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Al-Ahram Weekly 4 - 10 March 1999 Issue No. 419 
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Published in Cairo by AL-AHRAM established in 1875 |
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Al-Ahram Weekly 4 - 10 March 1999 Issue No. 419
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| Published in Cairo by AL-AHRAM established in 1875 |
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Egypt Region International Economy Opinion Culture Focus Travel Sports People Time Out Chronicles Cartoons Letters Plain talk
By Mursi Saad El-Din
Poetry does not seem to have a home. Not that it is homeless, but it does not belong to one particular country or race. Not wanting to use that much-vulgarised word, "global", I would describe it instead as "human" -- belonging to all humanity. We appreciate good poetry, whether it is written by Byron or Mayakovsky, Wordsworth or Aragon, Neruda or Faiz A Faiz. Poetry is -- to borrow a phrase from the PEN Charter -- a common currency suitable for all countries and peoples.
I thought of this as I read about the battle going on at the moment for the appointment of a Poet Laureate in Britain. This is a post which goes back hundreds of years and which has long been part of the deeply entrenched traditions of the land. Ted Hughes was the last laureate. He was English to the bones. This only accentuates the complexity of choosing a successor, since it seems there is no genuinely English poet who is qualified to take on this revered position.
The first name that came to the literary critics' mind was Seamus Heaney, the Nobel Laureate. But Heaney is a native of Ireland's County Derry. He considers himself Irish and is strongly opposed to those who would make him "British". I remember him writing, "My passport is green,/ No glass of ours was ever raised to toast the Queen." As Fergal Keane says in The Independent, there are still those who believe that the "Laureateship can act as some kind of cultural bridge-builder, a device to stress the shared nature of our cultural experience on these islands." Yet Heaney is probably one of those who would not agree.
A number of living British poets have ruled themselves out. Keane favours the young Simon Armitage. Meanwhile, a band of critics, as well as the office of the British prime minister, which is responsible for the appointment, are looking around for a suitable poet. One name that has come up is that of Derek Walcott. He is not British, being a citizen of St Lucia, but he belongs to the Commonwealth, and is known for his deep sympathy with Britain, which rises almost to a sense of belonging. He writes of Britain as "an insider/outsider, somebody who cherishes the language, but who understands the nature of exclusion," as Keane has it.
Yet while the debate wrangles on, it is the whole office of laureate that is gradually being called into question. "Is it relevant enough to our lives to warrant preserving this national institution?" asks Keane. Cultural life in Britain has become so fragmented that the idea of honouring poetry alone is not palatable to everyone. Some are suggesting there should also be laureates for rock music and the performing arts.
Why poetry? Because it is simply poetry. Poets may not make big money; their books may enjoy tiny print runs compared with novels or biographies. I have been reading about poets who travel near and far to read and publicise their poems -- of poets who display their poems in underground stations. I have even read about a poet who went knocking on doors to sell his latest collection. Poets have status in the literary field, but no market. This is why keeping the Laureateship is vital, for it helps strengthen the status and importance of this noble art form.
Poetry is not only for the highbrow reader, as people too often assume, but for the ordinary citizen too. The many poems written in time of war, by simple soldiers as well as established poets, are proof of this. Mothers sing poems to their babies, small school children learn arithmetic through poems. In other words, poetry is part and parcel of our lives. Poetry speaks of the world we live in -- both the personal and the public domains. As Heaney says -- and pace W H Auden -- poetry can make things happen. For it represents an assertion of intellectual and spiritual freedom in a world in which the mass media are obsessed with trivia.
