Get your own Free Home PageWorkshop Report 3
July 21, 1995
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NEWS
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The Death of An-Naqid
Few days ago, I received a double-issue of An-Naqid (The Critic). The usual color cover, the fine paper and the expensive layout and printing. On the cover I read the words "the last issue". An unpleasant surprise. Only two months ago I received a letter from the managing editor telling me that my poem "Algeria" will appear in one of the coming issues.
Editor Riad N. El-Rayyes (who is also the owner of Riad El-Rayyes Books Ltd., London-Beirut, which publishes An-Naqid) wrote the farewell article. After seven years of continuous monthly appearance (84 issues) there is a need to make a pause and to evaluate the past experience. This should help to outline a new magazine more adapted to recent cultural and political changes in the Arab world. El-Rayyes mentions no dates and is not specific. The article refers also to the attacks waged against the liberal and democratic policy of An-Naqid by conservatives and fundamentalists. They hated its strong opposition to fundamentalist falsification of Islam. Back in January a Sunni religious leader in Lebanon brought a case against Riad El-Rayyes Books Ltd. and succeeded in getting a court ruling preventing the publication of a series of books by a leading Libyan reformist Islamist, the late Dr. Asadik Anayhum, who was a regular contributor to An-Naqid until his death in Switzerland in October 1994.
It is difficult to know what exactly the reasons for closing An-Naqid are. I also suspect that publication costs became unbearable. But then I don't understand why the publisher maintained its very elegant layout and expensive printing. Perhaps the coming months will reveal more about the causes of the death of one of the leading literary and cultural magazines in the Arab world.
I have published several poems and articles in An-Naqid and was a regular subscriber during the last five years. In 1992 my long poem "Iraq" won a honorary mentioning in An-Naqid's pan-Arab Poetry Contest. The poem was then published by Riad El-Rayyes Books Ltd., London-Beirut.
I sent a fax to Riad N. El-Rayyes offering him my support in the evaluation process and in the creation of a new magazine. I am waiting for a response.
All in all, the disappearance of An-Naqid in the current complicated and crucial situation in the Arab world is a big loss.
METHODS AND TECHNIQUES
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Boring Aspects of Contemporary Poetry (Arabic and non-Arabic)
In Workshop Report 2, I mentioned eight boring features of contemporary poetry. Here are few more:
9. Surrealist automatic poetry.
10. Symbolist fascination with words.
11. Pure poetry of ideas.
12. Pure poetry of emotions.
13. Experiments in poetry elevated to the level of religions.
14. Classifying poets as angels, demons, tragics, comics, etc.
And that boring fellow whom I once considered a great poet: Bertolt Brecht. And good old Arthur Rimbaud? I have to comment on him in a next WR, particularly about the confusion resulting from the ambiguity surrounding his role as a revolutionary/destructor/reformist and his achievements as a poet.
Emotional Intelligence and Poetry
(Not instinctive emotional orientation, not emotional maturity (diversity and depth of emotions, capability of intensive emotional experience), also not the capacity of directing and using emotions - as energy generators - for achieving ethically sound goals.)
Emotionally intelligent poems are capable of reducing the intensity and probability of our inner volatility. They shock us by permitting us to get rapid, instantaneous, and temporary glimpse of reality i.e. nonconventional reality: things, environment and relations concealed/overshadowed by habitual everyday reality. What we see and recognize as existing reality, the conventional everyday reality - outside the realm of poetry - , is "incomplete", an illusion created and made possible by our emotional underdevelopment.
Am I underdeveloped as far as emotional intelligence is concerned? I think, yes, in most cases, though I can claim having experienced it on some occasions.
My "Mission" as a Poet
Firstly, I don't think I am a poet. I am making attempts and trying to write poems. I prefer not to be identified as a poet. If I am introduced as a poet to an audience I would feel uneasy, shy, and perhaps even ashamed.
Secondly, I have no "mission". I write poems because I think they are fairy machines which produce funny effects on me when I am making them, or when I reread them (some become dead corpses after a while and I can't read them again, they taste like raw vegetables).
Thirdly, I don't write poems because I feel I have to. The production of poems has to do with the way my mind and emotions work. My mind produces tens of themes on any given day. This motivates me to write. I just think it would be nice to write poems using these themes and thereby create beautiful things to look at.
But then I discover that I barely have time to write one poem in a week. Three elements come together in this process: the themes, the desire to create something beautiful and entertaining, and the limited time resource. The interaction between these elements is so dynamic and destabilizing that in order to retain my equilibrium I decide once or twice a week to put everything aside, choose a theme and start writing.
This is the practical-organizational aspect of producing poetry. It has really nothing to do with missions and mythical assignments. If I speak of writing poetry as a "mission" or a "task" then I mean that only in the above-mentioned practical sense.
INTERVIEW WITH MYSELF (1)
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Poetry Kit (PK)
Q: Are you crazy? What do you mean by "Poetry Kit" or PK?
A: I mean a kit where you can find all you need for producing good poems, particularly, the so-called forms, molds and patterns you can fill in with content.
Q: Are these forms and patterns reusable?
A: Yes, you can produce as many poems as you like using one or more of these ready-made forms. But you can also discard one form after using it once and replace it by another, provided that PK producers can deliver a continuous flow of such forms.
Q: Are you suggesting the use of a sort of throwaway forms and patterns?
A: Exactly.
Q: But you know, forms produced till now are the result of a long historical evolution. Who is going to produce the huge number of throwaway patterns and forms you want to put in these PKs?
A: This is of course a problem. Poets can do a good service to poetry and to the aesthetical education of the people by investing some effort in research and development, and trying to invent new forms and patterns for enhancing the methodological and technical tools of poetry.
Q: How do you justify this rather bizarre idea?
In the past history of humanity only one PK was produced containing few patterns and forms for producing poetry. Even our dynamic century didn't add much to that PK. We are de facto still using anachronic technology invented thousands of years ago. We have the knowledge and resources for fundamental renovation. We have to do that as soon as possible.
Q: What you are suggesting means the end of poetry. You want to introduce mass production procedures into poetry?
A: On the contrary, I want to save poetry and make it more accessible to a larger audience. PKs will give thousands of ordinary people and poets the chance to do and discover poetry independently.
Q: This is confusing, do you mean PK will make poets?
A: It might and it might not. Poets are creature born with peculiar nervous systems. This is something you can't produce with kits. But PKs can teach and educate and bring a huge number of people to the realm of poetry. PKs are even useful for the so-called great poets.
We will always have some "great" poets around, with or without PKs. But PKs will create a huge mass of people practicing poetry at a low-intensity level. This represents a tremendous cultural gain. No poetry schools or workshops are capable of creating such a phenomenon. And one further remark, why do you think PKs should guarantee that their users become poets. There are kits for numerous practical purposes. They help but no one expects them to create masters of crafts. For instance, you buy a swimming kit, or a diving kit, or a surfing kit and use them to enjoy these activities and learn about them. No one expects that the people using these kits will become champions and record smashers. So, having a PK will help you understand and practice poetry. Nobody is suggesting that by using a PK you are on your way to become a great poet. Not necessarily.
POEMS
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Returning to Mesopotamia
"Lost Languages" is getting longer and longer (over 100 lines). But I am working on another poem, "Festivity in Green." It started with an observation in El Coco two weeks ago. I saw three Banana leaves, three phases: birth, growth, death. But now, I find myself in a different region, thinking of the destruction of Ur of the Sumerians. People leaving the burning city, walking in the night on an earth of boiling metal, red in color, over them mythical birds, etc.
It is strange how this shift happened. Somehow I was worried because I haven't been working recently on the large poetical work on Iraq (history, identity, culture), the one I call the book of genesis of Iraq. Now I am back to it and I am happy. Where is the large yellow file stuffed with those themes and plans and the general outline of the work? It is here, opposite to me, silent. To hell with your plans. You know very well that planning, research, study is of utmost importance in poetry, BUT, important only for one sole reason: do it and forget it.
RECENT PUBLICATIONS
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(Only a small selection. I will add more in a coming WR. The paper chaos
in my workshop doesn't allow for more at the moment)
- Al-Khurfa. In: AL-Mutamar (weekly newspaper, London), Dec. 2, 1994
(Poem in Arabic.)
- Nocturnal Trip - from Berlin to Leipzig on a motorcycle. In: AL-Mutamar
(weekly newspaper, London), Jan. 27, 1995 (Poem in Arabic.)
- Information Gap: Crisis or Opportunity. Answers to questions. In: The
Urban Age, 1, vol. 3, February 1995. Washington: World Bank.
Anwar Al-Ghassani
alghassa@cariari.ucr.ac.cr
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