AustLit logo

AustLit

John Safran John Safran i(A144576 works by)
Gender: Male
The material on this page is available to AustLit subscribers. If you are a subscriber or are from a subscribing organisation, please log in to gain full access. To explore options for subscribing to this unique teaching, research, and publishing resource for Australian culture and storytelling, please contact us or find out more.

Works By

Preview all
1 Missisippi Stirring John Safran , 2013 extract biography (Murder in Missisippi : The True Story of How I Met a White Supremacist, Befriended His Black Killer and Wrote this Book)
— Appears in: Good Weekend , 21 September 2013; (p. 16-19)
1 5 y separately published work icon Murder in Missisippi : The True Story of How I Met a White Supremacist, Befriended His Black Killer and Wrote this Book John Safran , Melbourne : Penguin , 2013 6453296 2013 single work biography

'When filming his TV series Race Relations, John Safran spent an uneasy couple of days with one of Mississippi's most notorious white supremacists. A year later, he heard that the man had been murdered – and what was more, the killer was black.

'At first the murder seemed a twist on the old Deep South race crimes. But then more news rolled in. Maybe it was a dispute over money, or most intriguingly, over sex. Could the infamous racist actually have been secretly gay, with a thing for black men? Did Safran have the last footage of him alive? Could this be the story of a lifetime? Seizing his Truman Capote moment, he jumped on a plane to cover the trial.

'Over six months, Safran got deeper and deeper into the South, becoming entwined in the lives of those connected with the murder – white separatists, black campaigners, lawyers, investigators, neighbours, even the killer himself. And the more he talked with them, the less simple the crime, and the world, seemed.

'Murder in Mississippi is a brilliantly innovative true-crime story. Taking us places only he can, Safran paints an engrossing, revealing portrait of a dead man, his murderer, the place they lived and the process of trying to find out the truth about anything.'

Source: Publisher's blurb.

1 Forced at Gunpoint John Safran , 2012 single work column
— Appears in: Newswrite : The NSW Writers' Centre Magazine , February-March no. 201 2012; (p. 4-5)
1 Dear Christmas John Safran , 2011 single work correspondence
— Appears in: Sunday Life , 18 December 2011; (p. 12-13)
X