Monday, November 07, 2011

Post- post-ism's and colliding bodies in space

I studied Architecture for three years before I read for my Arts degree. Back then, what struck me as an (perhaps rather impressionable) design student, was that beyond the need to create form and function, habitat and structure, there was this inherent need to present spatial recognition for the body; a theatrical stage for life to be played out. And so the experience of life and the articulation of the body in that space became primary to the ways in which I conceptualised design. If anything, I have taken these learnings onward into the way that I write, both in structural intent and in literary composition.

Literature meets the post-modern when we collide against traditional notions of knowledge production and what we deem palatable for public consumption. Real life allows for as many interpretations of the individual experience as there are people. We've just noted the birth of number 7 billion. Go figure.

This is the dynamic with which the contemporary short story and poetic musing is breathed life into. The -ism's of the sociologist's realm step aside for that brief moment when hegemony gives way to anarchy; and we're made to witness an explosion of ideas, of ways of making sense of the lived world, of the many truths that reside herein.

If change is the most reliable constant, then so is the embraced and engaged surrender of ongoing dialogue, unbridled narrative and the body as an instrument in space, and in this, the theatre of life. Literature meets art meets cinema meets life. Belly of Fire is dancing to this rhythm as we 'speak' ...

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