The Poet as by Dave Jaffe
Margaret MacMillan is a historian who leans to the right. She wrote a book and a good one on Richard Nixon's 1972 visit to China. She mentioned the damage that Mao's 'Cultural; Revolution' had done to China. Yet she said very little about the American war in Indochina.
The U.S. armed forces killed somewhere between two and three million people in Vietnam, Cambodia and Laos between 1954 and 1975. As Christopher Lasch remarked communists kill people inside their borders. Capitalist rulers kill people outside their borders. The U.S. and its allies certainly did that.
All over the world after 1945, the United States sponsored right wing coups by military and the election of civilian leaders that killed millions of people. In 1965 General Suharto overthrew the left leaning ruler of Indonesia, Suharto. 500,000 people were killed in this coup. Jennifer Wade of Amnesty International when asked how many people Suharto killed in his more than 30 year reign said, " I think it would be about 4 million people."
In east Asia, the U.S. helped stamp out communist rebellions in the Phillipines using massive force. All across Africa, Asia and Latin America, the U.S. government helped install right wing dictators who murdered their own people and kept their countries safe for capitalism.
"He may be a son of a bitch, but he's our son of a bitch," said U.S. president Franklin Delano Roosevelt in the 1930's about the founder of the Somoza dynasty in Nicaragua. The last ruler of Nicaragua Anastasio Somoza killed 50,000 of his own people when they rose in rebellion in the late 1970's and turfed him out of office. In Latin America the U.S. helped overthrow the democratically elected Salvador Allende in 1973. His successor General Pinochet ruled Chile with an iron fist keeping profits safe from higher taxation and nationalizations. All across Latin America in the 1970's and later, dictators and right wing candidates backed by the U.S. of A. came to power.
Nearly all of them slashed social programs to the bone, destroyed unions and abolished legislatures. In this way they assured that many of their citizens would live much shorter lives. In Africa the U.S. helped kill the nationalist Patrice Lumumba and in the end installed Mobutu in the ruler's seat. Mobutu like many other U.S. backed candidates left most of his people living in squalor while he became a billionaire.
In the 1980's and before, the U.S. and its allies supported the apartheid regime in South Africa. South African troops killed about 1.5 million people in Angola, Mozambique and Namibia in the 1980's. Countries like Angola, Mozambique and Guinea-Bissau had already lost 2 million people to Portuguese troops in their struggle for independence.
True Mao Zedong and Stalin and Pol Pot were monsters. Yet the U.S. and its allies were no saints either.
"The yellow crane is gone," wrote the young Mao in 1927. "Who knows whither?
Only the tower remains
A haunt for visitors
I pledge my wine to the surging torrent
The tide of my heart swells with the waves."
Most of Mao's successors didn't write poetry. Yet Jiang Zemin, the successor to Cairman Deng Xiaoping did. "His poetry doesn't match Mao's," Chinese critics said. On the other hand the great Mexican poet Octavio Paz thought Mao's poetry to be mediocre.
Whatever the merits of Mao's poetry, Mao's ruthless dictatorship did give China new respect in the world. In 1900 China was a doormat for the great powers of the world. By 1963, as the African-American nationalist Malcolm X. said, "China is one of the most feared nations on earth." It still is to-day. At home Mao's policies killed millions of people.
"Nearly all men can stand adversity," said the U.S. president Abraham Lincoln. "But if you want to test a man's character, give him power." Mao's character was tested by adversity He may or may not have failed the test.
Wednesday 27 January 2016
Saturday 23 January 2016
Writing Poetry Can Endanger Your Health - by Dave Jaffe Part Nine continued, Section Two
The Poet as Ruler - Part Two by Dave Jaffe
Mao Zedong was a poet, but a very traditional one. He often wrote poetry at times of political stress. A son of a middle peasant, he was born in China in 1893 and died in Beijing in 1976.
In 1935 he took over the fragmented Chinese communist party and ruled it until he died. Aided by his political partner Chou En-Lai, he stressed Chinese self-reliance and modernization. Yet though many people praised him, he committed massive crimes. He and his communist companions imposed a ruthless, top-down style of government on China.
This wasn't a great departure for most Chinese since they had never known any form of democracy. Many emperors were just as autocratic and ruthless as Mao.
"Communism kills people inside its borders," said the cultural affairs critic Christopher Lasch in effect. "Capitalism kills people outside its borders." Mao Zedong proved Lasch's first statement about communism to be correct.
After coming to power the communists killed about a million of their so-called 'class enemies' This alas was on great departure from common practice in the world either. If the Kuomintang had won the civil war they too would have killed millions of their communist enemies. Yet Mao went far beyond this.
In 1958 he launched what was called 'The Great Leap Forward'. Hundreds of millions of Chinese were herded into large farming communes. They were also encouraged to build backyard furnaces so as to industrialize China which lagged far behind the rich western countries.
The Great Leap Forward was an abject failure. Somewhere between 25 and 40 million people died from starvation as farmers stopped growing grain. Mao's partners in power pushed him aside, fearful of yet another disaster.
Yet Mao launched a comeback. In 1966 he took a swim in the Yangtze River. The 73 year-old chairman of the Communist Party was telling China and his political rivals there, "You can't keep this old man down." Aided by his very left leaning comrade Lin Bao, he launched what came to be called 'The Cultural Revolution'.
Mao had his youthful allies. Millions of young Chinese called 'Red Guards' raged across China, humiliating Mao's rivals in the communist party,smashing up museums,and skipping schools which were mostly closed down.
They sometimes attacked their teachers, and destroyed older people's lives. They were armed with what was known as 'The Little Red Book' that was full of Mao's quotations. "It is not wrong to rebel," Mao once said and the red Guards surely agreed with that. They were part of what was a real youth rebellion.
Finally order was restored, but only after a million-and-a-half people were killed. The Red Guards were disbanded and sent to the countryside to work alongside the peasants.
Mao's rivals like Lin Bao and Liu Shaoqui were now dead or in prison. Yet though China now had atomic bombs it was terribly isolated on the international stage. Soon Chou En-Lai, who was nearly killed himself by Red Guards, and Mao invited U.S. President Richard Nixon to China in 1972.
Nixon came there and in Beijing toasted the success of the Chinese revolution. This was quite a switch for Nixon and the U.S.A who had supposedly hated the Chinese communists. Yet Nixon wanted to end the U.S. War in Vietnam and Indo China, and get re-elected president in 1972. The Chinese rulers helped him do both.
For Mao Zedong the poet and revolutionary, Nixon's visit was another feather in his cap.
Mao Zedong was a poet, but a very traditional one. He often wrote poetry at times of political stress. A son of a middle peasant, he was born in China in 1893 and died in Beijing in 1976.
In 1935 he took over the fragmented Chinese communist party and ruled it until he died. Aided by his political partner Chou En-Lai, he stressed Chinese self-reliance and modernization. Yet though many people praised him, he committed massive crimes. He and his communist companions imposed a ruthless, top-down style of government on China.
This wasn't a great departure for most Chinese since they had never known any form of democracy. Many emperors were just as autocratic and ruthless as Mao.
"Communism kills people inside its borders," said the cultural affairs critic Christopher Lasch in effect. "Capitalism kills people outside its borders." Mao Zedong proved Lasch's first statement about communism to be correct.
After coming to power the communists killed about a million of their so-called 'class enemies' This alas was on great departure from common practice in the world either. If the Kuomintang had won the civil war they too would have killed millions of their communist enemies. Yet Mao went far beyond this.
In 1958 he launched what was called 'The Great Leap Forward'. Hundreds of millions of Chinese were herded into large farming communes. They were also encouraged to build backyard furnaces so as to industrialize China which lagged far behind the rich western countries.
The Great Leap Forward was an abject failure. Somewhere between 25 and 40 million people died from starvation as farmers stopped growing grain. Mao's partners in power pushed him aside, fearful of yet another disaster.
Yet Mao launched a comeback. In 1966 he took a swim in the Yangtze River. The 73 year-old chairman of the Communist Party was telling China and his political rivals there, "You can't keep this old man down." Aided by his very left leaning comrade Lin Bao, he launched what came to be called 'The Cultural Revolution'.
Mao had his youthful allies. Millions of young Chinese called 'Red Guards' raged across China, humiliating Mao's rivals in the communist party,smashing up museums,and skipping schools which were mostly closed down.
They sometimes attacked their teachers, and destroyed older people's lives. They were armed with what was known as 'The Little Red Book' that was full of Mao's quotations. "It is not wrong to rebel," Mao once said and the red Guards surely agreed with that. They were part of what was a real youth rebellion.
Finally order was restored, but only after a million-and-a-half people were killed. The Red Guards were disbanded and sent to the countryside to work alongside the peasants.
Mao's rivals like Lin Bao and Liu Shaoqui were now dead or in prison. Yet though China now had atomic bombs it was terribly isolated on the international stage. Soon Chou En-Lai, who was nearly killed himself by Red Guards, and Mao invited U.S. President Richard Nixon to China in 1972.
Nixon came there and in Beijing toasted the success of the Chinese revolution. This was quite a switch for Nixon and the U.S.A who had supposedly hated the Chinese communists. Yet Nixon wanted to end the U.S. War in Vietnam and Indo China, and get re-elected president in 1972. The Chinese rulers helped him do both.
For Mao Zedong the poet and revolutionary, Nixon's visit was another feather in his cap.
Friday 22 January 2016
Writing Poetry Can Endanger Your Health by Dave Jaffe - Part Eight, Section One
The Poet As Ruler
Mao Zedong, China's new leader had a message for the Chinese and the world on October 1st, 1949. "China has stood up," he said in Beijing. He proclaimed China as the now communist-ruled People's Republic of China.
Mao's victory came after 100 years of humiliation for China and war and chaos that ravaged the country. It all started in the 1830's when British ship showed up on Chinese shores. The British forced the Chinese to consume opium grown in India.
When the Chinese emperor of the day protested, British warships and British soldiers battered the government into submission. The Chinese had looked down in condescension at the so-called 'Barbarians' who they thought were inferior to the Chinese. Yet now the emperor looked on helplessly as one other country after another siezed coastal land from China. Germany, France, the United States, Russia and of course, Great Britain, set up ports and governments on Chinese soil.
"No dogs or Chinese here," said British signs at its foreign-ruled areas.
Two massive rebellions failed to dislodge the foreigners. In 1911 the Chinese emperor resigned as China dissolved into chaos. Sun Yat Sen, the head of the nationalist party known as the Kuomintang, became the new supposed head of China. Yet he had little power. Worse was to come. At the end of World War One, the Japanese at the Treaty of Versailles got even more concessions from China.
A powerful May 4th movement emerged in China to protest the treaty but it failed to stop Japan on this issue.
Then the Great Depression hit the world in the 1930's. In 1937 Japan invaded China. "Kill all, burn all, destroy all," the Japanese High Command told its soldiers. The Japanese army killed somewhere between seven and 15 million Chinese.
A deadly three-cornered struggle broke out in China. In the north lay the communists who had survived the legendary 8,000 mile or near 13,000 kilometre journey called 'The Long March'. Then there was the Kuomintang, now the party of Chiang Kai-Shek, a ruthless free enterprise general who'd killed many communists in the 1930's and 1920's.
And then there were the Japaneses invaders who claimed to be building an East Asian 'Co-Prosperity' sphere.By the early 1940's, Japanese troops had already conquered large parts of East Asia. All across Europe and parts of east Asia, the Second World War was now in process. Over 55 million died as a result.
In 1945 two U.S. atom bombs put paid to Japan. It surrendered to the Americans and World War Two was over. Yet in China the civil war just went on. The United States threw its support behind the Kuomintang, giving it millions of dollars in aid.
Yet the communists led by Mao Zedong were helped by many poor people who wanted peace and social justice. The Communists won and Chiang Kai-Shek fled to the offshore island of Taiwan. Mao Zedong, a part-time poet and a full time communist, now ruled all of China.
Mao Zedong, China's new leader had a message for the Chinese and the world on October 1st, 1949. "China has stood up," he said in Beijing. He proclaimed China as the now communist-ruled People's Republic of China.
Mao's victory came after 100 years of humiliation for China and war and chaos that ravaged the country. It all started in the 1830's when British ship showed up on Chinese shores. The British forced the Chinese to consume opium grown in India.
When the Chinese emperor of the day protested, British warships and British soldiers battered the government into submission. The Chinese had looked down in condescension at the so-called 'Barbarians' who they thought were inferior to the Chinese. Yet now the emperor looked on helplessly as one other country after another siezed coastal land from China. Germany, France, the United States, Russia and of course, Great Britain, set up ports and governments on Chinese soil.
"No dogs or Chinese here," said British signs at its foreign-ruled areas.
Two massive rebellions failed to dislodge the foreigners. In 1911 the Chinese emperor resigned as China dissolved into chaos. Sun Yat Sen, the head of the nationalist party known as the Kuomintang, became the new supposed head of China. Yet he had little power. Worse was to come. At the end of World War One, the Japanese at the Treaty of Versailles got even more concessions from China.
A powerful May 4th movement emerged in China to protest the treaty but it failed to stop Japan on this issue.
Then the Great Depression hit the world in the 1930's. In 1937 Japan invaded China. "Kill all, burn all, destroy all," the Japanese High Command told its soldiers. The Japanese army killed somewhere between seven and 15 million Chinese.
A deadly three-cornered struggle broke out in China. In the north lay the communists who had survived the legendary 8,000 mile or near 13,000 kilometre journey called 'The Long March'. Then there was the Kuomintang, now the party of Chiang Kai-Shek, a ruthless free enterprise general who'd killed many communists in the 1930's and 1920's.
And then there were the Japaneses invaders who claimed to be building an East Asian 'Co-Prosperity' sphere.By the early 1940's, Japanese troops had already conquered large parts of East Asia. All across Europe and parts of east Asia, the Second World War was now in process. Over 55 million died as a result.
In 1945 two U.S. atom bombs put paid to Japan. It surrendered to the Americans and World War Two was over. Yet in China the civil war just went on. The United States threw its support behind the Kuomintang, giving it millions of dollars in aid.
Yet the communists led by Mao Zedong were helped by many poor people who wanted peace and social justice. The Communists won and Chiang Kai-Shek fled to the offshore island of Taiwan. Mao Zedong, a part-time poet and a full time communist, now ruled all of China.
Thursday 21 January 2016
Writing Poetry Can Endanger Your Health by Dave Jaffe - Part Eight
The Terrorist Who Wrote Poetry.
On September 11, 2001, four airplanes were hijacked by some fanatical Moslems. Two of the airplanes were flown into the World Trade Twin Towers in New York City. Another was flown into the Pentagon in Washington, D.C. A fourth crashed before it could hit its target, which may have been the U.S. Capital or the White House.
Close to 3,000 people, mostly Americans died from the actions of the hijackers. Most of the hijackers were members of a terrorist group called Al-Qaeda. Their leader Osama Bin Laden had founded the group a few years before.
In 1998, Al-Qaeda militants bombed two U.S. embassies in East Africa killing 12 Americans and two hundred Africans. This act was the first known terrorist action of Al-Qaeda. A story put out by a Moslem magazine and based in Pittsburgh Pennsylvania, mourned the death of the Al-Qaeda militants who died in the attack.
"God would re-unite us with them in paradise," the article said.
The leader of Al-Qaeda was a poet or at least a part-time one called Osama Bin Laden.
Born in 1957, bin Laden came from a multimillionaire Saudi Arabian family. He helped set up an anti-Soviet Union fighting force in the early 1980's when the Soviet Union invaded Afghanistan. He probably got help from the Saudi government and the CIA in doing this.
Like many upper class Moslems especially Saudi ones, he wrote poetry in Arabic. This tradition of writing poetry was born in Arabia in the 7th century. It came hand-in-hand with the rise of Islam.
Most rulers and political activists don't write poetry. Many politicians in democracies write books that are written in part by ghost writers. Some politicians like the late French president Georges Pompidou know quite a bit of literature. Pompidou knew lots of French poetry and often quoted French poetry in cabinet meetings.Xi Jinping, the present head of China claims to have read lots of Russian and French literature.Yet Xi Jinping doesn't write poetry. Nor do most present day political activists. Osama Bin Laden did.
In any case the '9/11' acts as the day came to be known set off what is now called 'The War On Terror'. "He who isn't with us," U.S. president George W. Bush said in effect, "is against us." U.S. and other NATO troops invaded Afghanistan looking for Osama bin Laden.
Then in 2003 more U.S. troops and other NATO forces invaded Iraq and overthrew its leader Saddam Hussein.
These invasions were then followed by what came to be called 'Arab Spring'. In 2010 and later, people in the Middle East rebelled mostly unsuccessfully against their tyrannical rulers. The two events seemed to merge into each other and many people died.
"We are all Americans now," headlined the sometimes anti-American French paper 'Le Monde' on the day after '9/11'. Soon this came true. After 2003, terrorists and suicide bombers who were fanatical Moslems, shot and killed people and blew themselves up all over the world. Countries like Canada, France, Great Britain, Spain and the U.S. again, and many places across the Middle East and East Asia were targetted by Moslem terrorists.
Meanwhile NATO and other troops killed hundreds of thousands in Iraq and thousands of people in Afghanistan. They in turn died by the thousands. NATO countries like the U.S.A. and Canada helped overthrow Moammar Ghadaffi in Libya. Soon Libya descended into chaos like Iraq and then Syria.
In Syria it seems clear that the U.S. and the Saudis are trying to overthrow the ruling Assad family while Iran is helping the Assad group. And all across the Middle East and parts of Asia, Iran's rulers back Sh'ia Moslems while the Saudis and the U.S. government back Sunni Moslems.
All these conflicts created millions of refugees and over a million dead. In Iraq alone over a million people died after the NATO 2003 invasion. In Syria over a quarter of a million people are now dead. Meanwhile in Syria and Iraq a new fanatical group has emerged called ISIS. The War On Terror and terrorists alone has killed over 75,000 people in Pakistan.
Perhaps all this chaos and killing was intended by Osama bin Laden. If so, he succeeded.Yet he didn't live to see it all.
U.S. SEAL forces killed him in Pakistan where he was hiding in 2011.
"The battle camels are ready to go/" he wrote in a poem celebrating a suicide bombing attack on an American destroyer that killed 17 U.S. soldiers. "To her doom/ (The battleship) progresses slowly, clothed in a huge illusion."
Bin Laden was another poet that ended up as a mass murderer. If he'd only written poetry he may have been quickly forgotten. But as the architect of '9/11' he has won an unfortunate place in the history books.
On September 11, 2001, four airplanes were hijacked by some fanatical Moslems. Two of the airplanes were flown into the World Trade Twin Towers in New York City. Another was flown into the Pentagon in Washington, D.C. A fourth crashed before it could hit its target, which may have been the U.S. Capital or the White House.
Close to 3,000 people, mostly Americans died from the actions of the hijackers. Most of the hijackers were members of a terrorist group called Al-Qaeda. Their leader Osama Bin Laden had founded the group a few years before.
In 1998, Al-Qaeda militants bombed two U.S. embassies in East Africa killing 12 Americans and two hundred Africans. This act was the first known terrorist action of Al-Qaeda. A story put out by a Moslem magazine and based in Pittsburgh Pennsylvania, mourned the death of the Al-Qaeda militants who died in the attack.
"God would re-unite us with them in paradise," the article said.
The leader of Al-Qaeda was a poet or at least a part-time one called Osama Bin Laden.
Born in 1957, bin Laden came from a multimillionaire Saudi Arabian family. He helped set up an anti-Soviet Union fighting force in the early 1980's when the Soviet Union invaded Afghanistan. He probably got help from the Saudi government and the CIA in doing this.
Like many upper class Moslems especially Saudi ones, he wrote poetry in Arabic. This tradition of writing poetry was born in Arabia in the 7th century. It came hand-in-hand with the rise of Islam.
Most rulers and political activists don't write poetry. Many politicians in democracies write books that are written in part by ghost writers. Some politicians like the late French president Georges Pompidou know quite a bit of literature. Pompidou knew lots of French poetry and often quoted French poetry in cabinet meetings.Xi Jinping, the present head of China claims to have read lots of Russian and French literature.Yet Xi Jinping doesn't write poetry. Nor do most present day political activists. Osama Bin Laden did.
In any case the '9/11' acts as the day came to be known set off what is now called 'The War On Terror'. "He who isn't with us," U.S. president George W. Bush said in effect, "is against us." U.S. and other NATO troops invaded Afghanistan looking for Osama bin Laden.
Then in 2003 more U.S. troops and other NATO forces invaded Iraq and overthrew its leader Saddam Hussein.
These invasions were then followed by what came to be called 'Arab Spring'. In 2010 and later, people in the Middle East rebelled mostly unsuccessfully against their tyrannical rulers. The two events seemed to merge into each other and many people died.
"We are all Americans now," headlined the sometimes anti-American French paper 'Le Monde' on the day after '9/11'. Soon this came true. After 2003, terrorists and suicide bombers who were fanatical Moslems, shot and killed people and blew themselves up all over the world. Countries like Canada, France, Great Britain, Spain and the U.S. again, and many places across the Middle East and East Asia were targetted by Moslem terrorists.
Meanwhile NATO and other troops killed hundreds of thousands in Iraq and thousands of people in Afghanistan. They in turn died by the thousands. NATO countries like the U.S.A. and Canada helped overthrow Moammar Ghadaffi in Libya. Soon Libya descended into chaos like Iraq and then Syria.
In Syria it seems clear that the U.S. and the Saudis are trying to overthrow the ruling Assad family while Iran is helping the Assad group. And all across the Middle East and parts of Asia, Iran's rulers back Sh'ia Moslems while the Saudis and the U.S. government back Sunni Moslems.
All these conflicts created millions of refugees and over a million dead. In Iraq alone over a million people died after the NATO 2003 invasion. In Syria over a quarter of a million people are now dead. Meanwhile in Syria and Iraq a new fanatical group has emerged called ISIS. The War On Terror and terrorists alone has killed over 75,000 people in Pakistan.
Perhaps all this chaos and killing was intended by Osama bin Laden. If so, he succeeded.Yet he didn't live to see it all.
U.S. SEAL forces killed him in Pakistan where he was hiding in 2011.
"The battle camels are ready to go/" he wrote in a poem celebrating a suicide bombing attack on an American destroyer that killed 17 U.S. soldiers. "To her doom/ (The battleship) progresses slowly, clothed in a huge illusion."
Bin Laden was another poet that ended up as a mass murderer. If he'd only written poetry he may have been quickly forgotten. But as the architect of '9/11' he has won an unfortunate place in the history books.
Tuesday 19 January 2016
Writing Poetry Can Endanger Your Health - Part Seven by Dave Jaffe
The Poet As Murderer by Dave Jaffe
Not all poets turned into victims or lived lives just writing poetry. A few of them turned into mass murderers.
A small crowd gathered outside the Catholic Holy Rosary Cathedral in downtown Vancouver one Sunday morning in March 2008.
They had come there to protest the Catholic Church's role in the creation and running of residential schools. These schools were financed by Canada's Department of Indian Affairs, who gave money to build the schools. The Catholic Church, the Anglican Church, and the United Church and its forerunners provided the teachers. From the 1890's to the 1960's, First Nations children were torn away from their homes. They were thrust into these so-called 'residential schools' which were in places a long way from where they were born.
Here nuns, and ministers and priests assaulted, brutalized and molested the children,. They were supposedly teaching the students to speak English and giving them an education in other subjects.
But in fact, the teachers traumatized hundreds of thousands of children and murdered thousands of First Nations students. "60,000 children died in residential schools," says the former United Church minister Kevin Annett who was kicked out of the United Church and helped organize the April 2008 protest. Some have disputed Annett's numbers. Yet most estimates put the number of murdered children at at least 6,000.
Yet there's no doubt that residential schools helped to destroy or nearly did destroy many First nations people. And a poet named Duncan Campbell Scott oversaw this project from 1913 to 1932. Scott wrote some very fine poetry.
"Think of the death of Akoose," wrote Scott in this poem called 'In Memory of Edmund Morris'
Fleet of foot
who in his prime, a herd of antelope
Drove through rank prairie; loping like a wolf
Tired them and slew them."
Scott was photographed by the famous photographer Yousuf Karsh. his photo shows us a prim thin man. He was active in Ottawa and led there cultural pursuits in drama, music and poetry.
Yet as far as First Nations were concerned Scott was brutal. He became the deputy superintendant of India Affairs in 1913. In that job he tried to get governments to force First Nations to give up their legal status. He repressed and tried to wipe out the rights of First Nations. Due to his efforts First Nations people were denied the right to hire lawyers or advisors when they clashed with government rules.
He oversaw the running of residential schools from 1913 to 1932 and thought they did a great job assimilating Indians into the larger Canadian society. His object, he told a Parliamentary Committee is to absorb Indians into Canada "until there is no Indian question." Scott's poetry on the other hand, says Robert l. McDougall was "precise in imagery, intense yet disciplined and flexible in metre and form."
A fine poet? Scott surely was that. Yet he was also a racist bureaucrat who oversaw a school system that murdered thousands of First nations children. Scott was one of a few poets who was also a mass murderer.
Not all poets turned into victims or lived lives just writing poetry. A few of them turned into mass murderers.
A small crowd gathered outside the Catholic Holy Rosary Cathedral in downtown Vancouver one Sunday morning in March 2008.
They had come there to protest the Catholic Church's role in the creation and running of residential schools. These schools were financed by Canada's Department of Indian Affairs, who gave money to build the schools. The Catholic Church, the Anglican Church, and the United Church and its forerunners provided the teachers. From the 1890's to the 1960's, First Nations children were torn away from their homes. They were thrust into these so-called 'residential schools' which were in places a long way from where they were born.
Here nuns, and ministers and priests assaulted, brutalized and molested the children,. They were supposedly teaching the students to speak English and giving them an education in other subjects.
But in fact, the teachers traumatized hundreds of thousands of children and murdered thousands of First Nations students. "60,000 children died in residential schools," says the former United Church minister Kevin Annett who was kicked out of the United Church and helped organize the April 2008 protest. Some have disputed Annett's numbers. Yet most estimates put the number of murdered children at at least 6,000.
Yet there's no doubt that residential schools helped to destroy or nearly did destroy many First nations people. And a poet named Duncan Campbell Scott oversaw this project from 1913 to 1932. Scott wrote some very fine poetry.
"Think of the death of Akoose," wrote Scott in this poem called 'In Memory of Edmund Morris'
Fleet of foot
who in his prime, a herd of antelope
Drove through rank prairie; loping like a wolf
Tired them and slew them."
Scott was photographed by the famous photographer Yousuf Karsh. his photo shows us a prim thin man. He was active in Ottawa and led there cultural pursuits in drama, music and poetry.
Yet as far as First Nations were concerned Scott was brutal. He became the deputy superintendant of India Affairs in 1913. In that job he tried to get governments to force First Nations to give up their legal status. He repressed and tried to wipe out the rights of First Nations. Due to his efforts First Nations people were denied the right to hire lawyers or advisors when they clashed with government rules.
He oversaw the running of residential schools from 1913 to 1932 and thought they did a great job assimilating Indians into the larger Canadian society. His object, he told a Parliamentary Committee is to absorb Indians into Canada "until there is no Indian question." Scott's poetry on the other hand, says Robert l. McDougall was "precise in imagery, intense yet disciplined and flexible in metre and form."
A fine poet? Scott surely was that. Yet he was also a racist bureaucrat who oversaw a school system that murdered thousands of First nations children. Scott was one of a few poets who was also a mass murderer.
Tuesday 12 January 2016
Writing Poetry Can Endanger Your Health -Part Six by Dave Jaffe
Wrting Poetry Isn't Always Dangerous
It's good to remember that while many poets were killed and persecuted in 20th century Eastern Europe this wasn't true in the 19th century. "In the nineteenth century," writes Milan Kundera, "all of small nations in Europe had romantic patriot poets. There was Petoffi in Hungary, Mickiewicz in Poland, Pescren in Slovenia" and so on.
In the early 20th century Europe went through the First World War, then the Great Depression and then the Second World War. These traumatic events killed tens of millions of people and triggered the rise of fascism, nazism and communism.
All of these movements rose and fell in the 20th century. They are all history in Europe and as a result most European poets are left alone to write what they want.
In Canada by contrast, most poets have never been harassed as poets have in Europe,
especially to-day. For instance the poet Irving Layton, taught for many years in a private Jewish school in Montreal. He turned many of his students onto poetry. Some of them became poets themselves. They include David Solway, David Slabotsky, and Seymour Mayne. Most of Layton's students who became poets have lived long and mostly trouble-free lives. None of them as far as I know have faced political persecution.
Things may have been a little different on the French speaking side in Quebec. Still I know of no French speaking poets in Quebec to-day who are inside a federal prison.
British Columbia and especially its west coast have been very hospitable to poets. George Bowering, Patrick Lane, Susan Musgrave, bill bissett, and Amber Dawn have thrived in Canada's most western province.
Amber Dawn is a lesbian poet who had had great success. Her language at one time would have been called 'obscene' and her poetry might have been banned. "My clit was found in a railway yard," Dawn writes in her poem 'On and Up'. "Is that still how it's done these days?" Dawn has not been censored at all. She has gone on to win many prizes and has received many awards.
Tom Wayman has written many poems about working people and from a progressive viewpoint. Nobody has persecuted him or prosecuted him in court.
No doubt in some countries dictators and their helpers have seen some poets as threats to their power. In Canada this is a democracy and poets are left alone. My stories then about the persecution and killing of poets is out-of-date to-day and hopefully in the future.
It's good to remember that while many poets were killed and persecuted in 20th century Eastern Europe this wasn't true in the 19th century. "In the nineteenth century," writes Milan Kundera, "all of small nations in Europe had romantic patriot poets. There was Petoffi in Hungary, Mickiewicz in Poland, Pescren in Slovenia" and so on.
In the early 20th century Europe went through the First World War, then the Great Depression and then the Second World War. These traumatic events killed tens of millions of people and triggered the rise of fascism, nazism and communism.
All of these movements rose and fell in the 20th century. They are all history in Europe and as a result most European poets are left alone to write what they want.
In Canada by contrast, most poets have never been harassed as poets have in Europe,
especially to-day. For instance the poet Irving Layton, taught for many years in a private Jewish school in Montreal. He turned many of his students onto poetry. Some of them became poets themselves. They include David Solway, David Slabotsky, and Seymour Mayne. Most of Layton's students who became poets have lived long and mostly trouble-free lives. None of them as far as I know have faced political persecution.
Things may have been a little different on the French speaking side in Quebec. Still I know of no French speaking poets in Quebec to-day who are inside a federal prison.
British Columbia and especially its west coast have been very hospitable to poets. George Bowering, Patrick Lane, Susan Musgrave, bill bissett, and Amber Dawn have thrived in Canada's most western province.
Amber Dawn is a lesbian poet who had had great success. Her language at one time would have been called 'obscene' and her poetry might have been banned. "My clit was found in a railway yard," Dawn writes in her poem 'On and Up'. "Is that still how it's done these days?" Dawn has not been censored at all. She has gone on to win many prizes and has received many awards.
Tom Wayman has written many poems about working people and from a progressive viewpoint. Nobody has persecuted him or prosecuted him in court.
No doubt in some countries dictators and their helpers have seen some poets as threats to their power. In Canada this is a democracy and poets are left alone. My stories then about the persecution and killing of poets is out-of-date to-day and hopefully in the future.
Monday 11 January 2016
Writing Poetry Can Endanger Your Health - Part Five by Dave Jaffe
Poets Live and Die Under Communism
"Josef Stalin killed everybody," a British journalist once wrote. This was true. Stalin, the communist tyrant, ruled the Soviet Union from the 1920's until his death in 1953.
In the 1930's Stalin crushed the Ukrainian peasants and then launched a series of brutal purges. Millions of people, many of whom were loyal communists, died in the gulag prison camps or were shot dead after so-called 'trials.
Poets, like many intellectuals, were targets of Stalin's henchmen. Osip Mandelstam was a very gifted poet. He died in one of Stalin's gulags in 1938. Vladimir Mayakovski, a multi-talented poet killed himself in 1930 rather than live in Stalin's Soviet Union.
Stalin had Pavel Vasiliarov, another gifted poet killed. Titsian Tabidze was a talented poet from the Soviet republic of Georgia. He killed himself in 1937 rather than face one of Stalin's purges. Stalin had four Yiddish poets killed in the 1950's. They were part of a group of Jewish artists who Stalin killed because he feared these Jews were part of a plot to kill him.
In his book on life in Communist-ruled Poland called 'The Captive MInd', the poet Czeslaw Milosz mentions three Polish Communist poets namely Wandierski, Stande and Bruno Janieski.. These three well-known poets of the 1920's and 1930's were afraid of being persecuted in Poland. They fled to the Soviet Union. Stalin had all of them accused of crimes and had them killed.
"The Western economy squanders talent to an incredible degree," wrote Czeslaw Milosz in 'The Captive Mind'. "Since it is not a planned economy, the Western state cannot come to the aid of people working in the various arts." Milosz's book appeared in the early 1950's. Since then a whole system of grants and prizes for artists have been set up in many western countries, including Canada. Still, anyone who wants to be a painter, poet or any artist is rarely going to end up rich.
The totalitarian governments of the 20th century that ruled Nazi Germany, Fascist Italy, the Communist Soviet Union and Mao's China crushed and killed many dissident artists and intellectuals. In the capitalist democracies being a poet could mean travelling on a road to starvation. Yet in Stalin's Soviet Union, Hitler's Germany or Mao's China,. a poet's life could also be short and fearful.
Being a poet has sometimes meant living a dangerous life.
"Josef Stalin killed everybody," a British journalist once wrote. This was true. Stalin, the communist tyrant, ruled the Soviet Union from the 1920's until his death in 1953.
In the 1930's Stalin crushed the Ukrainian peasants and then launched a series of brutal purges. Millions of people, many of whom were loyal communists, died in the gulag prison camps or were shot dead after so-called 'trials.
Poets, like many intellectuals, were targets of Stalin's henchmen. Osip Mandelstam was a very gifted poet. He died in one of Stalin's gulags in 1938. Vladimir Mayakovski, a multi-talented poet killed himself in 1930 rather than live in Stalin's Soviet Union.
Stalin had Pavel Vasiliarov, another gifted poet killed. Titsian Tabidze was a talented poet from the Soviet republic of Georgia. He killed himself in 1937 rather than face one of Stalin's purges. Stalin had four Yiddish poets killed in the 1950's. They were part of a group of Jewish artists who Stalin killed because he feared these Jews were part of a plot to kill him.
In his book on life in Communist-ruled Poland called 'The Captive MInd', the poet Czeslaw Milosz mentions three Polish Communist poets namely Wandierski, Stande and Bruno Janieski.. These three well-known poets of the 1920's and 1930's were afraid of being persecuted in Poland. They fled to the Soviet Union. Stalin had all of them accused of crimes and had them killed.
"The Western economy squanders talent to an incredible degree," wrote Czeslaw Milosz in 'The Captive Mind'. "Since it is not a planned economy, the Western state cannot come to the aid of people working in the various arts." Milosz's book appeared in the early 1950's. Since then a whole system of grants and prizes for artists have been set up in many western countries, including Canada. Still, anyone who wants to be a painter, poet or any artist is rarely going to end up rich.
The totalitarian governments of the 20th century that ruled Nazi Germany, Fascist Italy, the Communist Soviet Union and Mao's China crushed and killed many dissident artists and intellectuals. In the capitalist democracies being a poet could mean travelling on a road to starvation. Yet in Stalin's Soviet Union, Hitler's Germany or Mao's China,. a poet's life could also be short and fearful.
Being a poet has sometimes meant living a dangerous life.
Saturday 9 January 2016
Writing Poetry Can Endanger Your Health - Part Four by Dave Jaffe
The Short Life of Federico Garcia Lorca
Federico Garcia Lorca was another outstanding Spanish speaking poet who lived a short life.He was born in Spain in 1898 and died there in 1936 at the age of 38.
Lorca was a great poet whose books were translated into English under the titles of 'Songs' and 'The Gypsy Ballads'. Lorca lived in truly troubled times. He was left-leaning in Spain at a time when it was violently split between right and left wing political groups.
"In 1907 and 1908," writes the British critic and novelist John Berger, "2,000 bombs exploded in the streets of Barcelona." Barcelona was one of Spain's biggest cities though it was not the capital city that Madrid was. Yet both cities, like the rest of Spain, were polarized in their politics. In 1936 Spain's armed forces, backed by conservatives, launched a coup against the democratic and left leaning government of Spain.
Wherever they went, the military forces killed all the progressives they could capture. In retaliation, left wing groups often did the same to their rightist opponents.
A civil war then followed for the armed forces couldn't take over all of Spain at once.With the help of fascist Italy and Nazi Germany, the right wing army won the Spanish Civil War in 1939. General Francisco Franco, who ended up as the head of the armed forces, ruled Spain until his death in the 1970's.
Lorca, like many other progressives died in the opening days of the civil war. Right wing army people captured him in 1936 and shot him dead.
Today Spain is a democracy. Yet only very recently in Spain has anyone discussed Lorca's death or the death of Franco's victims in the opening days of the civil war. "Both main political parties want to keep all of the 1930's history off the political agenda," one young Spaniard told me a few years ago. This may change now that the Spanish political landscape has been swept by new left wing and centist political parties.
Yet whatever the future of Spain is, Lorca's life alas was a short one. His poetry
and his plays made him a target for right wing forces. His art could not save him. It determined his death.
Federico Garcia Lorca was another outstanding Spanish speaking poet who lived a short life.He was born in Spain in 1898 and died there in 1936 at the age of 38.
Lorca was a great poet whose books were translated into English under the titles of 'Songs' and 'The Gypsy Ballads'. Lorca lived in truly troubled times. He was left-leaning in Spain at a time when it was violently split between right and left wing political groups.
"In 1907 and 1908," writes the British critic and novelist John Berger, "2,000 bombs exploded in the streets of Barcelona." Barcelona was one of Spain's biggest cities though it was not the capital city that Madrid was. Yet both cities, like the rest of Spain, were polarized in their politics. In 1936 Spain's armed forces, backed by conservatives, launched a coup against the democratic and left leaning government of Spain.
Wherever they went, the military forces killed all the progressives they could capture. In retaliation, left wing groups often did the same to their rightist opponents.
A civil war then followed for the armed forces couldn't take over all of Spain at once.With the help of fascist Italy and Nazi Germany, the right wing army won the Spanish Civil War in 1939. General Francisco Franco, who ended up as the head of the armed forces, ruled Spain until his death in the 1970's.
Lorca, like many other progressives died in the opening days of the civil war. Right wing army people captured him in 1936 and shot him dead.
Today Spain is a democracy. Yet only very recently in Spain has anyone discussed Lorca's death or the death of Franco's victims in the opening days of the civil war. "Both main political parties want to keep all of the 1930's history off the political agenda," one young Spaniard told me a few years ago. This may change now that the Spanish political landscape has been swept by new left wing and centist political parties.
Yet whatever the future of Spain is, Lorca's life alas was a short one. His poetry
and his plays made him a target for right wing forces. His art could not save him. It determined his death.
Wednesday 6 January 2016
Writing Poetry Can Endanger Your Health by Dave Jaffe - Part Four
The Short Unhappy Life of Cesar Vallejo
Two Spanish speaking poets were nearly contemporaries. Both led troubled lives.
The poet and art critic Edward Lucie Smith said of the Peruvian poet Cesar Valejo, "He was Peru's greatest modernist poet." The British critic Martin Seymour Smith claimed that Vallejo was the world's greatest poet of the 20th century.
Yet Vallejo's short life was full of problems. He was fired from a teaching job because of a love affair he had. Then he spent three months in a Peruvian prison. When he was faced with going to jail,again, he fled to Europe.
Vallejo ended up in France where he knew many artists. Still, he endured great poverty there. He visited the Soviet Union at least three times but it's hard to know whether his left leaning politics helped or hurt him.
In any case he died in 1938 when he was in his late 40's. He spent most of his life just scraping by, just living on tiny amounts of money.
Next up: Federico Garcia Lorca.
Two Spanish speaking poets were nearly contemporaries. Both led troubled lives.
The poet and art critic Edward Lucie Smith said of the Peruvian poet Cesar Valejo, "He was Peru's greatest modernist poet." The British critic Martin Seymour Smith claimed that Vallejo was the world's greatest poet of the 20th century.
Yet Vallejo's short life was full of problems. He was fired from a teaching job because of a love affair he had. Then he spent three months in a Peruvian prison. When he was faced with going to jail,again, he fled to Europe.
Vallejo ended up in France where he knew many artists. Still, he endured great poverty there. He visited the Soviet Union at least three times but it's hard to know whether his left leaning politics helped or hurt him.
In any case he died in 1938 when he was in his late 40's. He spent most of his life just scraping by, just living on tiny amounts of money.
Next up: Federico Garcia Lorca.
Tuesday 5 January 2016
Writing Poetry can Endanger Your Health - by Dave Jaffe: Part Three
Abraham Moses Klein - Another Troubled Poet
Abraham Moses Klein or A.M. Klein, as he's known in literary history, appeared on Quebec's English-speaking literary scene in the 1930's.
Born in the Ukraine, Klein who was Jewish, grew up in Montreal and wrote poetry, novels and essays.
Klein was a democratic socialist and ran once as a candidate for the left-leaning Co-operative Commonwealth Federation. He also studied law and practised law for awhile.Then he ended up writing speeches for the liquor magnate Sam Bronfman. "I think Klein found Bronfman a tough man to be around," another Montreal poet once told me.
In any case in 1952 Klein tried to kill himself. A few years later he fell into silence. And before he died in 1972 he had become a recluse who had very little contact with people. This was a tragic end for a man who had many talents. Klein was yet another gifted poet who suffered.
Abraham Moses Klein or A.M. Klein, as he's known in literary history, appeared on Quebec's English-speaking literary scene in the 1930's.
Born in the Ukraine, Klein who was Jewish, grew up in Montreal and wrote poetry, novels and essays.
Klein was a democratic socialist and ran once as a candidate for the left-leaning Co-operative Commonwealth Federation. He also studied law and practised law for awhile.Then he ended up writing speeches for the liquor magnate Sam Bronfman. "I think Klein found Bronfman a tough man to be around," another Montreal poet once told me.
In any case in 1952 Klein tried to kill himself. A few years later he fell into silence. And before he died in 1972 he had become a recluse who had very little contact with people. This was a tragic end for a man who had many talents. Klein was yet another gifted poet who suffered.
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