Episode Transcript
Speaker 1 00:00:11 Hello, and welcome to the free mantle press podcast. Today, we are recording in wup in Raja, Nora butcher, and I would like to acknowledge our first storytellers along with una elders past present, and future always was always will be Aboriginal land. My name is bro Bateman, and I'm the author of, of memory and furniture and blue Ren, which are both published by Freeman press. I'm really excited to have two poets with me today. Each with works published in the new anthology, unlimited futures, speculative, visionary, black and black fiction, which Freeman press published in association with J press. First up. We'll be chatting to Al who is a writer, researcher, and poet originally from lolli Bella in Ethiopia, and now living in Perth where he's a senior lecturer at the center for human rights education at cur university later will be joined by AIF Ishma who is an award winning Australia Sudanese writer with six poetry collections to his name as well as a collection of short stories. Yuga, welcome to the podcast.
Speaker 2 00:01:33 Thank you so much. Thank you for having me.
Speaker 1 00:01:35 I would like to give our readers a taste of your work by asking you to read. I have no country in both Amari and English. Would you mind reading that for us now?
Speaker 2 00:01:48 Sure. Country. What I mean receive Hellman. NA Al QAN say like, like, ah, Roy it's the Q.
Speaker 1 00:04:29 Oh, that sounded wonderful. Thank you. Can you read the poem in English as well, please?
Speaker 2 00:04:37 I have no country as I rest my feet on the soil is that looks like me. He asks, where is your country? I raise my hands to the corner of the sky. I say, look on the VA of <inaudible>. And the midst of ABAI. The bones of di are ascending drums beat in the clouds, rambling, tender lightning songs. The spirits of the ancient gather pour down on the soil at my feet, making my hu beats their country. Don't ask me where my country is on the left and on the right in heaven and on earth. There is no one who doesn't know me there LA here, Uluru, covenant, and dreaming created the world. They hook have 10 planets from Iraq. Stand on my bombs, run in my veins, Salam, Kaya. They're saying now there in the womb of the ocean, the gift of the Wago great river turbo meets with Abbi saying what words is a country?
Speaker 2 00:05:46 When stifled by borders stars are my shoes. Light is my clothes. My keys and smile are a rainbow. I don't have a country. I am a country, myself. The abundance you see overflowing the body of the universe is greater than if every person took one world. Look at the moon. The conference of my poems filled with tens of thousands of listeners, lightning, the state with glowing flowers, yearning for my arrival in language, in knowledge and eternal life. The essence of my soul is boundless. The wind is my body songs of childhood water above fire earth, above water, holding it together, moving and space opening and clothing, the windows of the sun, fold and stretching the legs of lights. My is a wind that pierces mountains. My spirit is water that sleeps on fire. Life grows up. When I light down on sand, slavery is to live by a written history. Freedom is to be unbounded. Earth is my body sky is my soul. I don't have a country. I am a country myself
Speaker 1 00:06:59 That is such a powerful poem and such a beautiful personification of land and relationship to land. Thank you so much for reading the two versions for us yoga. So the poem is in two languages. Which language did you first write it in and how close to one another are they in meaning and phrasing?
Speaker 2 00:07:21 Uh, thank you. I think it is. Um, it's very interesting for me to, uh, write this point because, uh, it's my first time to translate my Amharic point into English. Uh, I first wrote the, the point in Amharic, uh, I'm IHA Harry Kazi, my language, my native language from Ethiopia. I'm a poet in Ethiopia. Uh, I have written and published book and performed in numerous stage in Ethiopia. So, uh, I have known as a poet in Ethiopia, but after I came to Australia, that creative side of me has been somehow sidelined because I focused more on academic work and also writing in English. So, uh, I first wrote it in Amharic and meaning that two have significant similarities, but there's always a significant part of the original, which cannot be translated. And I think that is a common reality of, uh, a life for people like me who come from different cultural or, um, knowledge systems and other backgrounds.
Speaker 2 00:08:28 We come with significant amount of experience that can be explained, pulled through our languages, but it's quite difficult to translate that using another language which developed based on a different social political and cultural realities. So, uh, because languages are very much intimately linked with the history, the experience, the culture of the people in question, uh, when we are unable to bring that language and use it in this country, uh, all those meanings, those knowledges ideas represented by that language are somehow, uh, lost. So, uh, translation is an attempt to rescue to bring something so that, um, uh, some part of, uh, the other culture can continue to live, uh, in, in, in a, in another culture, uh, here.
Speaker 1 00:09:23 So it's, uh, a sense getting rid of the silence spaces between one country and all its cultural and political history and another country.
Speaker 2 00:09:34 Absolutely because, uh, a lot of people really are concerned about, for example, the diversity of languages and cultures. Uh, this is because, uh, society becomes deprived of creativity and richness when it excludes other languages and other voices from itself. This is, uh, an important aspect or an important example of how ideas like the, the Ethiopian way of expressing place and the philosophy of life, which I'm happy to talk a little bit about, could be enriching and, and really important for places like
Speaker 1 00:10:14 Definitely the poem ends with the lines. I do not have a country. I am a country myself suggesting that identity with and connection to country can live within the body. Can you explain to our listeners why you've ended the poem this way and how this viewpoint might benefit colonized peoples?
Speaker 2 00:10:37 Uh, we, we may think identity is somehow, uh, concrete and fix it and something that we are born with or live with. But the reality is we come to know that identity through language, through ideas. That means we have a frame of looking at ourselves. Uh, that means, uh, if identity is also a way of looking a frame of looking, we can look at ourselves and come to understand who we are, uh, from different perspectives. So one of these perspectives is a perspective of, uh, place now, which is very much central from where I come in Ethiopia. I grew up in this place called Al. It was, uh, uh, built around the 12th century out of a single massive rock, a rock as big as a village. And the people carved out 11 churches starting from the roof and the entire king churches are built out of a single rock without cement, without anything as with a significant tunnels and the digging and carving as that period in, in the 12th century, uh, in Ethiopia.
Speaker 2 00:11:49 So for me, places are not simply the collection of stones and natural resources to be exploited, to be subdued by human beings, places have their own history and significance. So I came from a place where the place outside of me, the word I live in had a significant story to tell me, had the power to mold my behavior, my attitude, my approach to other people, and because LA was such a magnificent place, it kind of imposes on me a sense of humility in how I approach the world. And I approach other people. So place is in that way, very important for me. But another side of it is a place is something which is very sacred and greater than the individual. Uh, in our tradition, we call God is like divine or God beha means place or country. So even the name God in Ethiopia is a God of place and God, by his ability or here by his ability to hold the world, we think God himself is a place.
Speaker 2 00:13:05 So places define our identity, but a lot of people choose to define their identity based on their race, based on their political ideology, based on their material in individual and self-interest, which is a very, uh, dehumanized and demoralized way of reducing oneself, seeing oneself as not con disconnected, but connected with significant things like places like in Australia. For example, Uluru is a great example and seeing oneself as a holder, as, um, something that, uh, hold us and protect us. The other, this type of conception of identity has a capacity to enrich oneself. So when I see myself as place, I hold stories in my stories, in my experiences, in my memories, because I hold the world within me. I am also living in the world. I see, I see myself as a place and I also am in place in the world in that way, that relationship, that connection with place can define my identity because identity, whether we see ourselves as individuals or as collectives or as relational beings, that identity in a, at the end is forming our mind.
Speaker 2 00:14:33 It's a way of thinking. It's not something concrete. We, we touch it and, and see it. It is a framework and a mentality and attitude which can be framed, which can be changed in a way that uplifts a way of seeing oneself this way makes this question, where did you come from? Quite irrelevant and meaningless, because if I am a place connected with the land connected with the trees, connected with the stories of this country, uh, a politically motivated or a racially motivated question that tries to confine me within a box, uh, of identity becomes utterly in English and is made, uh, irrelevant to who I am.
Speaker 1 00:15:19 Why did you feel it was important to write about and reflect on this? And that's a huge question to ask, but I'd like you just to consider, um, reflecting on that a little
Speaker 2 00:15:30 Bit, you know, I've been in this country for a long time now, and at all times I am always perceived by others as a stranger, uh, because, uh, uh, this country has a dominant narrative that reduces its ancient history. It is a richness into the two, the 200 years of colonial history and, and the dominant narrative of, you know, uh, a European identity. So for me then reflecting on that question was very important because, um, for a long time after I came to this country, I didn't know I was even, um, a black person because in Ethiopia, I didn't up with a consciousness of color. Uh, but here, you know, Pless identities defined on based on what they look. So blackness become very important for me. And within that question of who I am as a black person, I did not want to define my blackness based on the Western narrative, where the individual black person is attached to a particular history, uh, upon which the Europeans were the only actors and others, where, you know, the, the objects of history, I brought my own historical experience and knowledge from Ethiopia, and also the connection that I could create in this country with indigenous, uh, population, with the ancient and long history of Australia, uh, I came to reflect on the meaning of place and how that meaning brings me into connection with indigenous first nations people in Australia, the European dominant white history in Australia breaks the possible historical connection or cultural connection between black Africans and indigenous black people in Australia.
Speaker 2 00:17:31 How do we overcome that? Uh, a breakdown is for me important because we can do that by overcoming this ideological individualistic, uh, uh, Western understanding of identity and going to our way of knowing who we are from Africa, as people belonging to the land people form by the stories of the ancestors, people who are connected with the past and the future generation, that type of narrative is very important for me to belong to this country more than what the politicians, uh, and identity politician, you know, narratives tell us, uh, in Australia,
Speaker 1 00:18:15 There's so much to unpack there. Thank you for your response. Uh, moving on to the unlimited futures collection, uh, it's a collection of poetry and pros, which combines the work of debut writers with established writers. How did you come to be in the collection?
Speaker 2 00:18:33 I came to the collection a little bit late, uh, because I didn't know the collection would include languages as there's an English. I didn't see much space in Australia where other voices, as you know, languages are really honored. You know, IHA is Ethiopian language, but it's not just for Ethiopia. It belongs to the whole world. And the entire knowledge that is contained within the Amharic language belongs to the whole world is a heritage of the world. Knowledge do not have boundaries, but they're bounded by the politics of language and politics of order. So I feel to like, this may not be the right place because, you know, if I can't write it in the original language, what's the point of writing, but the editor Raif, Ismail and my wife, uh, Rebecca hige, uh, met. And, uh, my wife told her this concern that I have, that I may not be able to publish it in my original language. So what, what's the point of contributing and surprisingly, they were so eager and interested actually to publish it in both languages. Uh, so that is how I, uh, become excited and contributed my poem, which I'm happy that it got published.
Speaker 1 00:19:50 Well, I'm happy too yoga. Thank you so much for being here today and sharing your vast knowledge and your stories with us. It's greatly appreciated.
Speaker 2 00:20:00 Thank you,
Speaker 1 00:20:03 Listeners. I am now delighted to introduce a thief Ismail to you. A thief is an internationally published poet and playwright whose works have been translated into German, Spanish and Swedish AIF has published six poet poetry collections in Arabic, as well as a short story collection. He's here today to talk about his contribution, to unlimited futures, a faith, welcome to the podcast.
Speaker 3 00:20:34 I'm happy to be here. Thank invitation.
Speaker 1 00:20:37 Can we, your piece from unlimited futures called white in Arabic for
Speaker 3 00:20:45 I to do that? Uh, and like the, the, what would the, you,
Speaker 1 00:22:32 You, you AIF. So I will read the English translation of the Arabic that you've just read. She does not come as they had agreed. He decides not to wait as is his habit. Since he fell in love with her, he locks the door of his isolated room in the far corner of the house twice. He makes sure he has locked the metal windows. Then he pushes his wardrobe in front of the door. He writes a short letter and puts it on the table beside his bed. He unwraps the sharp razor blade. And without any hesitation, he cuts the vein of his wrist then lies down on the bed directly beneath the rotating ceiling fan calmly. He contemplates it without any fear, as it moves slowly above him. At first the blood pumps quickly, and then it starts to slow down, drop by drop, and he begins to feel unable to control his body. He tries to match his breath as much as he can to the rhythm of his heartbeat as it gradually weakens.
Speaker 3 00:23:51 Oh, that's beautiful. Reading
Speaker 1 00:23:54 Your reading sounded absolutely wonderful. Uh, first up, I see this piece as a long form poem, but do you see it as poetry or prose?
Speaker 3 00:24:05 Uh, well, I have my own, uh, title for this kind of writing. I call it, uh, hybrid a hybrid mix up more than one genre with another and one creative text. Uh, it is also draw from my traditional, uh, style of the Sudanese African in our life back in Sudan. Uh, the story terror, a great role, uh, in our society. Uh, there is two of type of storytelling. There is a one, it is like a one man show with an instrument, and there is other one you can tell without company with music and through the, the, the tales he mix between poetry, um, music, and, uh, they about heroes and legend and mix it with the love. All him love stories to address all the audience in, in the crowd and the audience, uh, from three years all to 93,
Speaker 1 00:25:28 Fascinating.
Speaker 3 00:25:30 Uh, I came to Australia in December, uh, with my, the life kids from my first day, I started to ask about where I can find people with similar interest. Remember, uh, the social worker. I did ask him about that question and he turned to me very surprisingly. Why you asking about writers and libraries and books in your first day? He said, I have been working in this field for 11 years. This is the first time somebody asked me that question. I said, I'm a writer.
Speaker 1 00:26:14 It says at the, that co-create from Arabic by Dr. Vivian. Can you describe that process for our listeners?
Speaker 3 00:26:27 Uh, when I came to Australia or people with a similar interest, uh, the first artist I met, uh, a musician boy, uh, cross, and, uh, from him, my relationship branchees with other, uh, follow artists. Uh, he introduced me to Vivian in two, four before I came to Australia. I was Fiji for three years in Egypt, and I have a friend there. Dr. I save, invited me to a reading, uh, in a cafe I accent did it's to find somebody to read for English translation. And he suggested Vivian after we finished that reading, I did ask Vivian, are you, uh, willing to share with me the stage, uh she's with her general soul? She said, absolutely. And in the same year, uh, we start the process of the transcreation. The transcreation is, uh, artistic reworking of literal translation, uh, from Arabic to English. We work through my written text in Arabic.
Speaker 3 00:28:13 Uh, the first process is literal translation and we use any medium. We can find, uh, if it is drawing or dancing or miming, uh, we try as much as we could to stay, uh, true to the originally. And while we do that, uh, when I came to Australia, I looked for a professional translator. There is no way I can afford, uh, a professional translator. And also there a few, very few, uh, translator in the field of art in general. And for somebody like me, uh, writing is my mission in life. Uh, I can wait for that long process for that. We create, uh, this ongoing workshop and, uh, we, uh, six book in English and also, uh, we produced, uh, two plays and we participate in lots of, uh, workshop nationally and internationally.
Speaker 1 00:29:20 Thank you. A fi storytelling is obviously very important to you. Can you tell our listeners how you became a storyteller?
Speaker 3 00:29:31 Uh, I grew in, uh, a huge or, uh, tradition and my first creative, uh, mentor or, uh, is my grandmother, my grandmother, a woman. She don't know how to read or write, but she can invent, uh, tale in a second. And I remember we used to live in my grandfather's house. It's a big house and we are three families there beside my, my grandmother, my grandfather, that time early, we don't access to, uh, electricity warehouse around 17 kids between families there and, uh, my uncle, my niece, and my nephew and the neighbor. I normally, we come at evening and we sit down in a big circle and my grandmother in the middle, and she had, uh, small lamp and she hang that lamp like a spotlight in a tree. And she sit in that spotlight and she perform. She is the first one woman theater choice saw, and she tell her tale and the tales, uh, it is about our silly mistake around the day and try to correct them. And she invent the story around that, the most important things in her story. She mix the story with the magical reals. I introduced to magical reals from my grandmother before, uh, lately in life. Uh, I read my hero Gabriel or Isabella Lindi, or from young childhood. Uh, my imagination always creating those sharp images.
Speaker 1 00:31:37 They're wonderful images. And how amazing that your storytelling began with your grandmother and has carried on through your life. I'd like to talk now about the unlimited futures collection. It's a collection of poetry and prose, which combines the work of debut writers with established writers. How did you come to be involved in the collection?
Speaker 3 00:32:05 Uh, this collection is amazing. Let me start by two days ago. It's sorry. And now we, we are in sorry week, and it's good to talk about this collection through this week, uh, because, uh, it is a collaboration between, uh, through writer and the in writer. We have lots in common in both cultures, especially with the Sudanese culture and, uh, the in Australian culture. Uh, when I heard the calling about a limited future and the calling for, uh, this collaboration without any, I submitted my work and I'm glad to be in a company of fantastic, uh, uh, press and F press for, uh, taking, uh, the risk and publishing, uh, this fantastic, uh, anthology to my knowledge. I think that the first one of its kind in, in, I'm not sure I was the national.
Speaker 1 00:33:14 Thank you. I would like to thank a very much for being here. That was a thief, Isma and yoga. Galal talking about white dunes and I have no country, both works featured in unlimited futures, speculative, visionary, black and black fiction books and publishing has called the book poetic and powerful while alt feather has called it essential reading for everyone. Listeners, you can buy unlimited futures in all good bookstores and online Freemantle press.com.au. If you enjoyed this episode, be sure to subscribe to the Freemantle press podcast on your favorite app. I'm Bateman. And I look forward to catching up with you next time. As we explore the powerful world of west Australian poets and their poetry,
Speaker 1 00:35:27 She does not come as they had agreed. He decides not to wait as is his habit. Since he fell in love with her, he locks the door of his isolated room in the far corner of the house twice. He makes sure he has locked the metal windows, and he pushes his wardrobe in front of the door. He writes a short letter and puts it on the desk on the table, beside his bed. He unwraps a sharp razor blade. And without any hesitation, he cuts the veins of his wrist then lies down on the bed directly beneath the rotating ceiling fan calmly. He contemplates it without any fear, as it moves slowly above him. At first, the blood pumps quickly, and then it starts to slow down, drop by drop, and he fee begins to feel unable to control his body. He tries to his breath as much as he can to the rhythm of his heartbeat as it gradually weakens.
