'Of course, poetry is irrelevant to the "real" world of power and politics, but so is philosophy, painting, music and any other human activity where something genuine can be found.'
Thus did Pulitzer Prize-winning poet Charles Simic explain (The Sunday Age 'Agenda', March 9, 2003) why he was among those who shocked and awed the White House by sending it thirteen thousand poems to protest the Iraq war.
The message has sublime clarity: a poem is not a bomb. A poem 'costs' nothing to manufacture, buys nothing, kills nobody, and in all other ways is prodigiously removed from realpolitik. But poetry is humane. Hence the symbolic importance of engulfing the military might of the White House in verse. (A similar activity resulted in 150,000 verified returns of John Howard's anti-terrorist kit.)
On the face of it, the creative written word might also not be expected to hold sway over the power politics of economic might. Sixty-three per cent of Island readers live in mainland Australia and overseas and so may have scant knowledge of the fierce imbroglio which has pitted writers, artists and others against Forestry Tasmania's sponsorship of the biennial 10 Days on the Island cultural event.
Forestry Tasmania is a government business enterprise; a semi-privatised economic juggernaut. Its practise of clearfelling old growth forest is strongly defended by the government and opposed in varying degrees by over two-thirds of Tasmanians. Writers and artists in particular have a distinguished history of championing the natural world.
So it was that dismay and anger engulfed sectors of the cultural industry when Labor premier Jim Bacon announced Forestry Tasmania as the first-named major corporate sponsor ($50,000) of this year's event, which involves theatre, dance, song, gastronomy and much more - including, as its literary component, the announcement by Bacon of the Tasmania Pacific Region Prizes for fiction ($40,000) and poetry ($10,000). That these combined amounts equal Forestry Tasmania's sponsorship is coincidental; the Prizes came into existence independently of 10 Days and are separately financed.
However, the announcements form a major highlight of the festival. It's not every day that a state premier hands over cheques of that significance to writers. The Prizes, by virtue of this prominence, thus lost the quarantining they may have expected to have against the protest at Forestry Tasmania's high-profile backing of the Robyn Archer-directed extravaganza. Six novelists withdrew their publisher-nominated entries: before the shortlisting, Richard Flanagan (Gould's Book of Fish), Tim Winton (Dirt Music), Steven Carroll (The Art of the Engine Driver ), Danielle Wood* (The Alphabet of Light and Dark ) and, after they had been shortlisted, Peter Carey (True History of the Kelly Gang), and Joan London (Gilgamesh).
The shortened list comprises four powerful, well-written novels, extracts from which head up this issue. Still, it is necessary to reflect that had there been a shortlist containing Carey, Flanagan and Winton – an eminent possibility – the profile and sheer quality of the fiction prize would have made for an extraordinary announcement on the day.
Instead, there is bad blood and sorrow. An enriching moment has passed Tasmania by.
The preparedness of a small state government to initiate the biggest fiction prize in this part of the world – as the Premier's did – is commendable, and there is every expectation that future Tasmanian governments will ensure that these prizes continue. Island supports them, just as its next edition will support 'Future Perfect - Authoring Tomorrow', which has been arranged as an alternative festival, to run at the same time as 10 Days.
But once again a hard lesson is being learned. It is that where vested economic interests are clearly deleterious to the environment – in this case, through high-profit old growth clearfelling – opposition will be consistent, loud, direct and articulate. These, after all, are the most effective 'weapons' to use against the woodchipper, the log truck and the seven-figure CEO salary. And when old growth logging ceases in Tasmania, as it will do, this 10 Days on the Island event will be seen to have played a significant role in bringing that about.
In the end, big issues – the environment, war – aren't confined to neat geographical entities. Those in Tasmania who protest are part of a vast world movement trying to slow the appalling rate of environmental degredation. It is, alas, the mother of all battles. But with perseverance then hopefully, in Simic's words, something genuine can be found.
This editorial of ISLAND magazine, Island 92, is re-published by permission of the author, Island Editor, David Owen.
Email: island@tassie.net.au
*Danielle Wood actually withdrew from the Tasmanian Readers' and Writers' Festival, part of the 10 Days on the Island Festival. Wood, Australia's best young writer as recent winner of the $20,000 Vogel Award, told festival organiser Joe Bugden she could not take part because of the perception of association with Forestry Tasmania sponsorship of the 10 Days festival. Cinderella misses the ball