This is a simplish sample application to get from zero to rendering unicode text using harfbuzz to do the text layout, freetype for the underlying font magic, cairo for the anti-aliased font rasterization, and SDL to create the window to display stuff in.
ashleyh/ex-sdl-cairo-freetype-harfbuzz
Example code which uses SDL, cairo, freetype, and harfbuzz to do ttf/otf text layout and rendering
C