Poetry and Protest in Iran
June 17, 2009
From Harriet:
Poetry still plays an integral part in Iranian life, even in the midst of the protests and chaos. In a widely circulated blog post out of Tehran, a protester notes:
“Placards that people carried were different; from poems by the national poet Ahmad Shamlu to light-hearted slogans against Ahmadinejad. Examples include: ‘To slaughter us/ why did you need to invite us / to such an elegant party’ (Poem by Shamlu). ‘Hello! Hello! 999? / Our votes were stolen’ or ‘The Miracle of the Third Millennium: 2 x 2 = 24 millions’ (alluding to the claim by Government that Ahmadinejad obtained 24 million votes), ‘Where is my vote?’, ‘Give me back my vote’ and many others.”
Can you imagine protesters in Florida after the 2000 carrying placards with quotes from Mary Oliver? Billy Collins? John Ashbery?
Clearly, poetry and politics intersect differently over there.
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June 19th, 2009 at 11:47 am
Thanks for sharing this; it’s good to know that poetry has a place in the public sphere in some parts of the world… and a useful purpose.
June 19th, 2009 at 12:36 pm
I wish people paid that much attention to poetry in the US!
June 21st, 2009 at 5:38 am
It’s not that people don’t pay attention to poetry in the US, it’s that people don’t pay attention to the poetry *modern poets* prefer. Poetry still sells. In my local toy store, illustrated books of Yeats, Frost, Millay, Longfellow, Whitman sell very well. Shell Silverstein flies off the shelf. The rhythmic, rhyming snippets in Mother Goose continue to sell and sell and sell.
The problem with poetry from the latter half of the 20th century is that it is mediocre and bad. The problem is not with “the people” but with the poets. People still prefer music in their poetry; and that doesn’t have to mean meter or rhyme. Just look at well Whitman sells.
As every demonstrator knows, chants that rhyme or are strongly rhythmic are the ones that sweep the crowd. But this isn’t the kind of poetry Collins or Ashbery produce. They both have had their day, but both will be relegated to anthologies over the next decades, like clunky chants at a demonstration.
June 21st, 2009 at 6:22 am
Protest chants, of course, have their own demands. But that’s a very small part of poetry of protest in general, much less poetry as a whole. I don’t think the lack of rhyme has much to do with the general lack of attention to poetry, which is a subset of both a growing lack of attention skills and lack of attention to all but the most obvious kinds of writing by people in the US. And even given that, classic poetry that has become a part of tradition sells, but it’s not being read. Even among my own group of friends, many of whom are writers and most of whom are pretty serious readers, the poetry on their shelves, classic and not, is unread, purchased out of a force of habit, a feeling that they should, an attachment to a childhood poem. Nothing wrong with that, but loving a Frost poem that was on a poster on one’s high school wall has little or nothing to do with a poetry of protest.
I can’t agree (obviously) that modern poetry is “mediocre and bad” — much of it is, of course, just as much of the poetry written alongside Yeats and Frost, rhyming or not, which has been forgotten. Music and rhyme of the kind you appear to be attached to (if you don’t hear the music in a significant part of contemporary poetry then the problem is, as you say, not the poetry but the person) is an aspect of just one of many kinds of poetry.
June 21st, 2009 at 1:24 pm
I don’t remember putting so much emphasis on rhyme.
As it is, there’s still strong interest in the poetry of the early twentieth century and before, and comparatively little for the generations afterward. I’ve heard the assertion that people who buy “classic poetry” don’t read it, but have never seen any evidence for it.
The idea that the general public has lost interest in poetry is a myth perpetuated by a generation looking for an explanation other than mediocrity.
June 21st, 2009 at 3:22 pm
I was putting emphasis on rhyme w/r/t protest chants, which you specifically mentioned.
I see plenty of evidence that classic literature of all kinds is bought but not read, poetry is just a part of it. It’s an inevitable winnowing that happens over time.
As for the mediocrity of poetry today, I guess I’m lucky that I can see beyond my nose and am not wholly closed to the idea that art can evolve and new forms emerge that are on par with the old. Some of my favorite poets will be found among the classics who are anthologized, but others will not… they will be found in the anthologies of the future. It must be sad to be in the tiny box of poetry you describe. No wonder you sound bitter!
June 22nd, 2009 at 2:07 am
Anytime you want to provide some evidence to support your statement, feel free. Talk is cheap.
And what does the evolution of art have to do with mediocrity? Rather than defend any one poet you insult me and praise your own enlightened nose. Meanwhile, I regularly ask everyone I meet if they can name one poet from the latter half of the 20th century. To date, no one has been able to.
I guess all those people live in tiny little boxes too.
June 23rd, 2009 at 12:18 pm
I post excerpts and complete examples of wonderful contemporary poems here all the time… I do my part. If you don’t agree or just can’t see it, that’s your loss.
As for individual examples, in addition to and representing some I champion here regularly, you could start at one end of the contemporary spectrum with Jack Gilbert or, not to my taste, Clark Coolidge on the other.
Poetry, like any other art, evolves and embraces new contexts and techniques. Seeing it all as mediocre (or any other assessment for that matter) HAS to be tied to the product of that evolution. Your stance is akin, to my mind, to believing that only portraiture or only figural art is any good and painting that has evolved and developed since then is mediocre. I can’t buy it.
Further, if you look at book sales, contemporary poets ARE selling as well– and better than– even the venerated classics. Every list I’ve ever soon (google it) shows poets like Mary Oliver and Billy Collins, John Updike and Seamus Heaney selling as well as or better than the classics. The contemporary poetry scene is thriving like no poetry scene ever has, including the high points of the Romantic era.
And yes, any readers who can’t name a 20th century poet (and I find that suspect, as I’d be hard pressed to find anyone that couldn’t name even a mediocre example like Maya Angelou), live in tiny boxes indeed. May not be their “fault” given our educational system’s approach to reading and learning to read, but there it is. And I’d feel the same way about anyone who ONLY reads pre-1900 or pre-1800 or only Hallmark cards and inspirational poster poetry. Learning to understand and appreciate a diverse range of any art is a critical part of learning, representing the ability to open one’s ears (eyes, etc).
June 28th, 2009 at 8:57 pm
[...] the same time as the streets of Tehran construct their defiance with silence and the reading of poems during the day and the rooftops of Tehran articulate their anger with slogans that invoke both the greatness of [...]