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.