/no like klandestini/
emerging mediterranean writers
Adiam, the absent, clandestine protagonist of Clare Azzopardi’s story, "/No adjective describe story/" tries to appropriate her story through the language of the Other:
/the school nice school/Malta nice/St. Julian’s/Valletta nice/I never school/Eritrea war/don’t always like/I happy but I leave/happy/Maltese no like klandestini/klandestini say/yes?/I happy/Maltese friendly/good with me/we afraid/my country war/long time war/don’t say my story/no please/if government knows I problem/many problem/
This is an excerpt from one of the 20 poems and short stories that were chosen to be read at the Festival for Emerging Mediterranean Writers held in Malta as part of the Klandestini multilateral creative writing project.
The Project in Brief
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and when i reach port… - Insatallation by Pierre Portelli |
In October, 2003, Inizjamed and The British Council launched Klandestini - Emerging Mediterranean Writers, a 15-month multilateral creative writing project which consisted mainly of a series of creative writing workshops for emerging writers in Malta, Cyprus, Greece, and Italy. Some of the participants wrote in English but most wrote in their native language and had their works translated into English. The project ended with a festival of emerging Mediterranean literature in Malta in November 2004. The project was supported by the St. James Cavalier Centre for Creativity in Malta.
The workshops focused on poetry and short stories and they were led by established writers based in the UK: Northern Irish poet Sinéad Morrissey for Cyprus, Hungarian-born writer and translator George Szirtes for Greece, who has just won the coveted TS Eliot award for his poetry collection Reel (Bloodaxe 2004), and the Irish London-based poet and translator Maurice Riordan, mentored the group of emerging writers in Malta. The Cypriot group also had two important local mentors in Stephanos Stephanides and Aydin Mehmet Ali. Maltese writer Immanuel Mifsud and literary theorist Ivan Callus chose the Maltese works for the Klandestini festival.
At the beginning of the project, some people were afraid that assigning an image or theme would put the writers off because it would be seen as limiting their creativity, while others felt that without a common image or theme the project would lack identity. Eventually Inizjamed proposed “klandestini,” a Maltese words which refers to so-called “illegal immigrants,” an image and/or theme that people felt grounded them in reality and inspired them without confining them.
Creating Spaces
When the Maltese cultural organization Inizjamed and the British Council office in Malta came up with the idea of creating a multilateral creative writing project they chose to focus on the Mediterranean because Malta has ignored the memory and cultures of the Mediterranean for far too long. Most Maltese people today identify themselves with Europe: Europe is “us;” the Mediterranean, that is the “South,” is “them.” This is not to say that the Maltese feel they are fully-fledged continental Europeans - there probably aren’t many islanders anywhere who consider themselves full members of an adjacent continental mass, and the Maltese are certainly no exception. But because the Maltese have shared the same religion and culture with Europe for centuries since the Muslims were forced to leave the Maltese Islands in the mid-thirteenth century, most Maltese feel culturally closer to Europe. The (Western) Europeans are seen as trend-setters while the Mediterranean is often equated with sun, sea, irresolvable conflicts and a rich, quaint and obsolete cultural heritage.
Over the past decade or so, with the seemingly unwelcome arrival by boat of refugees, asylum seekers and other migrants mainly, but not exclusively, from North and subsaharan Africa, many Maltese have once again identified the Mediterranean Sea with the unwanted Other threatening our culture and livelihood. According to the Caritas report on Poverty in Malta for 1998, a good number of Maltese respondents considered the presence of immigrants and refugees in their neighbourhoods as “a threat to their security. It somehow down-classed their neighbourhoods and brought abnormality into their otherwise normal lives.”
And yet, as seasoned migrants ourselves, the Maltese should know better. Malta has a two-hundred-year-old direct experience of emigration. Historian Henry Frendo has noted, for instance, that “in Malta's year of Independence, 1964, 8,731 Maltese citizens left the islands in the hope of earning a living elsewhere, one of the highest rates of emigration ever recorded.” It has never been easy for those Maltese who emigrated, mostly for purely economic reasons, to settle abroad. The Caritas report talks about “the indifference, prejudice and silent hostility” that the local population showed towards the immigrants. This negative attitude caused stress, frustration, ill health, weak communication and language skills, and solitude. The immigrants faced “old forms of poverty like inadequate housing, work problems and economic stress.”
In
a provocative passage in what he calls his “breviary” of the Mediterranean (Mediteranski
brevijar), Predrag Matvejević (in picture) claims that “mediterraneity” is
not something you inherit, but something you achieve; it is not an advantage,
but a decision you make. Anyone can choose to become mediterranean; however,
“they say that there are less and less true mediterraneans in the Mediterranean
Sea.” The Italian social and cultural activist Flavio
Mongelli believes that being mediterranean is both a choice and an
inheritance. On the other hand he agrees with Matvejević
that the Mediterraneans should emphasize the process of
becoming mediterranean, but only if that means accepting that one’s culture
is the (ever-changing) outcome of many identities, if it is a multiple identity,
“un’ identità plurale.” This requires what Mongelli
calls “an act of consciousness. If we conceive of the Mediterranean as a
“multiple” identity, then “we feel that we belong not only to the culture into
which we were born but also to the other cultures that in some way influenced
our culture. In this sense we become Mediterranean when we acknowledge this
“plurality.” On the other hand, precisely because we have to “read within
ourselves,” in a way we are born mediterranean, and “inside us we are structured
in a way that there are many cultures.” The problem is having the ability to
acknowledge this.
Because Klandestini is an overtly Mediterranean project that tackles an age-old Mediterranean reality, that of emigration and immigration, it is a project that addresses issues related to our inevitably multiple identities as human beings and as Mediterraneans. The region has been identified with conflict and violence, with distances and divides, and yet dialogue between the various cultures shouldn’t be so difficult because over the centuries, people in many parts of this region with strong cosmopolitan traditions have learnt to develop relationships between, and beyond diversities.
Flavio Mongelli believes that because artists and cultural operators somehow represent the avant-garde of a people, its most sensitive and creative part, and because they are, in a sometimes subversive, clandestine way, “opinion-leaders” in their country, they are in a better position to express “the emotions and processes experienced by their people.” If the artist and cultural operator “support dialogue,” if they “encourage young artists to develop their art together and to collaborate on particular issues, their encounter will certainly have a positive effect in every individual country. It is therefore vital to create spaces, as the Klandestini project has done, for young artists to work together, for intellectuals to get to know each other, to exchange their views and experiences. This, according to Flavio Mongelli, is the best way to bring about the rebirth of collaboration between different countries and different peoples.
This is also, in a perhaps clandestine, unauthorized way, what the Mediterranean multilateral creative writing project Klandestini is all about.
Klandestini Festival of Emerging Mediterranean Writers
The final act of the Klandestini project was the Festival of Emerging Mediterranean Literature held between Friday 5 and Sunday 7 November, 2004, at St. James Cavalier in Valletta, Malta. The programme included two seminars on writing, translation and publication and two different literature readings by writers from Italy, Cyprus, Greece and Malta. All events were free and the general public was welcome to attend.
The writers selected to take part in the Festival were Nora Nadjarian, Jenan Selchuck, Gurgenc Korkmazel, Faize Ozdemirciler, Maria Thoma, and Christian Avraamidou from Cyprus; Frederico Zanatta, Marco Andreoli, Valerio Cruciani, and Alessandro Aronadio from Italy; Sotiris Selavis, Archontoula Alexandropoulou, Pavlina Ferfelli, and Angeliki Sigourou from Greece; and Clare Azzopardi, Stanley Borg, Norbert Bugeja, Priscilla Cassar, Maria Grech Ganado, and Adrian Grima from Malta. Their works and a biographical note about them are available on the official Klandestini project website at http://klandestini.britishcouncil.org/.
The speakers at the
seminar on writing and translation were the young
Maltese writer Norbert Bugeja, who spoke about "Writing in the Language of
the Other;" Jane Griffiths, an award-winning UK writer and academic, who read a
paper called, "The tongue tied: Poetry as Translation;" and the young Greek
writer and academic, Arcontoula
Alexandropoulou, who spoke about "Translation and Poetry as Cooking on Notes
and Dressing on Watercolours."
The
guest speaker during the seminar on publication was Neil Astley, founder of
Bloodaxe Books (1978) and UK award-winning poet and novelist. His presentation,
"Publishing: For or Against a Readership?" centred on the divisions in
literature, the ways the interests of writers, readers and publishers too often
conflict with one another, so that everyone loses out in the end.
Most of the texts not originally written in English presented during the two literary evenings, coordinated by Marcelle Teuma with the help of Claire Zerafa, Clare Azzopardi, Chris Gatt and Alec Massa, were read by the authors themselves in their original languages: Italian, Maltese, Greek, and Turkish; some were read wholly or partly in English. The texts read in the different languages were accompanied by English translations projected on a screen behind the readers. Two guest writers during the readings were Jane Griffiths and young novelist Jo Baker from Northern Ireland, author of Offcomer (2003) and The Mermaid's Child (2004), who was in Malta for a two-week writer’s residency.
Jo Baker was also present to help the organizers of the Between the Lines Literary Festival to choose one author from each of the four participating countries to participate in this year’s edition of the festival in Belfast. This popular literature festival takes place at the Crescent and other local venues, from Monday April 4th 2005 until Sunday April 10th 2005. The 2005 edition of the festival will feature a range of readings, talks, workshops, debates, music and more, from a host of local, national and international writers and performers in what promises to be an eclectic, electric and challenging week. The Klandestini writers who have been invited to the Belfast festival are Pavlina Ferfelli (Greece), Adrian Grima (Malta), Nora Nadjarian (Cyprus), and Frederico Zanatta (Italy).
Another
important feature of the Klandestini Festival of Emerging Mediterranean was the
installation in the St. James Cavalier Centre for Creativity, “and when i reach
port…”
Pierre Portelli, a leading Maltese visual artist: "Anxious departures
conceived in a paroxysm of febrile thought. The sleepless waves bear the boat of
the Initiate to the cult of chance as the furtive thought throbs with
expectation. Art stretches language to its limits and creates new possibilities
even peripheral ones. The clandestine thought, like the ever shifting paper boat
provides a means of fragile escape from stagnation, repression … breaking the
shackles of imprisoning logical thought and going beyond that to create and
transform possibilities.
"and when i reach port…"
Maria Thoma about the Klandestini Experience
I recently interviewed Maria Thoma, one of the Klandestini writers and coordinator of the Cypriot group, about the festival and the project in general:
AG: You have been involved in the Klandestini project since the beginning. What has it been like for you, both as the coordinator of the Cypriot writers and as a writer yourself?
MT:
It was the first time I ever took such kind of responsibility, but it was
pleasant because it was about writing and making people read and write. I
accepted the challenge of trying to organize it in Cyprus without second
thoughts, because I believed and still believe that such kinds of
interconnection between writers and artists and then between countries can only
be a good experience and can rather offer than use up. I believe that in Cyprus
we needed this connection, because the other countries in the project were
already formed into groups and we were the only ones who weren’t. Of course
there are other groups, but no young writers are registered in them. (In
picture: Maria Thoma, left, and Faize Özdemirciler)
Did the Klandestini Festival meet your expectations?
I had no specific expectations from the Festival because I was feeling a member of the group that was preparing it, the better our efforts were, the better the result. I was so happy to see it come to life, that I wouldn’t have noticed any faults anyway! But I think that the work we all did, especially the persistence with which the Maltese members of Inizjamed handled the whole idea like professionals and despite all the other obligations they had in Malta, is remarkable. The Festival was lively and the works were all original and stimulating.
Which works/writers/performances impressed you most?
It is a hard question whom I liked most because everyone put their sentiments and experiences and efforts into it and you can see when you read all those intelligent works. I think that my personal favorite, as performed in the Festival, was the piece by Alessandro Aronadio, “Dove Sei” (“Where are you”), because he had a very original perception of exile: At first a character who could be realized because he was in a script that no one wanted to make into a film, and then a man who couldn’t see his reflection anywhere. From a narratological point of view, one can see the metaphysical exile of the characters from literature and from normality and life.
I also liked the poem by Faize Özdemirciler, “Mayis’in Gözleri Şehlâ” ("A Slight Cast in the Eyes of May"), because it shows how much she feels exile. In Faize’s case, what made the Cypriots exiled is the Referendum and all similar movements of history and their failure. So this is a different metaphysical exile, the one people exiled from their own history and identity.
Not many of the emerging writers in the Klandestini project have actually written about so-called “illegal immigrants.” Why is that? Is it because writers are more interested in themselves?
I think that writers are always more interested in themselves than other people, that is their nature and one of the reasons that makes them exiled in the first place!
But I would say that each of our writers found a different way to relate to the subject, because it is a very wide subject and we had said in the beginning that a metaphorical approach was as welcome.
I don’t know if you remember this, but I had said in the beginning that I find it hard to relate to someone else’s experience, especially when I myself come from a family of immigrants and that is in itself something that stops me from seeing further away – or helps me do it, but in a more personal way. And I am not the only Cypriot who has chosen to write about Cyprus, internal migration has been a painful aspect of recent Cyprus history and still is a very hard problem to solve for those trying to form a good solution plan…
Many people criticize young people for preferring to write more about themselves. And it’s true, we seem to believe sometimes that we are oceans of experience and we don’t need to look behind our shoulder! I must tell you that it was very hard for me to write about our subject, and when I did, I still preferred the one poem that was about me instead of my other two, which were about illegal migration. I think that the question was: why try and give a vague idea of how it is for some other people, who have not told me their experience in person and in whose experience I never had any personal involvement, and not narrate myself, when my experience was so powerful, that I can be precise and true?
How important is it for the writer to be also a performer?
Through our efforts I was more and more convinced that the writer also needs to be a performer, or at least needs to find interesting ways to communicate their writing to a public in a theatre. A great percentage of the public will not actually read the writings, unless they are intrigued in another way to do so. My own favourite pieces of the festival I think I chose not after I read on the internet or printed on paper, but when performed by gifted people on the stage, and that says it all, doesn’t it!
Klandestini Participant Evaluation
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Valerio Cruciani |
The British Council gave the participants a questionnaire to complete at the end of the festival and the feedback which came back was very positive and encouraging. Not only did the participants enjoy themselves during the festival, almost all of them felt that they had gained a lot through their experience of the project. Kate Joyce, Assistant Programme Manager in the Film and Literature Department of The British Council in London, wrote a report based on the comments provided in the feedback.
All comments about the speakers invited to the festival were very positive. They were described as varied, stimulating, excellent, genuine and funny. One participant wrote: “I found them fresh, interesting and very helpful in terms of the field each one covered. Their comments were to the point and open to suggestions.” When asked whether they would have liked to see/hear anyone who was not featured in the programme, a couple of participants mentioned Michael Hofmann. Few other writers were suggested, but several people emphasised that all of the local mentors should have been invited.
Many participants felt that the project did not need improvement, or they could not think of any suggestions at the time of the questionnaire. “I don’t see how at the moment, because I enjoyed the whole experience, but I expect that all this creative energy gathered will be directed to future events of the same kind.” Some participants did reiterate, however, that the project would be better if an anthology or publication was produced at the end of it. One participant would have liked to see the project expanded with more countries involved.
Almost all of the participants felt more confident about their writing as a result of the project, even those who already felt quite confident. Many of the comments revealed that the participants had gained a lot from sharing their work. “I had the opportunity to get feedback, suggestions and opinions on it, in such a way that my writing style is prepared for any major change it might undergo. I feel my step is much more confident now.” Other writers wrote the following comments: “Acceptance by others is an important thing.”“I came confident, but this project added another brick to it.” “I had very constructive feedback from everyone.”“I have met people who share the same experiences with their writing as me, because people listened to me and understood me and told me what they liked.”
One of the most important tools made available to the writers by Klandestini was the project website. All participants had been using it, and two thirds of those who responded said that they had been visiting the site more than once a month. Their main expectation from the site had been to find out information about the project, and many of the participants also hoped for interaction between the participants. One participant said “My only complaint would be the slow pace in which some of the events or development appeared on the site.” Another participant said “It would be better if it created more interaction between participants in different countries.”
Every single participant felt that the project had contributed to strengthening international relationships between literary communities. It enabled emerging writers to form a network, broaden their perspectives, exchange ideas and “make our own creativity interact with that of others.” Many participants felt that coming together to discuss and share work, and regular contact through email and the internet had enabled this to happen. “It formed bridges and helped in the development of multifaceted connections between writers and countries.”
Epilogue: No One Speaks
The blue uniforms alight on the boat one by one. They smell the reeking feet, grimace and start to hurry the women on shore. My mother tries to unbend her back. They lift the children. They push me, Abdi, Korfa and the others. A bit too forcefully. Or maybe I’m just weak. Then they start to ask us where we’re from, how old we are, where we’re coming from, how long we’ve been at sea, where we’re coming from. No one speaks.
(Stanley Borg, “Wrong Turn”)
The Klandestini project: http://klandestini.britishcouncil.org/ and http://www.inizjamed.org
Adrian Grima
9 February 2005
Part of this article was published on First published on Babelmed.net