Adrian Blackledge: Blog #2, December 2014
The last month has been a period of juggling the demands of full-time work with the role
of Birmingham Poet Laureate. During this time I have had meetings with a wide range of
people in the city who are active in reading, writing, and performing poetry.
I took part in a well-attended event at Hall Green Library for Remembrance Day. The
evening, organised by Chris and Pauline Morgan of Cannon Hill Writers’ Group
(incorporating Hall Green Poetry Group), invited local poets and friends to the stage to
read either a poem of their own which remembered World War 1, or a published poem
from that period. The event was very moving, taking place as it did one hundred years
after the outbreak of the war. Congratulations to all those involved for making a wet
Thursday evening into a special event.
I was invited to read a new poem to launch a Postgraduate Research Student Conference
at the School of Education, University of Birmingham. The remit of this commission was
to write a poem which was relevant to educational research – no small challenge! Rather
than go to the rhyming dictionary to find a rhyme for ‘postgraduate research student
conference’ I reminded myself that education is not equally available to all people in all
places in the world. Indeed, in some times and places people have to stand up and argue
for the right to be educated. One such, of course, was Birmingham’s adopted daughter,
and Nobel Peace Prize winner, Malala Yousafzai. I read a new poem which pays tribute to
Malala. The poem will be posted to this blog in due course.
One of the highlights of the past month was an event which bridged my ‘academic’ and
‘Birmingham Poet Laureate’ roles. In my role as an academic I won a small grant to
organise a free poetry event which focused on translation. On Sunday 16th November
2014 Simon Armitage came to the Library of Birmingham to hold a Master Class on
translating poetry, and to give a public reading of his poems. Simon Armitage is one of
the leading poets of his generation, and he has translated The Odyssey, Sir Gawain and
the Green Knight, and The Death of King Arthur.
Simon began the master class by pointing out that he does not speak any languages
other than English. In fact what the public participants soon learned was that they would
be offered the opportunity to translate part of a fourteenth century poem into twentyfirst century English. Simon asked the members of the group to have a go at reading
aloud a section of the original text of Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, to feel not just
the rhythm, metre, and unfamiliar vocabulary of the ancient poetry, but particularly
what he called its “noise”. Focusing on alliteration, the poet set the group the task of
predicting, or imagining, or creating, or perhaps translating, words hidden behind
redactions similar to those in letters home from the trenches. This was not mere
guesswork: it was a creative activity which required the fledgling translators to produce
words which fitted that alliterative “noise”. A final activity demanded that the group
translate a section of the great old poem into contemporary English – but engaging,
original English that should grab the attention of the reader. As with any translation,
precision was not the crucial requirement. It was more important to capture something
of the mood and tone of the dramatic Arthurian tale. Everyone had a go, and before we
knew it the master class was drawing to an end. A measure of the success of a workshop
is whether it leaves people wanting more. This one certainly did. But as Simon Armitage
pointed out, there are a further 2,524 lines of Sir Gawain and the Green Knight awaiting
our translational attentions.
In the evening Simon Armitage gave a wonderful reading of his poems, including an
extract from the Gawain poem, at the Studio Theatre in the Library of Birmingham. The
library had donated the theatre space as a contribution to the festival, and the
collaboration between the University of Birmingham’s Translation and Translanguaging
research project and the Library of Birmingham enabled 200 people to enjoy a reading
from one of our leading authors which was at once funny, moving, serious, and
memorable. Thanks to the School of Advanced Study, University of London, the Arts &
Humanities Research Council, and the British Academy, both the master class and the
reading were provided free to the public as part of the Being Human Festival. If an aim
of the festival is to inspire and enrich our everyday lives, the events at the Library of
Birmingham on 16th November certainly achieved this. Following the evening poetry
reading a Twitter post read:
Adrian Blackledge and Professor Angela
Creese, University of Birmingham, with
Simon Armitage
“Simon Armitage rekindled my passion for poetry @BeingHumanFest tonight!”
What more needs to be said?
I am adding a couple of poems here, and will add more with each monthly blog. In the
new year look out for Burns Night, Holocaust Memorial Day, and International Mother
Language Day. I will also be running poetry workshops and drop-in sessions, so watch
this space for further information.
In the meantime I wish you a Christmas stocking packed with poems, and a creative
new year! A