Does being plurilingual make your work richer?
I am not sure that is for me to say. I know that audiences who recognise their language in my poems respond very positively and audiences who enjoy hearing new words and sounds enjoy this aspect too. I hope it makes my work richer, brings new people to poetry, and introduces new words and ideas to others.
Language can unite or divide people. According to you, how does language help in bringing people together?
If we regard language as a collective project in which a community of speakers, writers and readers engage over generations, it’s a source of wonder, pride, and aesthetic pleasure. I find pleasure in immersing myself in a language in which I am fluent, but also in listening and sometimes trying to make sense in and of a language in which I am a beginner. The unique sounds, tones, and even gestures of a language fascinate me.
You say language can be used to illustrate our shared heritage and humanity. How?
Languages are created and kept alive by communities. Different communities may have different languages, but often neighbouring communities will have borrowed words back and forth over the years. In some cases, pidgins and later creoles develop between neighbours. Languages also interact with each other through travel and trade, and of course colonisation. For instance, it is fascinating to trace a word like ‘aubergine’, or ‘baigan’ as it moved around India and entered Europe through different routes. In English, Spanish and French, the word came through Arabic and Catalan keeping the ‘the’ (al) and becoming aubergine and variants. However in Polish, there is no ‘al’ it is ‘bakłażan’ which suggests the word came from a different, more easterly route.
How is the aspect of shared heritage reflected in your poetry?
I am sure painters wax lyrical about their paints and in this way, language inspires me to write. Although I write in English, I often find the word I need is not there and I have to borrow from another language. Sometimes I like to use words for their meanings, and other times for their sounds, and generally there is a little of both. In one poem, ‘Blunt Knives’ I wanted to play with rhythm and sound and meaning, and I used the nattuvangam for a dance I had studied.
I’d like to think that by using words from many languages, my poetry introduces monolinguals to new words and ideas and, to those who know the words already, makes them feel a special belonging in the world of my poetry.