, will be released by Princeton University Press on March 5, 2024.

View an excerpt from the film:

Chapter 10: “Between Literature and Life” from Ralph Waldo Emerson: Give All to Love

(This excerpt is the complete chapter "Between Literature and Life," where Emerson's writings and their unique non-linear progression of thought are discussed and mark him as the true father of American thought and literature). 

This event is made possible by the generous support of the Concord Free Public Library Corporation,
a charitable organization funded solely through private philanthropy.
Support the Corporation’s work.