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Who's Afraid of Kathy Acker?

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Description:

Who's afraid of Kathy Acker? Just about everyone is, it seems, in this fractured valentine to a true American original. Kathy Acker's post- feminist work, in the words of one critic, had 'something to offend everybody.' Whether rewriting canonized texts like Don Quixote,or forging new boundaries of form and taste, Acker's work pushed the limits of literature. Her journey towards self-creation is said to have included stints working as a stripper and a porn actress. Whether this is true, or merely apocryphal, is difficult to say. She didn't become 'classic' Acker until the Punk movement of the late 1970s where at CBGBs-in the company of people like Richard Hell and Robert Mapplethorpe-she refashioned herself into a sexual messiah cum literary terrorist.

Acker's meteoric rise with her novel Blood and Guts in High School brought her notoriety. Groupies, acolytes and sex of every conceivable variety soon followed. After she was charged with plagiarizing a coterie of other significant male writers, Acker's star plummeted. She found a new home and admirers in San Francisco's riot grrrl scene, where she became den mother to an emerging crop of female troublemakers. Footage of Acker in full terrorist mode is interspersed with archival clips, animation and interviews with those who knew and loved her best.