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21 Nov 2009 - Anika Moa, Julia Deans
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21 Nov 2009 - Carthaginian, Freudoids, Milk Train
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21 Nov 2009 - Wellington International Ukulele Orchestra
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Parnell, Central Auckland
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Browns Bay, North Auckland
21 Nov 2009 - Jealous Itch, Bonneville Stingers, Ritual Grounds, Burning Embers
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Newton, Central Auckland
Comments
The first poem I thought of was The Magpies by Denis Glover.
Same. That's huge.
Then I think of Allen Curnow. He's amazing, but not huge.
I love the magpie poem too Jet. But what's the poem your mum, your dad, your grandma, your younger sister even your pet dog - the one everyone knows? The traditional, the iconic, New Zealand's classic poem, the kiwi version of "old Macdonalds farm"???
That's what this is all about.
Encapsulating your incredible country in a stanza.
I would say there is no New Zealand poem which meets these criteria, which is a bit sad really, as there has been a lot written over the past 150+ years. I know in my day, and I dare say things haven't changed all that much, there's a truckload of kids who grow up with no exposure to poetry except having to endure whatever they can't escape at school. I was never acquainted with any NZ poetry until doing my lit degree at 'varsity.
Myshin. That is a shame mate.
I'm 35 and have distinct childhoood memories of my old man reading me Banjo Paterson poems to put me to sleep - probably why they aren't so poular these days. But the general concensus on poetry across the Tasman is at least limited to a half dozen national treasures.
You do have a poet on one of your bills Sir Aparana Ngata's who wrote Karangatia Rå, but my god it's so full on. Makes The Man from Snowy River sound like a nursery rhyme.
What would you say is NZ's most broadly known tune for the past 150 years?
Excluding the national anthem that is.
// What would you say is NZ's most broadly known tune for the past 150 years?
ohhh, nice. my pick...
pokarekare ana
/Does it exsist, and if so what is the most famous poem? The one everyone knows at least a stanza of, the knee jerk answer...
Does NZ poetry exist? NZ has more poets per head of population than almost any country on Earth.
A lot of teachers going through the system in the 70s tried to get more kiwi poetry, and writing in general, into the courses at schools but I didn't get that much myself, despite going through the system in the 80s and 90s.
That said one stanza comes to mind immediately when I see the words kiwi poetry, simply cause someone had it on the side of a dairy on Swanson road for years as a mural.
'Rain,
I can hear you make tiny holes in the silences
Rain'
- Hone Tuwhare
or something to that effect.
thanks Heather.
Quardle oodle ardle wardle doodle.
That's pretty funny.
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out of the gate, and off for a walk...
went hairy maclary from donaldson's dairy! yay!
bahaha, maybe they should make Lynley Dodd the next poet laureate..
is there a poem with " eh cuzzy bro' " in it?
might need to watch a few more of those Billy T re-runs on Maori TV. He's bound to have done a couple.
Shamed that I can't think of a single line from a Baxter/Hunt/Manhire poem...
Clearly you ought to hang out on the waterfront more often.
I've been looking around this site and the common thread seems to be New Zealand's history of hardship and people dying for the cause. They all seem so full of foreboding.
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Anyone who has learnt a second language (especially european) should be able to reproduce Manhire's Declining the Naked Horse (even if it's not exact).
The naked horse will come into the room.
The naked horse will be coming into the room.
The naked horse comes into the room.
The naked horse is coming into the room.
The naked horse came into the room.
The naked horse has come into the room.
The naked horse would of come into the room again if we hadn't stopped it.
Ode to mixed flatting (baxter) is a classic.
// would of
surely that's "would have"
God Lynley Dodd rocks. I never realised she penned Schnitzel von Krumm, my mates sausage dog is constantly called that down the park.
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Jessie, Jessie, Jessie. That mistake is the "punchline". I actually mistyped it (ie, correctly) when I was writing it out and had to go and bugger it up. According to my indepth knowledge (haha, engl125), the poem works by parodying grammatical exercises in two ways -- one the "naked horse" (when aren't horses naked) and the mistake in the final line, which also satisfyingly has an intervention where the narrotor prevents the horse from coming into the room again, thus ending the exercise.
Here's the actual text of the poem
The naked horse came into the room.
The naked horse comes into the room.
The naked horse has come into the room.
The naked horse will be coming into the room.
The naked horse is coming into the room.
The naked horse does come into the room.
The naked horse had come into the room.
The naked horse would of come into the room
again if we hadn't of stopped it.
Incidentally, that site is the electronic poetry centre -- should be able to get a few goodies there.
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hahaha
tell you what, come to the Crown next Saturday 6th and you can tsk tsk me in person
I hope that didn't sound dodgy
Whicked Greeny, thanks. The thing for me, not being a kiwi, is knowing which poems are part of the vernacular. If only they were ranked by people's knowledge of them, or how often they are referenced...
What would be the top three mate?
// tsk tsk me in person
You should watch what you wish for. heheh!
As for the top 3 poems. That's a pretty hard one, as I don't think there is a lot of consensus on that. I think they'd have to be one Sam Hunt one, perhaps My Father Today (also with a magpie reference). Baxter's high country weather is also supposed to be a bit of a benchmark. Oh, and an Allen Curnow one. Personally, I'm a sucker for Canto of Unsigned Wonders, but er, it's a bit of an odd one.
How about something by Barry Crump? Problem with all the top poets is your average kiwi knows the names, but'll have no clue of any of the work.
// your average kiwi
well, me...and Noizyboy, apparently
The poetry etc quoted on the Writer's Walk on Wellington waterfront is pretty cool. I like that one by Bill Manhire goes "I live at the edge of the universe, like everybody else... sometimes I think congratulations are in order."
James K Baxter's the Maori Jesus is good too - "I saw the Maori Jesus walking on Wellington waterfront .." what's the next part...
i mean "walking on Wellington harbour..."
The only reason I know the maori jesus one is because of the ads for wellington.
would those ads be onlinne anywhere??
Baxters first works that were published posthumously 'Cold Spring' are really good, though slightly long winded...
Baxters definitely one Hendo...
Sam Hunt is also a very well known poet. However whether or not his poetry matches his publicity skills is open for debate...
Also check out Bill Manhire, Ian Wedde, Vincent O'Sullivan... Theres heaps out there. Google them in.
where's that from noizy?
There was an old man from Otahuhu . . . . .
he lived in a holden, a wreck, but fru fru...
Poetry kicks so much arse. I've just finished ENGL217 poetry so I'm overly enthusiastic about it.
My lecturer/mentor (only 15 people in the paper) was Nick Ascroft who is/was a Burns Fellow. Some of his stuff is on nzepc. I'm going to check it out right now.
What would you say your countries three most well known poems are Jim?
Can't help you with that. Before the course I was pretty much a poetry virgin, and we didn't study it, just wrote it.
My great uncle was a poet, but I always thought my great aunt was a far more interesting and creative person.
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I'm a little suprised nobody has mentioned Hone Tuwhare, surely a very strong contender for the most widely known living New Zealand poet. Perhaps his 'No Ordinary Sun' or 'The Old Place' would be recognisable to a few New Zealanders?
Yep Hone's a contender. That one of his about rain is pretty cool. But c'mon guys... this is a rock site. So why's no one mentioned NZ's greatest (if not only) rock'n'roll poet? Peter Olds!
Lady Moss revised (1972)
Doctor's Rock (1974)
Freeway (1974)
Many others too but these are the volumes I have and love. Check these titles from Doctor's Rock:
Lady Lust Revisiting the Great Psychiatric Rock & Roll Nostalgia
Highway to Halfway Bush
(and so on)
Great raw sores of poems about brushes with the law, bad drugs, V8 cars, rock & roll, strip joints, bikies, booze set in the seedy 1970's underbellies of Dunedin Wellington and Auckland and the inevitable pschological frailties accompanying such an extreme lifestyle. Also poems of great beauty, sadness and imagination. Peter Olds. Go raid those 2nd hand bookshops for NZs poet laureat of rock&roll debauchery.
Hahaha no doubt, Seedy 1970's underbellies indeed.
OK, so this might seem a little odd, but I went to see the film adaption of Maurice Gee's "In My Father's Den" last night. It, ah, certainly is a kiwi film, in the fine tradition of Rain and other bleak warped but strangely realistic tales. Now, I already mentioned Baxter's High Country Weather, which was quoted in the movie to great effect.
Alone we're born
and die alone
yet see the red-gold cirrus
over snow-mountain shine
upon the upland road
Ride easy, stranger
surrender to the sky
your heart of anger
i love that poem - studied it at high school - it always comes into my head when i'm going through the Mackenzie basin. liking it is as close as i come to subscribing to existentialism. but that's only cos it nods a little towards idealism (that nature seems eternal, while we come and go).
I'm quite fond of this as well, which can be found in concrete on the wellytown waterfront:
It's true you can't live here by chance,
You have to do and be, not simply watch or even describe.
This is the city of action,
The world headquarters of the verb
-Lauris Edmond
NZ poetry
It's like you were molested by an accelerator pedal
"I've totally had enough of these five-
way intersections," you fume, chipping black
nail polish with yellow teeth. "Fuck slack
bitch crap!" - incoherent spit directed
at drivers, windows pursed, unaffected
by the popveined tirade. Nothing changes;
your incense burning like pinecone again,
I consider leaping from the moving
vehicle. Perhaps not 'thoughtful' or 'soothing',
but my-life- and sanity-preserving.
Past Seatoun and saltspray we drive, curving
through gorging gulls and their scrambled escapes
from balding tyres and impotent brakes.
They, and I, are lucky to be alive.
Well I must say I'm glad to have piqued everyones interest.
The down side is no-one can give me a definitive answer, although this forum and many emails have got me an interesting web page which I thought might interest some of you poets.
I'm one of two rappers who have had poetry published in a literary mag!
the other person is my mate Eel...
in New Zealand i meant.
wow...u must must b famous or sumfink!!!!
[ http://www.ofi.shorturl.com ]