Dance is suggestive of physical energy, of a body in continuous and rhythmic movement. Poetry operates in much the same way. Some would even say dance comes from the same hidden place as poetry. They just happen to be expressed in different ways.
The dancer expresses himself or herself using the body; the poet uses words, threading these words together so they have structure, rhythm — both internal and external — and unity
I was fascinated when, paging through the National Arts Festival programme, I saw that Threads, a collaboration between poet Lebo Mashile and choreographer Sylvia “Magogo” Glasser, was being staged. Mashile is a famous poet, and was winner of the Noma Award in 2006; Glasser has been around for a long time — she founded her dance company in 1978 and has trained a multitude dancers.
In an interview with Cue, the festival newspaper, before their show on Thursday, Mashile said: “I’ve learnt to inhabit my own body, the body has its own voice, it has a language. It isn’t words, but it is words, it’s a text. I have found my physical and internal locus. I have realised the commitment it takes to be a dancer.”
It’s an onerous commitment, and I can see why she spoke in those terms. As a poet, you have to speak clearly, in a declamatory voice; as a dancer you have to get your moves right, twisting and turning, moving this way and that, generally showing that your body has rhythm.
The problem, if I can call it that, is that Threads placed on Mashile’s shoulders a big responsibility. She has to dance, and she has to speak words. (Try dancing and talking at the same time to see what I mean).
The first moments of the production worked quite well, transcendently, I would daresay. Then, she still had her energy, but the performance lost wind and a bit of its soulish energies along the way. Near the end, I couldn’t quite hear some of the lines, the words seemingly being drowned in the rivers of sweat collecting on her and her fellow performers.
This is unfortunate, as poetry works through the unity of its constituent words — if you hear certain words and not others, then the poem is a not poem, it’s just abandoned words, lying on the side of the road.
There’s a simple technical solution to this: Mashile should just record her poetry and lip-sync her performance, or some of it. Some of the spontaneity is bound to be lost in this fashion, but much more will be salvaged. At least we will get to hear her beautiful lines and her voice. This way, she can concentrate on dancing (which she didn’t do much of) and not need to worry that her words will be lost to the audience.
In many other ways, Threads is a beautiful production, and several moments of the performance are evocative. There’s a certain poignancy, some would say a dirge-like quality, created by her lines and the dances of her seven co-conspirators. She declaims about the lives of ordinary South Africans, the married, those who sleep to get to the top, noisome versions of masculinity and black economic empowerment.
The use of the threads on the stage is ingenious, suggestive of ties that bind us to those close to us, and of enslavement. Equally beautiful is the use of colour on the stage — I haven’t seen any production that uses colour in the way Threads did.
The two should be commended for their collaboration, and for improvising on these urban forms of expressions.