If I have taken one thing from 2018, it is the deepening of my belief that each of us needs to speak out on what matters. We also need to listen – and support others in being heard. It is therefore a joy to announce that Shivanee Ramlochan has generously agreed to be the first interviewee of my ‘Saying the Difficult Thing’ project, which will be launching in January 2019.
The project will run all year on this blog, to resist silence, and enable change. Known throughout the world, Shivanee Ramlochan is an inspirational poet, editor, blogger, enabler and activist based in Trinidad. Their first collection Everyone Knows I Am a Haunting was published by Peepal Tree in 2017.
Each interview will ask the featured poet to explore some of the ‘difficult things’, their work addresses. Our conversations will touch on personal biography, political consciousness, and creative and aesthetic strategies, using quotes from the poet’s work to bring their words to the reader.
The first ten ‘saying the difficult thing’ interviewees will all be women or female-identifying poets, to counter the ways in which both society, and the family, have historically conspired to silence women’s voices. Known, established poets will alternate with voices beginning to publish and make themselves heard. Interviews will feature links to published works, performances and reviews as appropriate, and the conversations will be conducted live, in person, if the poet is in the UK, or via Skype.
Shivanee Ramlochan’s interview will be posted in January 2019, along with the list of the remaining nine initial interviewees. We will ask everyone to share the text of each interview through social media. Together we can link round the world in changing awareness about the ‘difficult things’ which need to be said – and heard – throughout 2019.
Everyone Knows I Am a Haunting
