Zulu Charlie Romeo

Published on July 27, 2015

Music
* Under the credits is Harlaamstrat 74 off of John Dankworth’s Modesty Blaise score.
* First up, A Nice Day from a truly wonderful album, The Original Chico Hamilton Quintet Complete Studio Recordings.
* Then there’s Ohnono/Kiwembo, Andrew Bird’s contribution to Tradi-Mods Vs. Rockers – Alternative Takes on Congotronics, Vol. 1 (which is a great rabbit hole to go down).
* Anita gets introduced to Hay Tantos Muertos, by Marissa Nadler.
* Then falls in love to Hymn of Silence by Silencio
* Then there’re two pieces from Nathan Johnson’s score to The Day I Saw Your Heart.

Notes:

As you can tell with the story, there’re a lot of holes in the histories of Anita Corsini and Mkano. Here is a selected bibliography:

*I first stumbled upon their story while reading about Zazel, the human cannonball, in a book called Theatrical and Circus Life: or, Secrets of the Stage, Green-Room, and Sawdust, by John Joseph Jennings, published in 1892.
*I read many news articles. The one referenced in the New York Herald can be read here.
*I am particularly indebted to two excellent pieces of scholarship:
1. “Zulus Abroad: Cultural Representations and Education of Zulus in America, 1880-1945,” by Robert Trent Vinson and Robert Edgar, published in the Journal of Southern African Studies in 2007.
2. “Beyond the Exhibit: Zulu Experiences in Britain and the United States, 1879-1884,” a graduate thesis of Erin Elizabeth Barbara Bell submitted to Carleton University in Ottawa in 2011.