The power of poetry
Brace yourself for ‘‘current affairs dressed up in clown clothes’’ when Mad Doggerel Cabaret hits Queenstown’s Te Atamira this Sunday.
The show’s part of the Arts on Tour initiative and the brainchild of current Poet Laureate David Eggleton, poet and musician Daren Kamali and classical guitarist Richard Wallis.
‘‘We have spoken word and songs and chants, and kind of a medley of different ways of presenting poetry,’’ Eggleton says.
‘‘[It’s] intended to entertain, and amuse and also say something about the state of New Zealand in the world today.”
Eggleton, who has almost reached the end of his three-year term as Poet Laureate, says, personally, the show’s like a ‘‘last hurrah’’, and a way for him to sum up his thoughts on the role.
‘‘I was appointed to the role, really, to kind of dwell on, or think about, those things which make us New Zealanders — what makes us Kiwis and in the zeitgeist of the moment, the spirit of the times, especially in the 21st century, where are we in terms of what’s going on around the world?”
The content of the show touches on up-to-the-minute subjects like Brexit and Boris Johnson, Jacinda-mania, and Brian Tamaki, but the performance also reaches back into the throes of NZ history, a nod to how the country’s made its mark on the world, despite being small and isolated.
‘‘We were a very idealistic country and NZ got its own sense of identity after David Lange came in and the Labour government, and things like the anti-Springbok tour of 1981 and the anti-nuclear ships … there were all these attempts to create a NZ sense of identity.
‘‘[In the show] I talk about that in a kind of tongue-in-cheek and satirical way … and relate very much to comedians like Billy T James and Fred Dagg and that generation of comics,’’ he says.
For Eggleton, poetry has been a life-long quest to figure out what it means to be a Kiwi.
‘‘[My family] were living in Fiji so coming to NZ was a change that I had to adapt to, and so I’ve always had that awareness of being a new migrant and just the differences in NZ society.
‘‘It’s been continuous, that trying to fit in — as you were encouraged to do — [but] now, it’s much more about diversity … I’m very interested in the bigger picture.”
Eggleton says the power of performed poetry is in how it can raise energy levels and intensity, and allows people to live in the moment.
‘‘That’s what a poem can do, it’s similar to a rock concert, but we’re doing it with poetry.’’
Mad Doggerel Cabaret, Te Atamira, Sunday, 7.30pm. Tickets $17, via teatamira.nz
