WalcottTHEY CAME to hear the man of words. Like moths drawn to his brilliance, they flocked into L'Ambassedeurs suit at the Hilton Kingston Hotel. They came to hear a Nobel Laureate speak. They came to commune with Walcott.
Derek Walcott was giving his first reading in Kingston in several years. He chose to read from his newest work, The Prodigal in keeping with W.H Auden's warning to not "ruin a fine tenor voice with effects that bring down the house," he would later explain to the audience.
The tempered applause which greeted the end of his first reading was reluctant to reveal exactly how they felt about the reading. As Walcott described the world as 'The Prodigal' saw it, silence descended upon the room. The curtains had been closed, allowing the words a chance to work their magic.
AUDIENCE RESPONSE
Walcott himself pointed to the ambiguity of the audience response to his reading when he told the audience. "Sometimes I think the real reaction to poetry reading is stunned boredom." Walcott was speaking in the question and answer segment which followed his reading.
Like all great literature, Walcott's work is best received between two covers. As the playwright, poet and novelist pointed out, too much gets between his words and the audience when they are read aloud.
Not surprisingly, therefore, the real treat of the evening was his entertainment of questions. He seemed to give each question equal weight, cocking his head to one side before responding. Often he quoted from other writers who had already eloquently expressed the answers he wished to give.
When questioned about what 'concerns' now creep into his writing he noted, "I think my biggest concern is how irritating I find myself to be."
QUESTIONS
Several of those who questioned him were themselves poets and so many of the questions surrounded the craft. Walcott explained that he believed it important to indulge in different genres of writing. "If you write verse only, all the time," he said, "you turn into a terrible person, because nobody will be able to ask you a simple question."
When the questions ran dry, Walcott was again requested to read for a third time. "I'll do what I said I wouldn't do and go for effects that bring down the house," he said relenting to the request. This time around he read from 'The Schooner Flight'.
In his introduction Professor Edward Baugh, the night's master of ceremony explained that Walcott was not merely one of the great Caribbean poets but one of the world's great poets. When Walcott read from 'The Schooner Flight' he showed why he was not merely one of the world's best poets but one of the Caribbean's. His words captured the essence of the Caribbean identity. "I'm just a red nigger who love the sea, / I had a sound colonial education, /I have Dutch, nigger and English in me, / and either I'm nobody, or I'm a nation."
This time around, the standing ovation left no room for quibbling. Walcott had brought the house down.
