World Book Capital 2008

[Stewart]

World Book Capital is a title bestowed by UNESCO to a city in recognition of the quality of its programs to promote books and reading and the dedication of all players in the book industry.

It runs from 23rd April to 22nd April and next week Amsterdam will be officially inaugurated as World Book Capital 2008. You can view its site here (http://www.amsterdamworldbookcapital.com/).

Previous World Book Capitals have been:

2001: Madrid
2002: Alexandria
2003: New Delhi
2004: Antwerp
2005: Montreal
2006: Turin
2007: Bogot?Next year Amsterdam will pass the baton to Beirut.

[Eric]

I have to say that I hadn't been following the UNESCO World Book Capital series. Only Antwerp was within striking distance of where I live. But now Amsterdam is only an hour away by public transport. So I might turn up there a few times during the year.

I hope that all the fanfares and hype do lead to an increased number of serious works of Dutch literature being translated into English. Up to now, the number of books is OK, I suppose, for a smallish country, relative to what appears in Britain from other languages, but the choice of novels to translate has been rather arbitrary.

[Eric]

I haven't been to Amsterdam lately, because there's a bloody national bus strike, and the nearest station's far away (12 kilometres, even when the buses are running). So it'll be interesting to see in due course, what impact the status of Book Capital is making on the city.

When the unions and employers kiss and make up, I shall be going to the Dutch capital to have a look. I've not been there since 23rd April.

[Eric]

The debate about neo-censorship in September looks interesting, but otherwise this year with Amsterdam as World Book Capital hasn't made much impression on me, although I'm living in the same country.

The Netherlands hardly seems to be promoting contemporary Dutch literature, falling back on the Portuguese-born Spinoza and the German-born Anne Frank as the mainstays of their World Book Capital profile. Plus the kids' writer Annie M. Schmidt.

With regard to Dutch literature per se, the whole thing looks a bit lame.

[Adrian]

Next year Amsterdam will pass the baton to Beirut.

And after that it's Ljubljana's turn, after they beat out Wellington. I can see Wellington trying again in 2011 when "cities from Europe and North America will be excluded from the next call for nominations"

BPANZ Wellington Loses World Book Capital Bid to Slovenia (http://bpanz.org.nz/?p=61)

[Eric]

So, this enterprise has arrived at the positive discrimination stage, always the precursor to undemocratic behaviour.

The message for 2011 appears to be that it is so unfair that Europe and North America have thriving and dynamic literature. So we've got to give the others a chance. So far, so good. But what if a lot of what the others have on offer is well-hyped stuff aimed at fulfilling political ends?

The Waltic conference in Stockholm tried latter-day agit-prop, earlier this month, and appears to have fallen abysmally flat, judging by the lack of reviews in the Swedish, let alone any other, press.

Once woolly idealists and hard-headed propagandists for undemocratic r?gimes combine forces to run book festivals, the whole idea of a meeting of minds goes out of the window. Instead of the hard sell of commercialist bestsellers, you have the hard sell of vague and often unrealisable political ideals.

Beirut will be OK, as long as no one is in the mood for assassinations or war during the time of the festival. And in the Middle East, that cannot always be guaranteed. Remember that once upon a time, Beirut was a thriving, partly Western-style, sophisticated city. It is now a pock-marked capital, hoping that civil war between various factions will not erupt. Not the ideal place for inviting an international bunch of writers to.

Wellington is in an interesting position. It is surely as Western as Ljublana, Paris, Toronto or Helsinki, but happens to be conveniently placed at the other side of the world, where it has to compete with cities that maybe have a much less well-developed infrastructure. Surely the idea of excluding Europe and North America is really a disguised way of excluding the West.

[Cocko]

Wellington is in an interesting position. It is surely as Western as Ljublana, Paris, Toronto or Helsinki, but happens to be conveniently placed at the other side of the world, where it has to compete with cities that maybe have a much less well-developed infrastructure. Surely the idea of excluding Europe and North America is really a disguised way of excluding the West.

In some respects I agree with your point about "western" cultures settled in the southern pacific region, indeed NZ (and my own Australia) have a very high standard of living, extensive infrastructure and a strong colonial identity which separate us from many of our neighbours. On this basis it would seem weird to exclude North America and Europe yet leave it open to countries like NZ.

However, each of the countries mentioned bring something different to the table, certainly NZ brings a powerful Maori heritage. Despite a century or so of white settlement, you could mount a pretty strong case that UNESCO should get behind a relatively young country like NZ, especially given the extent in which New Zealanders have embraced their indigenous culture. Something us Australians are still trying to catch on to!

Not that I want to defend my Kiwi friends too much. There is obviously a lot of countries with strong literary traditions that could be in with a shot instead of Wellington, but culture goes far beyond infrastructure and which country rose its flag on your shores first. In fact, I believe it was the Dutch that stamped their claim here a lot earlier than the English.

Anyway, this whole thing sounds a bit like trumped up Eurovision Song Content to me... now that's something we certainly don't understand down here.

[Eric]

In my opinion, NZ is an outpost of British culture, plus a couple of hundred years of mixing with Maoris. Firstly on a colonial basis, now giving the indigenous population chance.

If Wellington wins, apart from a token presence by Maori authors from Aotearoa to make it look good, there will be a great deal of English-language stuff promoted, authors that write in world language English and have been copiously discussed in, for instance, New Zealand Book News:

http://www.bookcouncil.org.nz/about/index.html

But those applying will highlight the Maori presence to show the rest of East Asia that NZ isn't just a stuffy, tea-drinking colonial outpost.

[Funhouse]

Eric, why would you assume that any Maori writers would be a "token presence"? Many of New Zealand's most prominent and popular writers, such as Witi Ihimaera and Patricia Grace and Hone Tuwhare are Maori.

It sounds to me like you've got a bee in your bonnet about "political correctness" and you're trying to sniff out a conspiracy in advance and where there is unlikely to be one.

I'm a Kiwi (although I've lived in Australia for ten years now) and I can assure you that the indigenous culture (and Pacific island culture) in New Zealand is strong and a much bigger part of the national identity than it is here in Australia, for example. In that respect, Wellington is not "just like Helsinki" and it's not just an outpost of British culture.

[Cocko]

Hey Eric, are you being a tad condescending to the Maori legacy to suggest that "NZ is an outpost of British culture, plus a couple of hundred years of mixing with Maoris", what happened to all those years of Maori culture that preceded European settlement?

And anther thing, lets not get the two indigenous populations of Australian and NZ mixed up. Sure the assimilation has been rough, as a clashing of cultures often is, but let's remember that NZ signed a treaty with the Maori people in 1840, recognising their presence prior to white settlement. This I would suggest is also recognition of their cultural significance to the land, something you seem to be unwilling to do almost 200 years later.

It is Australia that still doesn't embrace 50,000 years of indigenous culture in its consititution.

As for statements like New Zealanders are "just a stuffy, tea-drinking colonial outpost", there is little response to this apart from stating that you are a dickhead mate ? albeit a well read dickhead.

Can't believe I got sucked into this, I'm not even a New Zealander!

[Eric]

There's nowt like a bit of provocation. What I'm curious about is:

a) To what extent is the Maori language a living language, and to what extent a fossil that the English-speaking majority tolerate?

b) In what language do Grace, Ihimaera and Tuwhare write? This interests me at a postcolonial level. Some countries, once liberated from colonial rule, revert to the local language, while in others, such as Ireland, the dominance of the colonial language has gone so far that the indigenous, original language is pushed into the background and kept as a kind of relic, to be wheeled out at festivals.

For me, language is an intrinsic part of any given culture, but there is a tipping point, beyond which it is simply impossible to rescue the language and restore its full power and significance for a society. Can Maori still be rescued in these terms? I very much doubt it. Maori is a relic.

Looking at the Oxford Companion to New Zealand Literature entries on the three writers, I can see that ethnically they are all Maori, and rightly proud of it. But Tuwhare (born 1922) only spoke Maori until he was nine and writes poetry in it, Grace (born 1937) and Ihimaera (born 1944) write in English. They are the dying embers of Maori culture.

That is what I'm getting at. Maori culture is doomed as a living organism. You can go into long and, indeed, politically correct discussions about whether the Brits were dominant bastards, wrecking a culture, but that culture is now permanently wrecked and will never rise again as a national culture, in the same way as that of the American Indians is dead.

In India, things are very different. There, only about 200,000 people of about a billion actually speak former colonial language English as their mother tongue. English is used to communicate and, to an extent, to cement the country together without any indigenous language getting the upper hand. But millions of people are potentially quite capable of writing novels and poetry in their true vernaculars - languages they also speak every day - if they have the talent to do so.

[Funhouse]

There's nowt like a bit of provocation. What I'm curious about is:

You know, it is possible to satisfy your curiosity without provoking people...


Maori culture is doomed as a living organism.

You're not afraid to pull statements like this out of your arse are you?

You obviously know very little about New Zealand beyond what you've seen in a few books and so much of what you so is obviously inflammatory that I'm reluctant to seriously engage with you, however I'll play along with you for a little bit longer until I get sick of it.

(a) Maori is very much a living language. It gets taught in schools. Some schools operate entirely in Maori. Some people speak it as their primary language. Some communities operate almost entirely in Maori. When the national anthem is sung it is sung first in Maori and then in English. Languages blend and merge, as I'm sure you're aware, and New Zealand English has a significant amount of Maori incorporated into it. Will Maori ever challenge the hegemony of English in New Zealand? No. Will it deteriorate into non-usage? No. It will remain a significant part of New Zealand culture.

(b) Language is not the only component of culture.

(c) You seem to have little awareness of the significant differences and similarities between former British colonies. It's just irrelevant to bring up India as a point of comparison to New Zealand as the experience was so different. Australia, Canada and the US are closer examples to the New Zealand experience in that the colonists stayed on as the dominant population. However, New Zealand is still fundamentally different to these other examples because of the treaty (as Cocko mentioned) and the size of the indigenous population that remains (about 10% of the total population), amongst other things.

(d) It is not really possible to make a living as a writer in New Zealand even when writing in English, let alone in Maori, but English is obviously a more viable choice if you want to reach a wider audience. There are nevertheless a significant number of writers who do write in Maori.

[Cocko]

Okay, okay, okay... Eric you sure can wind people up and wear them down. I expect this will be my last comment on the matter as I think Funhouse has said it best. But let me take a slightly different approach and take it away from literature. I know this is a little contentious as this is a literature forum, but as I work for Australia's federal film and television funding agency I'll have to pull on this knowledge.

I saw one of the most insightful panel discussion this year at the Australian International Documentary Conference in Perth. There was several countries represented but I'll keep this discussion it to New Zealand and Australia. The CEOs of both Maori Television and National Indigenous Television discussed their corporate strategies as bilingual broadcasters. In fact, Australia's NITV which is barely a year old has taken many leads from Maori TV as they have been around for five years.

The establishment of both NITV and Maori TV was a reaction to exactly Eric's point. However, while Eric assumes that the local dialect is only trotted out for festivals, these two broadcasters have a mandate that the language is broadcast on a daily basis, both for educational purposes and entertainment. For example, here is some context regarding Maori TV:

"The Māori language is the cornerstone of Māori culture. It provides a platform for Māori cultural development and supports a unique New Zealand identity within a global society. It is a taonga, at the very heart of Māori culture and identity, and for that reason alone it must be preserved and fostered.

Through the course of the 20th century, however, the health of the Māori language was seriously compromised and by the 1970s academics were predicting the death of the language within a generation.

The Māori Television Service (Māori Television) is part of a national strategy to revitalise te reo Māori and tikanga Māori. The most recent literature describing the background for Māori broadcasting and Māori Television is the Report of the Māori Broadcasting Advisory Committee (MBAC), which was released in September 2000. This report provides a comprehensive historical context describing the struggle that Māori have endured to gain recognition of the importance and place of te reo Māori in broadcasting. It correlates this struggle with the steady decline of the Māori population fluent in te reo Māori, concluding that whilst Māori have been marginalised in the broadcasting sector, te reo Māori has declined to a “perilous state”."

I strongly suggest watching some Maori TV or NITV online, here are the links:

NITV - National Indigenous Television (http://nitv.org.au/)
Māori Television (http://www.maoritelevision.com/)

The examples don't stop there, if we revert back to Australia for a second, the agency I work for, Screen Australia, has investment initiatives for indigenous people to tell their stories in any language they see fit, there are also programs such as Black Screen which is a travelling film festival all around the country the shows the latest films to be made by indigenous people.

Still, I somehow get the impression that this won't be enough to satisfy Eric. I suspect the battle will never be won until the indigenous populations of Australia (2 per cent) and New Zealand (10 per cent) rise and overthrow the whites. But the examples above are making significant inroads. In Australia's case these film and television projects are vital considering the many different Aboriginal and Torres Straight Islander languages are oral traditions, not written, so capturing stories of the dream time (as told by elders) is of foremost importance.

Yet, this conversation is still fundamentally flawed as I consider places like New Zealand and Australia to be much more diverse than just the culture of indigenous people and colonials... we are in fact part of a multi-cultural society which blends the customs and beliefs of people from all over the world, some I dare say that might even come from the Netherlands.

[Eric]

First of all, Cocko and Funhouse, what is your level of knowledge of Māori or an Australian aboriginal language? (I too believe in the correct use of diacritic marks, but my keyboard doesn't do macrons.) It's interesting to have insights into the language you are fighting for. Could you have written what you wrote in defence of Māori in Māori? If not, do you feel you ought at least to learn an indigenous language to lower intermediate level, so that you can share in it to an extent and understand both the linguistic and social factors involved a little more from the inside?

My central point is the following:

That tipping point of ultimate extinction has been passed. No amount of state subsidies and school lessons, in and about the language and culture, will save it. I agree absolutely that recent legislation and the apology made for wrecking Māori culture by the White British invaders, colonisers, or whatever you want to call them, was the right thing to do.

The dignity of the culture should be maintained. But idealism will not save the culture and language from inevitable death. Very few languages indeed have climbed out of the grave. The only really successful examples in modern times being Hebrew and Catalan, and in the 19th century, the Baltic languages, plus Finnish, all of which are now living, functioning languages. Nynorsk in Norway was more or less invented, but has survived. Have the Māoris got the stamina to keep the language teaching and writing going, once the novelty has worn off?

The Endangered Languages scene has become a playground for politically correct people, well-meaning but not realistic. Once again, the English-speaking world is worrying desperately about languages that are about to die out, but hasn't got any time for any of the ones that have survived. Protecting endangered languages has become a charity activity, like saving stray cats, or rare species of grain.

Languages in a similar position as Māori are legion. In Europe, there are: all the Gaelic languages, Basque, Romansch, Saami, Sorbian, Friulian, Frisian, Livonian, and many more shards of language. These, and dialects, are fascinating to study, but socio-political factors mean that unless an enormous effort is put into increasing their use and status, they will die out.

I am interested in the ones that made it, ones that at the end off the 19th century were doomed or dying, having been almost stamped out by colonialists. But ones that have survived! Let's see if Māori can be rescued. But I am pessimistic. Because it is located in an English-speaking area. And the average English-speaker has no interest whatsoever in languages as living social and cultural entities.

What you call a wind-up is merely trying to look the facts in the face and applying a little logic.

[Adrian]

Pertinent though not exactly up-to-the-minute comic from local cartoonist:

http://img510.imageshack.us/img510/2836/20081022jibs8.png

Also here if the link dies Jitterati by Grant Buist - Wednesday, October 22, 2008 (http://jitterati.comicgenesis.com/)

[Eric]

I think Adrian's cartoon's very amusing. It highlights two things: a) the ridiculously showy and irrelevant events that some organisers invent, instead of promoting the reading of books; b) the fact that one man's canon is another man's literary cannon fodder.

[titania7]

Eric,
I agree with your sentiments about the cartoon.

As a bit of a sidenote, speaking of libraries, there's a popular
book out about a kitten that was left in a library's return-book slot.
The name of the book is Dewey and it was written by Vicki
Myron with Bret Witter. It's a best-seller, by the way.

Makes me think of the mention of the kitten in Traat's poem
(I love kittens).

Who knows what will be discovered in a library deposit next?
A new-born baby, perhaps? Or a pet ferret? My grandmum
actually knew a lady who owned a couple of these critters.
From all appearances, they tend to be incredibly frisky
animals. I hate to think of the havoc one might wreak in a
library slot ;).

~Titania