Reel Pleasures. Laura Fair

       ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

      Few authors work in isolation, and this book would certainly never have been completed without the support of individuals and institutions on numerous continents.

      A year of intensive research was funded by a generous Fulbright faculty research award to Tanzania, during the academic year of 2004–5. A number of three-month preliminary and subsequent research trips were made possible by financial support from the departments of history at the University of Oregon and Michigan State University. The staff and collections at the National Archives of Zanzibar and the Tanzanian National Archives were invaluable. And without the residential fellowship and warm collegiality offered by the Netherlands Institute for Advanced Study, which provided the opportunity to spend nine full months focused solely on writing, it is doubtful that I would have ever managed to wrangle together a complete draft manuscript. I am also extremely grateful to those who wrote on my behalf for grants and fellowships over many years, as I struggled to transform a hunch into a book.

      The critical comments offered by friends, colleagues, audience members at talks, and anonymous reviewers were instrumental in helping me refine (and often find) my arguments. The insights and encouragement provided by members of my writing groups strengthened not only the text but my resolve to keep on writing and rewriting and rewriting. Graduate students at Michigan State University were also key interlocutors, turning me on to new ways to think about my subject matter and innovative fields of historical enquiry. I am sure that all of them will see their fingerprints in the pages that follow.

      The men and women who shared their experiences and understandings of the past also deserve a special note of thanks. While published and archived material were essential in allowing me to piece this picture together, without these personal stories the image I came to see would have remained utterly flat. It is their stories about what moviegoing meant to them that brought this history to life. Many generously shared not only their time and insights but also their private papers and photo collections, adding depth, richness, diversity, and personality to the view presented in official archives.

      My deepest personal debt is to those who helped us survive Nassir’s sudden death near the end of a glorious year doing research in Tanzania. From those who gently washed his body and helped lay his remains to peaceful rest at our home in Zanzibar, to those who comforted us and shared their memories of his joy-filled, goofy days on earth I am eternally grateful. The few who dared to mention Nassir’s name after he passed also deserve special recognition, as do those who taught me to keep his soul alive by continuing to act on his best qualities, acknowledged my sorrow and sent good bourbon on his birthday, or encouraged me to keep putting one foot in front of the other and took me on high-altitude hikes on the anniversaries of his death. I am thankful to have had friends and colleagues who told me it was okay to stay away from writing when I could not bear to touch this research, as well as others who gently pushed and prodded me to get back to work.

      I am truly blessed to have had Sabri’s company on this journey. His exuberant embrace of beauty and wonder has been a daily reminder that life deserves nothing less than to be lived to its fullest. His generous willingness to give, accept, and adjust is something I both admire and aspire to someday emulate. Rare is the researcher lucky enough to have a child who appears to move effortlessly back and forth between continents or who is willing to spend his first year of high school in a new, foreign country without the slightest complaint. I have been truly blessed. Sabri was two years old when I began this project. His name is derived from the Arabic word for patience, and as he used to bounce around like a little kid, disrupting interviews, I teased him that he was a test of my patience. But sticking with me through the process of writing this book has certainly been a testament to his patience and fortitude. I just dropped him off at college. The refrain my grandfather used to sing from one of his favorite player-piano rolls keeps ringing in my head: “The years go by as quickly as a wink. So enjoy yourself! Enjoy yourself! It’s later than you think!”