Poetry can seem intimidating, yet, it could offer so much to us all. Why is poetry so important and how do we shift the narrative of it?
Growing up, I began to notice that poetry was made fun of, and often seen as pretentious, almost devalued. Poetry was the English class that classmates would make excuses to avoid and always dread.
I think it was because it was an effort to read, analyse and understand, boring teenagers with archaic language. The absence of enthusiasm for poetry has always puzzled me; it’s only now that I realise that its burial in elitism could probably be to blame for it.
Unsurprisingly, it seems to be another art form rooted in inaccessibility and privilege. An artform overpowered by fancy vocabulary, taken away from areas of society that arguably need it most. Areas in which dialect or language is different and vocabulary is limited.
In a feature for the Young Poets Network, Joelle Taylor, TS Eliot award-winning LGBTQ+ poet, wrote: “We cannot talk about poetry without first talking about class.” Pointing out how the two intertwine and how more working-class poetry, for example, slam, has been belittled and “colonised” as “the middle classes flocked” towards it for ease.
So what is happening in the world of poetry? Is it as intimidating as I think? What is happening at the moment or has been done in the past? To learn how to nurture the community as I feel the world would be a slightly better place for it.
What we gain from poetry
I think the most important thing to talk about is what we gain from poetry, and how it serves us in society. Its something that holds huge influence and power in understanding and processing things.
Poetry often acts as a commentary on something, whether that is an emotion, a location or even a political issue. It allows people to explore a subject with creativity at the forefront. An alternative way to understand something, and is often a way to resonate with others.
Just in the same way lyrics in songs speak to people poetry also does, often compared to food for the soul. However, it’s almost a more explicit version, there is no way that the words can hide behind instruments or vocals, as the words are on a page alone.
So, what do we gain from it, well, that’s the thing, it’s limitless. It can bring about personal revelations helping us grow internally, a way to confess, process and play with the past. It can also create a sense of community through pub gigs, commenting on societal structures and injustices whilst also offering an avenue to fight for freedom.
This is why I believe it is so important when it comes to accessibility, every corner of society should have access to devices that offer these things. By keeping poetry for a select number of people we are withholding something pretty powerful.
When it could even be argued, that these corners of society – the lower classes, the marginalised communities, and the minorities have so much more to say.
Whilst writing this article I wanted to speak to people working within poetry, so I met with Tim Wells, @timwellsauthor a poet/author living in London, who recently published a new book, Crown & Anchor.
I wanted to ask him a few questions I had about poetry to help me form more of an understanding, from someone whose every day is filled with poetry.
Tim had some poems published on the proletarian poetry website – opening a door to a more inclusive poetics. A society ran from 2014 to 2020, sharing all sorts of poetry, and conveying working-class lives. Whilst recognising how hard the arts is for everyday people.
So, I firstly wanted to ask if he thought there was any particular reason for a lot of people viewing poetry as pretentious, he told me he doesn’t think it is seen as that “it is by some people and not by others, I think some people like it that way’ and that those may like to ‘keep it that way.”
Exclusivity
When it comes to exclusivity, in theory, everyone can share their work, everyone can attend an open mic, and everyone can sit down and write. But it’s the context that makes poetry or any art form inaccessible.
It’s people’s busy schedules, students juggling work and deadlines, people bringing up children. It’s coming from low-income areas, being working class, being a minority. There are countless reasons why it’s not just as simple as it seems. There are invisible barriers that do make it harder to succeed, especially in such competitive fields.
The time put into working on arts can be limited for people, when speaking to Tim he emphasised to me the importance of coming together locally saying, ‘If you’re working class and in the arts, you usually have to do a job as well as whatever art you’re doing’ which is like ‘constantly fighting two battles, at least.’ making it crucial for people to ‘come together and support each other.’
It’s also vital to talk about language and dialect when speaking about accessibility. Different areas have different accents, different slang, and even differing vocabulary, creating the word gap. Yet, it seems not all vocabulary is recognised as the right one, “proper” vocabulary (used within educational settings) fails to recognise racial or cultural differences, branding it as lower level.
“If you’re working class and in the arts, you usually have to do a job as well as whatever art you’re doing.”
Tim Wells
So when it comes to an art form based on language it can easily become inaccessible through the use of fancy words and different pronunciations. With poetry that seems simple and understandable, it’s seen as no good. This doesn’t mean that these people cannot bring anything to the table, or shouldn’t engage in poetry.
Look at the way John Cooper Clarke writes and reads his poetry, lots of swearing, aggressive language, shortened words like ‘coz’ and slang like ‘twat’, with references to working men’s clubs and ravers. Shifting the idea of poetry massively, through a thickened accent and northern dialect.
It’s interesting that this is still an issue because working classes tend to be at the core of the words we use in society day to day, with the middle classes, specifically youth using them to seem ‘cooler’ or more down to earth. Almost like a “salt of the earth to the scum of the earth” analogy, the working class created a lot of the vocabulary used by all yet it’s used against them somehow.
Underneath it all, “working class people come from a very strong oral culture”. Tim turned and asked me, (who did some bar work whilst studying) “How many pub lines do you hear in a day?” to which I responded, a lot, explaining to me, quite simply that those lines we hear over and over again “tweaked a little bit – that’s all poetry is.”
Making progress
Now, I guess the question is where do we go now? What is happening at the moment and what is there a lack of? When talking to Tim, my main questions were about what was already going on or the absence of it.
He shared with me that “there’s a lot more going on than people actually think” more so on a local level which seems “pretty healthy” but nationally is where the issue comes into play, and “it’s not glamorous”.
“Unfortunately, thats not the kind of stuff that the Guardian picks up on,” Tim says. It also seems, that locally “that’s where the fun is”, the make-shift stages in small dingy pubs, “the weirder, more unusual places” tend to be Tim’s favourite places to read his poetry.
When it comes to a national picture, it’s not very well funded and there’s not as much of a community going on. So I guess that’s where needs the most focus. A few charities and foundations have popped up over time, but most seem to be inactive, or charities seem to be more community-led, like Proletarian Poetry for example.
Locally, there are fanzines and small presses “a lot of that stuff bubbling away”, alongside open mic nights, which is all very positive but, there still seems to be a slight stigma when it comes to a national level.
One thing that I’ve personally noticed from being out and about in London is underground poetry, a lot of tubes currently have poems in ad sections so that it’s available to commuters travelling into the office, or even for people just jumping on the tube for a few minutes. This means poetry is accessible daily to all Londoners and has been supported since 1986, all funded by different art and British councils.
Things like these are positive, but I still do think there needs to be more stuff actively done. I still don’t know where the answer is. Nationally, maybe it’s in education and equal opportunity, or maybe in more government funding to the arts. The answer is bigger than just encouragement, it’s changing how things work.
I think the main thing to do is to keep on writing, and using it to its advantage, however you want to. To keep supporting others and keep sharing, for venues to keep running open mics, for zines to still be made.
Even if it is easier said than done.
Featured image by Ruby Fletcher.