We need poetry

Here we are, Lilit from Armenia and Stefania from Italy, trying to learn more about Belgian poetry during the“Poëzieweek”. David Troch, Ghent’s own city poet, agreed to meet us in The Krook, the new library, to give us some insights.

Blindfolded reading

It was our first time at The Krook. We chose a spot by the window which gave us a beautiful view over the city.

We wanted to know if Belgian people are interested in poetry ? So David shared his experience as a Belgian poet with us.

People need poetry when someone dies, gives birth or falls in love

“People need poetry when someone dies, gives birth or falls in love. They don’t read poems spontaneously. “ So he came up with a concept to interest more people in poetry. He blindfolds the visitors of the library, lets them choose between five collections of poetry and reads them a poem from their chosen collection. After this experience, most of the people decide to buy the book.

He tells us that it’s hard for poets to sell their works but they organise a lot of readings. For example during the poetry week.

Words words words

We had never read Dutch poems before and David explained that poets in Flanders mostly write in Dutch and that it’s difficult to translate into other languages because words can have several meanings. There are only a few Flemish poets who are got published in different languages.

If you are not a Dutch speaker and you would like to read some Flemish poetry you can have a look at Leonard Nolens’s poems, which have been translated in several languages.

Poetry bordello

Before meeting David, we did some research about the poetry scene in Flanders. We found out that there are several poetry collectives around the country. We wanted to know everything about it.

“We have poetry communities in different cities in Belgium. We do readings and have a slam poetry scene.”

David mentions Poëziebordeel who organise face to face performances. Their poets perform in several rooms in a building, people come in one by one and the poets read to them.

How to write like a poet?

Having a better understanding of the Belgian contemporary poetry scene we were interested in David’s work as a poet. He gives lectures in creative writing and some short stories he wrote will be published around the end of the year.

It was interesting for us to know how David’s writing proces works. “When I write poetry, sometimes I have sentences that pop-up in my head and I write them down. I also like to listen to people talking in the train. Sometimes people say something that catches your ear, so I use it for poems and short stories.”

Political Poets

Another interesting topic for us is the involvement of Belgian poets in social and political life. David doesn’t define himself as a writer who is standing on the barricades but sometimes he writes engaged poems. In fact he was asked by Radio 1, a national radio station, to write and perform a poem about a recent newsfact, in his case Global warming.

David hope’s that people may reflect about their own life when they read poems.”

Music to our ears

At the end of our conversation we were curious to experience the blindfolded reading. We chose one of the poems from David’s collection “Zij aan zij”. He read it to us and since we don’t understand dutch yet it sounded like beautiful music to our ears. Decide for yourself.