Featuring Ali Cobby Eckermann, Omar Musa, Maxine Beneba Clarke, Taika Waititi, Quan (Regurgitator), Claire G. Coleman, Tayi Tibble, Hera Lindsay Bird, Behrouz Boochani, Luka Lesson, Steven Oliver, PiO, Candy Royalle, Michelle Law, Courtney Barnett, Quinn Eades, Selina Tusitala Marsh, and many more.
Let me be brutally honest about one thing. I love poetry. I read, teach, and have studied it. I think it is an under-focused medium, and a unique way of expressing a feeling, thought, or perspective of the world. Spoken word and slam poetry is a particularly interesting form of poetry as it is specifically performative—while all poetry is theoretically intended to be performed, slam is for a group audience and specifically focuses on hot-button and emotionally charged subject matter. But whenever I hear the term ‘slam poetry’, I am unable to not think of that scene from 22 Jump Street, and I have to have a little giggle.
Now that I’ve gotten that out of the way, I can be serious.
Solid Air: Australian and New Zealand Spoken Word is a collection of spoken word pieces that have been translated from fleeting moments of performance to the solidity of the page. Collecting the work of Australians and New Zealanders who have diverse backgrounds – immigrant, first nations, LGBTQIA+, the sheer multiplicity of voices and perspectives speaks to the elasticity and relevance of the medium. Only in an anthology which places these disparate experiences side by side without comment or critique but merely as presentation to the reader, is it possible to draw such a conclusion so unequivocally.
Many of the poems have clear inspiration from the beatnik tradition (gritty realism, the depiction of pseudo-intellectualism, drug use, and quest for self-knowledge) or the poems of Bukowski. Indeed, some are personal to the point where reading them offers a vague sense of discomfort. The intimacy of seeing them performed must be almost intrusive. But the counterargument to such a perspective is that poetry is often an act of pure self expression. So if you want to quite literally describe an act of onanism, maybe that’s just a metacommentary of the form.
What particularly struck me as curious was the experience of reading something intended to be performed. In much the way that the experience of reading Shakespeare to oneself is totally different to seeing it performed, many of the poems within Solid Air are a ghost of what it must be to see them given voice by the person who wrote them and intended them to be read in a specific way. I was fortunate enough to see Dr Denise Chapman performing one of her poems at the Emerging Writers Festival this year (she is not featured in this anthology). As a black woman in Australia, you can imagine that the subject matter of ‘I just had to touch it’ is hardly pleasant, but the raw emotion through which Dr Chapman conveyed the sense of violation and anger that was running through her mind when a male colleague touched her hair and then justified it with the line which became the title, made it is so much more powerful than simply reading it on a page. My favourite poem in Solid Air (and indeed, possibly my favourite poem of the entire collection) which is a little lost in its transcription is Tim Evans’ ‘Poem, Interrupted’. Yet the act of noting down these works is nevertheless important, even if the reader experiences only a diminished version of the actual product, there remains a power in the words on the page that provoke thought and reflection. In the words of David Stavanger and Anne-Marie Te Whiu in the introduction, “on these pages sit words that have often first been performed in a live context to an audience. The pulse of those moments still hangs between the lines.”
Perhaps the most powerful of works within the collection are those written by indigenous artists. The rawness of the medium means the profundity of the connection to country and the anguish of being marginalised is conveyed perfectly. Highlights include ‘Fern Your Own Gully’ by Evelyn Araluen, ‘I am the Road’ by Claire G Goodman, ‘Sedition – a letter to the writer from Meri Mangakāhia’ by Anahera Gildea, and ‘Give Nothing’ by Taika Waititi & Emily Beautrais.
This is a very distinct work. Even if you are not traditionally a fan of poetry, the diversity of voice and subject matter will still mean that there is something in here for everyone.
Solid Air is available from Amazon, Book Depository, and other good book retailers.
Will you be picking up Solid Air? Tell us in the comments below!
Synopsis | Goodreads
Over the past decade, Spoken Word has established itself as a central part of contemporary Australian & New Zealand poetry. For the first-time ever, these voices are transported from the stage to the page, captured in print so that the spoken-word experience can be shared with a new and broader audience.
Solid Air showcases the work of more than 100 performance poets – combining elements of slam, hip-hop and experimental performance poetry – to deliver an unforgettable reading experience that is both literary and loud. Poems capture themes of modern culture, identity and resistance.
Contributors include: Ali Cobby Eckermann, Omar Musa, Maxine Beneba Clarke, Taika Waititi, Quan (Regurgitator), Claire G. Coleman, Tayi Tibble, Hera Lindsay Bird, Behrouz Boochani, Luka Lesson, Steven Oliver, PiO, Candy Royalle, Michelle Law, Courtney Barnett, Quinn Eades, Selina Tusitala Marsh and many more.
