No words barred

I am: A chick, a d**k, a s**t, a mutt, a dude, a prude, a b***h, a snitch, a d**e, a type, a punk — No. People are not Pokemon, you can’t catch them all with your Master Ball (whatever that means)

— From Kudi Namkeen by Rene Sharanya Verma

In January this year, among the innumerable YouTube sensations was Kudi Namkeen by Rene Sharanya Verma, 20, a second year History Honours student at St Stephen’s College, Delhi. Verma’s poem, posted online by the group Delhi Poetry Slam, was a rebuttal to the ‘Honey Singh culture’. Within days it had received thousands of views and, at last count, had been seen nearly 1.6 lakh times.

Verma’s performance, which was at a slam conducted by the group, is one among many such witty and outspoken poetry performances that have peppered the Capital’s cultural calendar over the last few years. These spoken word performances, which are judged by spectators, have been gaining an audience across cities from Pune to Bengaluru. Their appeal lies in the fact that they provide young people a space to express themselves freely and lash out against perceived wrongs.

“Eighteen to 29. That’s the most common age group at slam events,” says Akhil Katyal, a 29-year-old poet and translator, who teaches English at the Shiv Nadar University in Greater Noida. “The tradition of public performance is as old as the city itself, with mushairas and such, but slam events are probably around three years old.

The performances are visibly and volubly anti-right wing and slam is a riveting mix of performance and the written word. One would fail without the other. It can’t be just read out; at a slam, you have to feel it, feel the effects,” adds Katyal.

The Chicago-based poet March Smith is popularly credited with starting poetry slams, back in 1984. “It’s a wonderful form of expression and great at calling out hypocrisy; maybe this is why it aligns well with the younger generation,” says Nicole Sumner, a teacher at the American Embassy School in Delhi. Sumner has been both witness and participant of slam poetry events since its inception. She is also an enthusiastic proponent of the art form and has organised workshops in Delhi. “India already has an amazing oral culture to draw from and here slam can be a hybridised popular form,” she says.

For many in India, the excitement that the form offers is a major draw. “We believe slams are theatrical events and not listening booths,” says Aditi Angiras, a 26-year-old PhD student at Jamia Millia Islamia, Delhi, who set up the slam group Bring Back the Poets. “In our performances, there is no stifling of content. I tell my students, you should write poems you don’t want your mum and dad to read.”

Free for all

Shantanu Anand, a 22-year-old law student, first got interested in slam poetry after watching a TED talk by American poet Rives. Other spoken word poets like Sarah Key and Anis Mojgani furthered his interest. In 2013, Anand went on to become one of the founder-members of the Airplane Poetry Movement (APM) in Pune, where the Pune Poetry Slam and APM have become regular events. APM has also conducted events in Mumbai and Bengaluru.

In Delhi, slam events are now common across colleges in the city and a favourite extra-curricular activity. “People are interested and like its interactive framework. We’re still figuring out how to manage it since so many people want to perform,” says Ira Anwar, a 20-year-old student of Ambedkar University, Delhi, and member of the group Mildly Offensive Content. “We still have regular events in certain restaurants, but over the last year slam has really grown a lot as a movement.”

Slam poetry, however, is still testing the waters in India. As Anand says, “It’s still a very unrestrained, young movement and performance spaces are accepting. There’s no precedent and there’s a real romance about the possibilities. When it becomes more popular, say in five years from now, that will be the real test for poetry slams.”

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