以诗喃吟唱愤怒与希望

Books & arts

文艺版块

Les slammeurs

诗喃者

Rhyme for your life

让生活充满韵律


Young people put their anger and hopes into spoken poetry

年轻人把他们的愤怒和希望化作口语诗

In a small, dimly lit room one recent Saturday morning, a group of Congolese slammers are chanting about politics and art, poverty and sex. They tower over the seated audience, gesticulating wildly. The listeners laugh, jeer and occasionally join in by repeating refrains or clapping. This is exactly how slam is meant to be. Marc Smith, an American former builder who hosted the world’s first slam event in Chicago in 1984, would be impressed.

最近一个星期六的早晨,一群刚果诗喃者在一间昏暗狭小的房间里吟诵着政治与艺术、贫穷与性活动。他们高高站在坐着的观众面前,疯狂地打着手势。听众们不时地大笑或嘲笑,偶尔也会通过重复诗句或鼓掌的方式加入进来。这正是诗喃的本意。1984年在芝加哥举行了世界首场诗喃赛事的美国前建筑商马克·史密斯对此印象深刻。

Mr Smith promoted slam, a form of spoken-word poetry, as a way of liberating rhymes from the page and making them accessible. Like rappers, slammers do battle, but they are judged by the audience. As well as giving marks out of ten at the end of performances, attendees express their opinions by cheering or heckling. Slam reached Goma, a city of some 1m people in embattled eastern Congo, five years ago when a handful of young men began watching YouTube videos of slammers across the world. They were inspired by the raw, uncensored rhymes of artists such as Grand Corps Malade (Large Sick Body), a tall French slammer with spinal injuries who writes about racism and loneliness in suburban Paris.

史密斯先生提倡通过诗喃(一种口语诗的形式)将韵文从书页中解放出来并使之普及。就像说唱歌手之间会进行较量一样,诗喃者也会斗诗,但他们的输赢是由观众来评判的。除了在表演结束时按十分制打分外,参与的观众还会通过欢呼或起哄的方式表达自己的观点。诗喃在五年前到达了戈马——一座有大约100万人口、位于刚果东部的危机四伏的城市——当时有一些年轻人开始在YouTube上观看世界各地的诗喃者的视频。他们深受Grand Corps Malade(高大病体)等艺术家们未经删减、原汁原味的押韵所鼓舞,Grand Corps Malade是法国的一个高个子诗喃者,他常创作有关巴黎郊区的种族主义和孤独的诗喃。

“There was a lot of appetite for slam here,” says Ben Kamuntu, one of Goma’s early slammers. “Young people wanted to break away from silence, we wanted to express ourselves.” With its sprawling tin-roofed houses and unpaved sidestreets, Goma is a far cry from Chicago’s skyscrapers, but the same slam fervour spread among its youth as it did when Mr Smith first promoted the idea in America. Soon, more than a hundred people were meeting to practise, clubbing together to rent a small house where they could slam. Before the pandemic hit, the best exponents put on shows in Goma’s bars and restaurants.

戈马的诗喃者元老本·卡蒙图说,“这里有很多人对诗喃有浓厚的兴趣。”“年轻人想打破沉默,我们想表达自己。”戈马有着铺天盖地的铁皮屋顶房屋和未铺砌的小巷,与遍地摩天大楼的芝加哥相去甚远,但戈马年轻人对诗喃的狂热却与史密斯先生第一次在美国宣扬这一想法时的情况毫无二致。很快,一百多个戈马人聚集在一起练习,他们共同租赁了一间可以练习诗喃的小房子。在疫情来袭之前,最优秀的诗喃者在戈马的酒吧和餐馆举行了演出。

When one slammer, a slight 22-year-old called Rita Zaburi, was asked by a friend why she spent so much time alone in her room, she decided to respond in verse. On the morning of your correspondent’s visit, she stands up, shyly at first, and slams about what it means to be a poet. “It is not about being a sorcerer, healing wounds with the magic of your creativity,” she begins in French. “It is about denouncing the evils that swallow our society.”

当一个名叫丽塔·扎布里的22岁的诗喃者被一个朋友问及她独自在房间里呆很长时间的原因时,她决定用诗喃来回答。在《经济学人》记者来访的那天早上,她的表现也可圈可点,她刚开始还很羞怯,后来就展示了有关“当诗人意味着什么”的诗喃。她用法语开始说,“当诗人与当巫师不同,诗人用创造力的魔力治愈创伤,诗人痛斥吞噬社会的罪恶。”


Actually, Goma’s slammers do both. Their city has been surrounded by warring armed groups for over 20 years. Rebels, who generally fund themselves by smuggling gold, coltan and wood, often kidnap people on nearby roads. In February men wielding Kalashnikovs intercepted two UN cars less than 30 miles from Goma; they hauled out the Italian ambassador, his bodyguard and driver and shot them. People in the region are slaughtered with machetes and guns every month. Militiamen terrorise women by raping them.

实际上,戈马的诗喃者两者兼备。这座城市已经被交战的武装团体包围了20多年。主要通过走私黄金、钶钽铁矿石和木材为自己提供资金的叛军经常在附近的公路上绑架民众。今年2月,手持卡拉什尼科夫冲锋枪的男子在距戈马不到30英里的地方拦截了两辆联合国汽车;他们将意大利大使、保镖和司机从车里拖了出来并开枪杀害。戈马每个月都有人被砍死和枪杀。民兵通过强奸妇女来恐吓她们。

Ms Zaburi and four other female slammers help women who have been raped or beaten in weekly “slam-o-therapy” workshops. The participants—some attacked by rebels, others by their husbands—learn to write about their experiences. One of their number, Deborah, slams about what the group means to her: “I love you, you respect me, we give each other advice, we are working together to build a community,” she intones in Swahili. When Deborah was 15, her parents forced her to marry a man who came home drunk and beat her most nights. She gave birth to a child who died in infancy and eventually ran away from the abuse. Slam helps her relax, she says. “It is a way to have fun, to destress, it helps me to put the pain behind me.”

扎布里女士和其他四名女性诗喃者会在每周的“诗喃疗愈”研讨会上帮助遭遇强奸或殴打的女性。部分参与者曾遭到叛军袭击,而其他参与者曾被她们的丈夫伤害,她们学会了书写自己的经历。其中一个叫黛博拉的诗喃者用斯瓦希里语吟诵了这个群体对她来说意味着什么:“我爱你们,你们尊重我,我们互相建议,我们共同致力于建立一个诗喃者的社区。”黛博拉的父母在她15岁的时候强迫她嫁人,她的丈夫常常在喝得酩酊大醉后回家,并殴打她。她生下的孩子在婴儿期就死了,但她最终还是逃离了家暴。她说,诗喃帮助她放松。“诗喃是一种享受乐趣,消除压力的方式,它帮助我脱离苦海。”

The men who established the slam scene in Goma are also among the city’s most prominent activists. Mr Kamuntu, for example, wrote some of his best slam in prison, where he was locked up for two months after protesting against the refusal of Joseph Kabila, a former president, to leave power. But slam in Congo is about more than airing political anger. Goma’s young slammers are exuberant. “People tell tales about what has happened in their neighbourhoods, recount love stories, make jokes,” Mr Kamuntu says. “Even if there is no electricity in a street, there is still life in that street and a joy at being alive that must be expressed.”

在戈马建立诗喃圈子的人也是该市的一些最著名的活动家。例如,因抗议前总统约瑟夫·卡比拉的拒绝下台而被关押了两个月的卡蒙图在狱中写下了一些最精彩的诗喃作品。但是,在刚果的诗喃不仅仅是宣泄政治愤怒。戈马年轻的诗喃者们精力充沛。卡蒙图表示:“人们会讲述他们的邻里故事,会讲述爱情故事,还会开玩笑。”“即使一条街上没有电,但那条街上仍然有生命,仍然有必须表达的活着的快乐。”

来源:经济学人

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