What’s in a Renga?

MORAG MACINNES reflects on the opening session in a new renga group in Stromness

YOU’D THINK, wouldn’t you, that the creative process is a severely fascist thing; something you indulge in because you can be the author of all creation and shape reality to your own design. Ted Hughes’ poem Hawk Roosting describes the mindset well:

‘The sun is behind me
Nothing has changed since I began.
My eye has permitted no change.
I am going to keep things like this.’

But art can and should be collaborative. Community plays, at their best, can give a voice to lost histories. From orchestras to playground mural projects, Greek choruses to Brechtian theatre, shared endeavour enhances the product and energises participants. It’s a lonely business, making new stuff. All the better to get over your angst and share. No good living in what Leonard Cohen describes as ‘the tower of song’:

‘I said to Hank Williams: how lonely does it get
Hank Williams hasn’t answered yet
But I hear him coughing all night long
A hundred floors above me
In the tower of song.’

With this in mind, local writers met at the Pier Arts Centre to work with our Host, writer Alison Flett, and our Renga Master, artist poet and publisher Alec Finlay, to produce a twenty verse Ninjuin Renga. This Japanese form, related to haiku, has rules – though it seems to be okay to break them if the flow of the verse demands that – and the Master decides if that’s appropriate.

You must alternate between three and two line verses. There should be a connection between verses but not word repetition. You should use concrete images, not abstract ones, and you should be aware of seasonality as the verses progress. If that sounds daunting – well, oddly, it’s not. To be offered a form – this is the moon verse, this the flower verse, this a link, this a shift – is comforting.

In the Pier, the atmosphere was warm and supportive. Tea in bonny bowls, free pencils, and a sense of engagement from everyone. We all scribbled our verses, read them out, and commented. Only one verse could go forward to be part of the schema, so sometimes it was very hard to choose, or to lose a favourite. But it was usually clear which poet had caught a moment, or shifted the cycle on to a new level.

Where there was confusion, the Master’s word carried. (Not as fascist as this might seem; Alec had that role because of his experience in the form – more of a guide than an arbiter, he knew what fit best to the ancient template. There was no point at which folk felt their work was unappreciated, or ignored.)

We were joined by an audience, which also felt strange at first, but then fine; because everyone was encouraged to contribute something, or just sit and enjoy the process. Perhaps the most invigorating aspect of Renga is this engaged discussion which goes on, perfectly non-confrontationally, about the merit of ones’ words in the context of the rules and the previous verses.

Being with other practitioners and looking coolly at images, feeling able to say, ‘I’m no sure aboot the repetition’ or ‘I think that’d be better the other way round’ throws off years and years of fear writers have about showing their work and dealing with criticism of it. The fact you’re engaged together in something which can only be made by all of you somehow relieves the pressure on you as an individual.

I suspect this is very Zen – in a sense, you give up your own ownership of the project. Instead, you accept everybody’s contribution. Susan Sontag said, ‘to snare a sensibility in words, especially one that is alive and powerful, one must be tentative and nimble.’ Simplicity, swift thinking and the tentative but hopeful offering of half-formed images – is the key to a fine Ninjuin Renga. Beyond that, the master reminds folk of the importance of being grounded by time and physicality.

The final piece we emerged with, is a sequence full of surprises and unexpectednesses, humour and poignancy.

‘the boat blows
tarred wood boils

steer clear
the roust scrapes
along Eynhallow’

The renga group hope to keep meeting once a month, to practise the discipline and learn from it – watch the press for details. Everyone is welcome to join in. Alec Finlay warned us that we’d be tired when we finished, and that phrases and images would keep recurring. That’s certainly true. I didn’t expect to be awake half the night wondering which line should go first in a two line phrase I’d jotted down in ten minutes. If you are a writer who needs to be forced into the immediate business of creating, renga is the form for you.

© Morag MacInnes, 2008

Links

• Pier Arts Centre