AS this year’s International Writing Programme begins to count down the days to the end of its Fall Residency, I find myself more tired than ever before. I rush to be a part of everything: readings, panel-discussions, class sessions, parties, performances, café chats, etc. I find myself doing this, despite being tired, because I know that I will miss all of it when it is gone.

‘Have I fallen in love with the United States?’ is what I ask myself constantly. Like so many other Guyanese people (I will be visiting “Little Guyana” when I get to New York in a few days), have I been seduced by America as well, even after a long time of trying to be the exception to that by [ignorantly] protesting that I never would be taken in by the country? The truth is that even though I am aware that my limited time here is not reflective of the experiences in the daily lives of the typical American, I still have lost myself to this place. No, I have not been taken in only by the beautiful buildings or the many shades of red that the autumn brings with it. It is certainly not the food that makes me like the place so much. Nor is it the prospect of indulging in that fanciful and ambiguous myth of “an easier life” that people say one can find in the USA.

I do think I enjoy being here because of the amazing people I have met, and because of the overwhelming response people have towards literature and the arts in general. There is a level of respect, genuine appreciation, and a commitment to the development of the arts that is truly mindboggling to me.
Recently I went to an event called “Moving Words – Dance Artists and Writers in Collaboration” that got me thinking even more about art and the way it is shaped and accepted in the USA. As the title of the performance indicates, dancers and choreographers used pieces of literature – poetry and short stories – to inspire dance performances which were performed to a packed house. This performance made quite an impression on me and it was quite interesting because I had never really contemplated the merging of dance and literature, nor had I ever really thought that, beyond my own use of dance in staging my plays, that there could be a true artistic connection between dance and literature – where one is not only able to inspire the other, but the two forms merge in such a way that the themes and ideas in the literature can become even more emphasised or highlighted. Watching the dancers perform at “Moving Words”, I quickly realised that dance, relying on the body and sound as the main modes of expression, was an ideal method for bringing literature that was written in a foreign language to an audience. The language of the body and music itself are universal. If a piece written in Korean, Arabic, or Italian is danced to an English-speaking audience, then the chances of them being understood are obviously much higher than attempting to read the piece to the audience in the original language the work was written in.

DANCE IS AN ACT OF TRANSLATION.
Of course, dance has always been an important part of the Guyanese stage and while many groups aim towards the entertainment aspect of dance, there are several instances that come to mind (particularly when one thinks of (Kreative Arts and the National Dance Company of Guyana) where interpretation and translation [of stories and ideas] successfully merge with entertainment.
I do wish that more dancers in Guyana were able to occupy that space of fusion that can exist when dance and literature come together. The opportunity for experimentation, for creating new and innovative forms of dance, for giving new life to old literature, for bringing Guyanese literature to new audiences, and to continue to be on the cutting edge, to continue pushing the boundaries, of what is happening on the global stage.

Sometimes, we do get instances where dance meets literature – as seen in the occasional spoken word performance that is accompanied by dance. But even this, sometimes, is not taken seriously because spoken word poetry often falls into the category of “entertainment” only rather than “literary education/entertainment.” This is unfortunate because there is so much that can be accomplished by bringing the two forms together; and I’m not even talking about using the rhythms and musical qualities of certain forms of literature, such as poetry, as fuel for the performative and physical aspects of dance – though that is certainly important. I am very concerned with an approach to dance that totally embraces the “literariness” of what has been written. How does one reflect a metaphor or symbol from a poem in dance? How does a dancer use his/her body to convey the overall mood (tragic or comic, desperate or free, etc.) of a story in a dance performance? How can a group of dancers tell the story through their formations? How are literary themes and ideas transmitted through dance to an audience?

Sure, it is one thing for dancers and choreographers to create a concept and story and then use dance to tell that story, but much more difficult, and more interesting, at least to me, is translating an existing, written piece of literature, whether new or canonical, through dance. Can Martin Carter’s “This is the Dark Time My Love” be danced in such a way that what is written in the poem can be captured in the performance? Can Wilson Harris’ stories be danced as a form of telling those stories? Can the symbol of the peacock in `Palace of the Peacock’ be represented in dance in such a way that everything the image symbolises becomes clear to the audience? Can dance capture the very essence of a piece of literary work? The answer to all of these questions is “yes.” All of it is possible, but they become impossible without people who try, without people who are willing to invest the time and resources, without people who can teach and train, without people who are willing to go all the way, and without an audience willing to appreciate all the forms of art that Guyanese artists, including dancers, are constantly offering to them.