by Mx. Kris Vyas-Myall

Poetry has an unusual place within the science fiction and fantasy community. Many of the earliest and most influential works come from poetry, such as the Norse epics or Spenser’s Faerie Queen, continuing into the 19th century with pieces such as Rosetti’s Goblin Market and Childe Roland to the Dark Tower Came by Robert Browning.

This has continued in the speculative magazines, with poems regularly featured in F&SF and Galaxy.

However, introduction of more experimental forms has come to be as important a dividing line as the "message" and "anti-message" divide we have seen debated for the last decade. Even more literary writers such as Brian Aldiss are not always in favour, describing William Burroughs as “piss” in a letter to Zenith.

For myself I love to see more experimental forms and beat poetry, the likes we have seen emerging in the post-war era, ever since I read Donald Allen’s anthology, The New American Poetry.

So as such I was fascinated to see on BBC News that there would be a meeting of International Poets at the Royal Albert Hall.

Me and my wife applied and were pleased to receive tickets. It was a fascinating list of poets

With the performance starting at 6:30 I was able to meet my wife just outside our offices and grab an early bite to eat before taking the underground round to South Kensington (thankfully my offices only being a short hop away).

Heading into the Royal Albert Hall we found the place to be packed, causing me to momentarily worry we had turned up on the wrong day and Bob Dylan was playing here again. The Royal Albert Hall seats around five thousand people and to see this many interested in seeing Avant-Garde poetry was a shock and a delight.

On the way in people were handing out flowers and the whole thing was a curious atmosphere, with a stage covered in foliage and the clanking of bells. Almost funereal. There was also a lot of smoke about but I think the was more from the audience than an attempt to create a specific mood. (We were up in the gods ourselves so did not get as affected by this as much as those in the stalls much have done, which is a good thing given my wife suffers from asthma).

This evening is an experiment and we are finding out what happens when you put 5000 people in a hall with a few poets… – Alexander Trocchi

As it was a very long night I won’t take you through all the performances but will highlight some of the most memorable:

Lawrence Ferlinghetti’s To Fuck Is To Love Again was an excellent crowd pleaser. Making brilliant use of irony, metre and giving a rousing performance, he wove a journey about sexual repression and the pointlessness of division.

Harry Fainlight’s The Spider was frustratingly interrupted and he took it hard. However, the poem is a brilliant dark piece that he performed really well under the circumstances. It takes a dark journey into the mind of someone who believes themselves being transformed into a spider and how this compares to their own mental state. If it was published in Fantastic, I am sure fantasy fans would be devoting many letters pages debating its merits (whilst I would myself be giving it five stars).

Adrian Mitchell's poem To Whom it May Concern was a little more traditional than some of the others, having spent a long time on the British poetry scene and in anti-war causes, but probably my favourite of the evening (and many others given the level of applause he received). It is an angry piece against the war in Vietnam and contains amazing imagery:

I smell something burning, hope it's just my brains.
They're only dropping peppermints and daisy-chains

Ernst Jandl gave a fascinating performance that was mostly through sounds but was really meaningful nonetheless. This included one that was done entirely through sneezing! I had never heard sound poetry before but it is a really interesting and something I would like to see more of.

Allen Ginsberg was obviously the star attraction and gave a performance in his usual powerful style, sounding like he is forcing the words out in a flow of emotion. These included his epic The Change and a brand new one combining viscerally disturbing imagery, despair and current politics.

He also read New York Bird by Russian poet Andrei Vosnesensky. Apparently Russian authorities would not allow Vosenesky to perform his own poem, so Ginsberg performed it in his place.

Some of the performances were less memorable and there were also some highly expected performers, like Pablo Neruda, who did not end up performing.

There were some downsides to the event. The whole thing seemed very disorganised, with no official running order. Nor was it really all their best performances. I have heard records of some of those present that have been significantly better.

It was also disappointing how all of the performers were men. Why not invite some excellent contemporary women poets like Diane Di Prima or Denise Levertov?

What was most fascinating about the whole experience was seeing these poets live, and being with so many others people who were interested in this kind of art. Whilst we there we saw the event being filmed, so perhaps it will spread even further?

Either way it was an exciting performance to be at and shows a healthy future for experimental writing around the world. The event lasted more than four hours so we headed home for the weekend very tired but also elated at what we had seen.

Will the poems of this calibre and experimental nature be featured in the SF magazines? It's hard to say, but I surely won't find it aught amiss if they do!

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[Don't miss the next episode of The Journey Show, featuring singer-songwriter Harry Seldon.  He'll be playing a mix of Dylan, Simon, and some unique original compositions!]