Selected Poems (African Writers Series, 72)

by Tchicaya U Tam'si, Gerald Moore (Translator)

This selection of Tchicaya U Tam'si's poetry is here presented in sensitive English translation by Gerald Moore. He says in his introduction: 'Despite many return visits to the Congo and many travels to other parts of Africa, Paris has remained the centre of U Tam'si's activities. This tension between childhood memories of Africa and everyday mundane experience in an alien capital, between his passionate presence in the suffering Congo and his physical absence from it, is one of the dominating themes of his poetry, most notably in the collection called Epitomé. Tchicaya's reputation as a poet has grown slowly and steadily, despite the extraordinary inaccessibility of his work. The most prolific poet of modern Africa, he has also been one of the hardest to get hold of.'

Genres: Poetry

143 pages, Paperback

First published August 1, 1970

About the author

Tchicaya U Tam'si (25 August 1931 - 22 April 1988 ) was a Congolese author. His official name is Gérald-Félix Tchicaya; his pen name means "small paper that speaks for a country" in Kikongo.

Born in Mpili, near Brazzaville, French Equatorial Africa (now Congo) in 1931, U Tam'si spent his childhood in France, where he worked as a journalist until he returned to his homeland in 1960. Back in Congo, he continued to work as a journalist; during this time he maintained contact to the politician Patrice Lumumba. In 1961, he started to work for UNESCO.

He died in 1988 in Bazancourt, Oise, near Paris.

Since 1989, the Tchicaya U Tam'si Prize for African Poetry is awarded every two years in the Moroccan city of Asilah.

U Tam'si's poetry incorporates elements of surrealism; it often has vivid historic images, and comments African life and society, as well as humanity in general.

(from Wikipedia)

Reviews

[Nick · Rating 5 out of 5]

"Nothing is pure which resists the mixing of things; I mean that real purity abhors all purity..."

The collection is presented in four parts: A Game of Cheat-Heart, Epitomé, The Belly, and Bow Harp. For the first part, Cheat-Heart, U Tam'si's flow is effortless and free. He leaves out punctuation marks, instead relying solely on line breaks and white space to set the rhythm. The beat and cadence of these verses were so unique, and I often felt like I could hear his voice in my head, accent and all.

In Epitomé, the punctuation marks return. U Tam'si uses too many exclamation points for my tastes, but other than that, I have no complaints. The motifs that stood out to me here were those of water and salt. There's often mention of oceans or the sea or just water in general; then there's also lots of salt, saltmaking, being a saltmaker--"the saltmaker sifts the salt." This bit actually got me thinking a lot about the balance of salt and water in my body. I thought about how my body feels when its water is extra salty, or when it needs more sweet fruit, or when it needs some cold, crisp leaves. It's almost like the concept of the four humors, but with saltiness, sweetness, savoriness, and, I don't know, blandness I guess, for the clear tastelessness of water.

There was a deeply affecting use of sexually graphic language in a good number of these poems. A couple of my favorite lines were: "a moon narrow as a virgin's cunt" ("Low Watermark," p. 7); and "then / an idiot virgin opened her sex for me / to piss upon my already putrid sorrow / god knows how i enjoyed it" ("Strange Agony," p. 15).

[Kirsten · Rating 4 out of 5]

I found this small volume browsing my library's collection on the hunt for a totally different book (I got both). I was intrigued by the author's story and viewpoint. This translation includes most or all of four previous publications, released in small runs and subsequently difficult to find, despite the author's acclaim both at home and abroad.
The poetry itself is interesting in a way I've encountered before with similar results. There's a bit of surrealism and a very strong internal symbolism that I found difficult. I won't say impenetrable, as the images recur so consistently I did get a feel for many of them, but at the same time I could see that some passages would be much more powerful if I could connect to the range of meanings associated. Part of that's on me as a reader, but I found I would prefer reading an analysis of the poetry. Nonetheless I enjoyed reading and thinking about the poems and their context, political and personal, and picking apart what did not work for me. I'm grateful to my library for the extent of their collections.