Montreal Serai

George Orwell had a sixth rule for writing: Break any of these above rules sooner than say anything barbarous. George Orwell was perhaps not talking about political barbarisms alone, but the barbarity of inappropriateness in general. His sixth rule pretty much gives the licence to write or say anything, short of being barbarous. But because barbarity is itself a relational call, where does it leave us?  George Orwell’s sixth rule intrigues me.

Or, is there a universal understanding taken by all of us on what constitutes barbarism? I do not think so.  Let me therefore deviate partially here, before I disclose the other five rules. The other day on TV, I saw the launching of a new US troop carrier, named the New York. Its bow is made from steel melted from the WTC shell retrieved from “Ground Zero.” Now the Navy spokesperson, talking to the CNN reporter, very solemnly invoked the memory of those who had died on September 11th and proudly also stated that, “this ship can take our forces to go to war anywhere in the world.”   There is a barbarous choice of words here. It is the righteousness in the voice of the young Navy spokesperson, when she talks about the readiness to “to go to war” anywhere in the world, that is worrisome. Why do the big powers inculcate such marauding language in the mental makeup of their citizens? Should someone break the news to this person, that there is an element of barbarity she is engaging in?  Can language and literature be removed from the politics of the times? Can literature be independent of social development? Of course not!

Why is Literature Still a Must?

Without being disdainful about blog and twitter/facebook language (being a partially active practitioner myself) there is an emerging need to uphold the literary event, that is the written word. The book. The novel. The work of fiction. The well-written, well explained document that does not simply engage in a pop haze, a txt language miasma that passes off as literary expression. There is a place for that and there is need for pop culture experimentation, but literature needs to be preserved for distilling the truth, instead of promoting a haze in the name of experimentation.  In the social conditions we inhabit, or in Orwellian language-the times we live in, the word is blurred by sound, fury, effects and Mbps transmissivity. If you don’t trap it in a blitzkrieg millisecond, it has gone past you and delivered to those who live in bytes and pixels. Their needs are fundamental and cannot be suppressed. The flamboyance of the web and the 140 space compact with Twitter is actually a curious deal with the devil. It forces the truth to be stated in a precise and economic manner, for those who wish to convey anything seriously. And for those who don’t wish to do so, the obscure 140 space ramble is possible. It is self serving. Unless one can use this same medium and invent a way of telling the truth. I know of someone who is writing a whole novel on Twitter. Space by space in 140 space releases!  Literature is however, for the time being, only conceivable as the permanently printed hardcopy version! And there is a dire need to preserve that medium.

Now obviously there are five other rules, which we are all interested in and which if stated first would make the life of an aspiring writer considerably self-conscious, restrictive and possibly miserable. I could have blithely started out on this essay by saying, “When I first dived into writing this editorial essay…etc etc etc  ” and I would have ended up on a well travelled path.  Incidentally, one of Orwell’s first rules is: “Never use a metaphor, simile or figure of speech, which you have seen before in print.” There are several other rules about not using long words, when short words exist, cutting out superfluous words, using foreign words unnecessarily, not using the passive when you can use the active —- violations which we have carried out and which I am doing right now, instead of stating simply that “We violate the rules, often.” But most of all we often write stuff, that we have seen somewhere else.

This essay and editorial is not so much about the rules of writing as much as it is about the need for Literature to be preserved and allowed to flourish, as a significant means of mass communication and artistic endeavour in changing times.  Literature is all about telling a truthful story.

What is of the essence in Orwell’s writing, and more so in Homage to Catalonia, than in 1984, is to state the distilled truth, the absolute truth, the feeling that is at the heart with as few words as possible. Are we always able to achieve what we really intended to say? Can we say in a single word, or a phrase, or a sentence what lies at the core of our mind? With half a million words available in the “official” English language to play with and the new words that we can create and introduce,( because the language does not belong to any ethnocracy), can we come across with the clarity of a freshly poured glass of water in a super clean tumbler? Is there a morning that we can describe that best reflects the news that we read in the newspaper? Is it a coffee morning? Is it an alcohol morning? Is it a flower morning? Is it a blood drenched morning? Is there an inherent deficiency in language that disallows true expression or do we garnish the truth with unnecessary eloquence?

Writers, novelists, authors cannot live by rules. The rules are there to assist. In fact writers must settle down to earth early in the morning, after flying around late at night in a daze of expressions and words. The task of the editor then sets in.  Seeking the truth and expressing it, is the cardinal need. It is the essence. But, style, eloquence and a certain cadence intercedes as technique. In fact, writers do engage in deception. Juxtaposing words in an unexpected manner to wake the reader up and cause some interaction and interest. Thus careful and accurate choice of words is followed by an attractive style. Such is the essence of Literature.

In this issue of Montreal Serai, we have combined several poems, short stories, book reviews,  filmmaker interviews and essays that uphold the idea of telling the unambiguous truth.  Included are award winning writers like Rawi Hage and Jaspreet Singh, as well as our own prolific and much published Maya Khankhoje and frequent contributors Nilanjana Iyer, Lesley Pasquin, Anna Fuerstenberg and others.

They say home is where the heart is. Or is it the hearth? Or both? What constitutes homelessness? Are people homeless because they brought it upon themselves,  as some would argue,   or because they have no choice, as mounting evidence would seem to indicate? Is having no home the same as having no shelter? Is a love of liberty and sleeping under the stars the same as fear of being incarcerated in an institution?  Is  ow(n)ing a mortgage the same as owning a home? Is one entitled to privacy in a public space? Are public spaces really for the public?  And most importantly, what are the causes of homelessness? What are the responsibilities of society towards the homeless?  These are the questions that Montreal Serai writers and artists have explored for our readers. Their answers have taken the shape of articles, commentaries,  reviews, short stories, poetry and multimedia art. The locales are as varied as large cities like  Kolkata, Chicago, Montreal and London or small nameless generic towns. The causes are  as dissimilar as the floundering of high finance is from  the sinking of the soul. The protagonists are individuals,  peoples, nations, statistics. Whatever it is, sit back and  read on.  No, don’t sit back. Sit up and pay close attention - because homelessness could soon strike a person near you.

In November 2008, I saw a theatrical piece by Dave St. Pierre at Theatre La Chapelle in Montreal.  The piece was entitled “Warning” and it was produced by Mandala Situ.  It was my first exposure to the choreography of Dave St. Pierre (the well-known Montreal avant garde choreographer and dancer).  The stage opened with 3 nude women and expanded to four when a woman in a make-believe bunny costume joined them.  It seemed at first like a male heterosexual fantasy, including gratuitous nudity.  This notion was further augmented by the fact that I had never seen so many male audience members at a “dance” performance, many of whom had come alone.  Was nudity the most compelling attraction?  I had also not been to a show that was so continuously sold out at Theatre La Chapelle.  Hmmm!  Following the show, a friend asked me my reaction and I responded negatively saying that I felt it exploited the female body to no benefit.  I wasn’t sure what was gained by it.  He challenged me by saying that I needed to see this piece in the context of Dave St. Pierre’s body of work.   To be honest the piece stayed with me in a way that many others haven’t. 

This issue of Montreal Serai is about “Art and Democracy”.    What is art’s role in a democracy?  I felt compelled to do further research on the subject, knowing that it had been handled through the ages in a variety of ways.  I listened to an interview of Caroline Levine, author of the book Provoking Democracy: Why we need the Arts, who was interviewed by Liz Bulkley on NHPR Radio (http://www.nhpr.org/node/14058).  Levine’s position is that a democracy occasionally smothers voices that are not part of the mainstream.  She indicates though that the test of a democracy is its ability to allow and accept genuine challenges to culture.  Artists should be looking to push us out of our comfort zone and force us to see things with an alternate lens and consider the possibility of a parallel universe.  Artists seek to re-define conventions.  Levine also states that notions of diversity/pluralism are of significant importance for allowing us to know each other better.  If we relied solely on the marketplace, we would be continually dispensed more of the same…a la Hollywood.  Artists expand our horizons and stretch the impossible to the possible.

As it often happens in life, as I was trying to figure out of what to say further, the quotation below jumped out at me while I was reading Adrienne Clarkson’s biography of Norman Bethune.  In it she quotes Bethune as saying:

“The function of the artist is to disturb.  His duty is to arouse the sleeper, to shake the complacent killers of the world.  He reminds the world of its dark ancestry, shows the world its present and points the way to its new birth.  He is at once the product and preceptor of his time…  In a world terrified of change, he preaches revolution – the principle of life.  He is an agitator, a disturber of the peace – quick, impatient, positive, restless and disquieting.  He is the creative spirit of life, working in the soul of men.”

In an interview on the website Xtra, Dave St.Pierre is quoted as saying:

“You have to follow your art, not what other people say,” he says. “I will always try to push the limits with my work. If someone tells me I can’t do something on stage, I’ll do it.”

How do I feel about Dave St. Pierre’s piece now?  Still conflicted, but more clear around the role of art in a democracy.    Montreal Serai has played a role in this debate for the last twenty four years.  Bringing  the margins to the center!  Raising issues that would otherwise be glossed over and enabling debate which the mainstream media avoids.

A couple of websites you may want to check out:

http://minnesota.publicradio.org/display/web/2008/01/11/exploringdemocracythroughart/

http://www.artofdemocracy.org/

http://www.justdemocracyblog.org/?p=633

http://www.nhpr.org/node/14058

http://www.monthlyreview.org/books/artofdemocracy.php

http://www.communityarts.net/readingroom/archivefiles/2002/10/art_in_a_democr.php

http://www.re-public.gr/en/?cat=6

An interesting blog….

http://artandpoliticsnow.blogspot.com/2008/10/art-of-democracy-and-selma-waldman.html

http://www.metropolismag.com/story/20030701/the-art-of-democracy

http://think.mtv.com/044FDFFFF00989E9C00170099461E/

http://forum.odeo.com/episodes/1328756-no-2-Art-Critic-and-MacArthur-Fellow-Dave-Hickey-on-Art-and-Democracy

http://www.digidave.org/2009/05/documentary-about-web-collaboration.html    

We’re not idiots. But as Canadians, we’re told things, contradictory things, things that don’t add up… about Afghanistan, our mission, security, democracy… February 19th, here in Montreal, Robert Fisk, respected Middle East correspondent of 33 years, argued fervently for NATO and Canada, to get the hell out of “the total, absolute catastrophe” of the Middle East.  Montreal Serai co-sponsored the talk and this issue of Serai is dedicated to Canada’s militarization.  Now the 6th biggest spender in NATO, we’re meaner, more fantastic, more unreal than ever before.

The headquarters of Bombardier (800 Rene Levesque, Mtl.) producing military planes and training pilots to fly them. Photo by Martin Duckworth

In the Defence Department’s Mission statement here, we’re told that Canadian Forces are called upon to fulfill 3  roles:

• 1) Protect Canadians at home.
• 2) Defend North America in cooperation with the US.
• 3) Defend Canadian interests abroad.

We’re told that this is a democracy and yet the how’s, when’s and where’s of numbers 1, 2 and 3 are decided without any pretense to democratic consultation. Which seems to have led to a situation in which, as Fisk so aptly put it, “We are not safe anywhere!” For to honor numbers 2 and 3 surely means to seriously compromise number 1, when, for instance, Canada is deeply partnering with Israel on matters to do with our mutual security in such areas as correctional services, prisons, law enforcement and borders and mutual protection from “common threats” including “border issues” See here.

How do we, the electorate, deal with this allegiance, following the horrors that Israel has just inflicted on the Gaza, an open air prison of sorts / a testing ground for weaponry the likes of which not previously seen, the stuff of nightmares.  We do not deal with it very well, largely because we do not have to.

The terrible reality of Gaza here has not been televised.  Our constitutions, deemed too delicate, were spared the horrors, by what Fisk observed as TV’s “coalition with government” and, quoting Reuters, “Out of respect for the dead.”  ”The same bodies,” he added, “they wouldn’t show respect for when they were alive.”

How prepared are we to question policy and practice when it’s also a matter of business as usual? Many Canadians have interests in Israel vested right through their retirement: See here how the Canadian Pension Plan is investing in weapons sold to Israel. Heavens! you may think, at what price those golden years?!

The headquarters of SNC Lavalin (453 Rene Levesque, Mtl.) producing bullets for Canada and other militaries. Photo by Martin Duckworth

Then again, the CPP is no less patriotic than the DND who promise that “Defence will continue to make a vital contribution to the economy” while promoting “the deeply held Canadian values of democracy, freedom, human rights and the rule of law.” Speaking of the latter…on the matter of our mission, to Afghanistan, didn’t Harper recently declare on CNN, ”  …quite frankly, we are not going to ever defeat the insurgency. Because I think, you know, a part of the calculation there is the fact that, ultimately, the source of authority in Afghanistan has to be perceived as being indigenous. If it’s perceived as being foreign — and I still think we’re welcome there — but if it’s perceived as being foreign, it will always have a significant degree of opposition.” The blood of Afghan men, women and children; how many lives? Only for our leader to blandly arrive at the same understanding as Lawrence of Arabia, in 1929, “Granted mobility, security, time and doctrine, victory will rest with the insurgents.” Such is Afghanistan. “Why,” Fisk asks, “didn’t we read this in 2003?”

In a Real News panel on why we are in Afghanistan here,  Sunil Ram, military and security analyst, reports how the Taliban go back and blow up schools and other institutions built by the occupying force, the invaders, the Canadian crusaders. Tariq Amin-Khan, professor of politics at Ryerson points out that, “Reconstruction runs counter to the logic of militarization.”

This is Canada’s history in Afghanistan.  Will we learn from it?  Or are all lessons of history lost when foreign policy and defence are trade driven, outside democratic and ethical influence?  Malalai Joya, outspoken female legislator, banned from the Afghan Parliament, argued that “No nation can donate liberation to another nation.” Amin-Khan understands, “You have to allow the political process to unfold.” And that process must be native to that land.

Fisk spoke of how Palestinians are living the history of the Balfour Declaration while every day we in the West are living in this fantasy land of business as usual.  But, I for one want to escape to that reality that understands a we, over here, can no longer be safe from a them over there, the Arabs and Muslims, by now, “white hot incendiary with frustration that they do not get the one thing that all Arabs and all Muslims ask for…justice.”(Fisk) Because, thanks to the defence trade’s twisted notion of democratic praxis, we produce a plethora of weapons to go round so that there is no longer here and there; there is only here.

“Why”, Fisk asked of government leaders, “do we believe these people?” “Why do we put our trust in Obama,” notably silent during Gaza.  Because he believes? We can believe what our government and military say they believe because we are prevented from seeing what they do.

Is it sane to suggest that until we bring the military into democracy, discussion and decision making, along with the economy, histories, the sciences, the environment, media and so on, that security will increasingly mean insecurity.

In this issue of Serai, there are no borders.

To see Robert Fisk in Ottawa, March 2009 click here.

Rights are hard to locate. One man’s rigorous beliefs in his “cultural” assertion are another woman’s confinement and destitution. The rights of a nation, of a people, run against the path of development chosen by a state. The rights of a majority community overshadow the rights of a minority. The rights of those who are incapacitated or challenged are questioned by those who are described as “normal.” One man’s right to luxury runs a collision course with another man’s tryst with survival.

Rights are for those who have power. Those who have the muscle — the guns, the money and the connections to weave in and out and play games with the tenets of civil law and the ideals of a perfect and fair society, as laid out originally by a band of constitutionalists with dream in their eyes.

Rights are there for journalists who distort, provoke and vitiate hatred by planting misleading stories that are pernicious and provocative and rights are not there for journalists who want to tell the truth, to expose inequality. Rights are there for policemen to plead self-defence after killing kids for playing in the park and not for the families of immigrant communities whose neighbourhoods remain encrusted with blight and neglect and lack of facilities.  This is the way it has been. Rights are defined by the interest you represent. The interests that emanate essentially from economic clout or the lack of them, as the case maybe. Rights are incipient to the conflict between the haves and the have nots.  Between the powerful and rich and the poor and destitute. Between the articulate, educated, noisy and the soft-spoken, resolute and less strident. That is why rights are all about class roots. And cultural differentials cover up everything else. The overlays, the distractions and the disconnect begin! The relational vectors that launch out in different directions as opposed to the mean resolution to overcome poverty and powerlessness. The irrelevance of the price of tea in China is what it sounds like when the question of rights is divorced from any discussion on poverty!

There are civil and equal rights and then there are human rights. The right to survive, to live, comes before even the right to constitutional access. Where there are no human rights, civil rights is a far cry.  The demand for rights are relative. The rights of people in Burkina Faso and the rights of people in Yonkers, NY.   The only common denominator is poverty. The source!

In the last two weeks I have been in New York and Mumbai. Travelling on trains and planes over and past slums, ghettoes and run down neighbourhoods. Two cities, where blight is cloaked by tales of terror that invoke warmongering aggressiveness.

When you want to describe poverty, you have to travel by it by train. Because trains, as we all know, never go through the neighbourhoods of the well-endowed or pass through the backyards of households that have  graded, stepped lawns, households that have butlers and cooks who announce the menu before each meal with a dash of Spanish, Italian or French thrown in demurely. Trains move through abandoned, neglected and forlorn neighbourhoods and dark and dreary underpasses, where blight, collapsing balconies, tin sheds, abandoned container yards and rustic town facades duel with splendidly colourful graphiti-ed walls and children chasing each other behind broken bottle-strewn backyards and cabins with plastic sheeted windows. No I am not travelling the Sealdah railways station corridor, in West Bengal India, but taking an Amtrak to New York along the Hudson from Montreal. Town after town streams by or comes to a screeching halt under the wheels of the Bombardier-made train as one or two passengers get in or get off with their duffel bags and backpacks, mostly students headed for the big city further down south.

And a week later, the sun has not come up yet in Mumbai and I am driving from the airport to my hotel. This is one week after the carnage. There is a huge pile of uncollected garbage on top of a cement platform. It is very large. The platform. On its other side, rows of people are lying down. Not a stir. A large rodent wobbles out of the pile and moves slowly towards the feet of one of the sleepers. My cab slows down in Mumbai and  I feel the train slowing down as it approaches Saratoga Springs. Here are signs that the cars are in better shape at the station parking lot and therefore there are some signs of affluence. More students are seen off by parents who are still clinging on to their SUVS. In the dark, I can see a man slumped on a bench. Further up, I reach my hotel in Mumbai  and a long stream of Mercedes Benzes are lined up and smartly dressed security personnel are running metal detectors over everybody. Rights, you ask? It cuts a swathe through all nations, but poverty is what decides who has it and who does not.