| FRANK O' HARA
ON YOUR NERVE Review by Linda France |
| Before last Thursday night
Frank O'Hara was a poet whose work I knew only vaguely. I
knew he was American, gay, working in the art world, and
that he died in a car accident on Fire Island in 1966.
But his poetry never really engaged me. What I thought of
as its lack of focus, disjointed rhythms, its
indiscriminate use of allusions, its rhetorical poses,
confused me. And then, at the Queen's Hall, three Scottish poets, W.N. Herbert, David Kinloch and Donny O'Rourke, celebrating the life and work of Frank O'Hara in a montage of his poems, their poems and their musings (in prose, but still scripted), through their own deep appreciation, provided a key to my understanding. Their openness, playfulness and verbal fluency caught, what I believe now, is the spirit of O'Hara's poetry. The manner of their presentation -- interwoven voices, changing viewpoints, from past to present, from Frank to David, to Donny, to Bill -- enacted, in a very vibrant and moving way, O'Hara's style. All this was enhanced by the sound effects - brief evocations of the bustle of New York streets, smoky nightclubs, elegant galleries, the salty sound of the sea rolling onto sand. It was intriguing to hear three such rich Celtic voices singing the praises of someone so very American. Perhaps this was why they are so attracted to O'Hara's work -- they share his distinctive voice, his access to a broad, cohesive range of cultural references: a rich layering that England is in the process of losing through its own insularity, philistinism and neglect. Bill Herbert asked us to imagine that we weren't actually in New York in 1960 at all, that really we were in an Arts Centre in Hexham. At times this wasn't easy. Donny O'Rourke tossed in memories of his own Uncle Frank. David Kinloch recalled a brief encounter in front of Monet's Nympheas. The mood was anarchic but lyrical, evoking four people's ideas and experiences -- Frank's and Bill's, Donny's and David's -- bringing them all together to make One Thing: 'Light clarity avocado salad'. Appetising stuff. So we learnt as much about the three Scotsmen as we did about Frank O'Hara. They all merged. And that was fine because the real subject of On Your Nerve was an intensity of living, a celebration of energy. Sitting in the out-of-hours library, I felt much the same as David Kinloch did, recounting the story of when he watched a friend of his, ill with AIDS, dance with his hero, an 80 year old Japanese choreographer. David said it was then that he really understood what dance was. It was listening to On Your Nerve that I first really understood what Frank O'Hara was about. It would have sounded great on the radio: the pictures the words made were full of colour and texture. The plan is that the final show will be performed at Glasgow's Mayfest. I hope we will get a chance to see the culmination of what has been an experimental creative process at the Queen's Hall at a later date. Those of you who love words, love life and who missed this, make sure you get to see it next time around. (Performance: Queen's Hall, Hexham 12th December 1996) |
 On to David, OR on to Donny... No, go to Frank Not yet? Alright, let's head back to Projects |
