Spoken Word & Storytelling: Where Words Come Alive | ft. Roshan Abbas, Priya Malik & Yahya Bootwala

[00:00:00] Spoken Word, Storytelling, Poetry, Kabhi Sammilan, Poetry, Nasri Nazwar, In the beginning was the word. How do you teach the love of words to a generation for whom everything is awesome? In poetry, spoken word, it's about connecting with the audience over an emotion. I was actually trying to find myself and I picked up spoken word and I'm very grateful for that. And what is and what is not spoken word? It's a bit of an art. To just perform.

[00:00:37] Ladies and gentlemen, please welcome your host Akarsh Khurana. Hi, good evening. Welcome to the second episode of the third season of Unscripted with Akarsh Khurana, which is me. So, I am a bit of an avid reader. So, I like books. There's a book you may have heard of. It's called the Bible. I haven't read it. There's a line, a very famous line in the Bible which says,

[00:01:05] In the beginning was the word. And the word was with God and the word was God. I'm not sure what it means. But philosophically, they say that before anything else existed, there were words. So, yeah, clearly words thematically are going to be what we are talking about today. When I started my theatre career, when I started Thespo, I started Thespo. Nadir, who is behind there, was a very important part of it. They've heard this. But I got the first award in Thespo.

[00:01:34] I got the best director award in Thespo, which is a very dangerous thing. I thought that I was going to be a very dangerous actor cast. So, I got the best actor cast. And it's like a big fan of the set. And it was a big production. And it's all gone. Full House was the first time. When it started, 20 people were saved. I was like, I was like, I was like, I was like, I'm going to go.

[00:02:00] I was like, I'm going to go. family friend I didn't want to see I was going to see actually I didn't want to see so I said I said I said I was going to see I was going to see I saw her I said you will be home I went home I went to home I went to see and then I put a book and said this book

[00:02:30] it's called Towards a Poor Theater by Jerry Gratovski what is the name that is a stage a light and a person which has a story obviously this was true and today it will be true so today we are doing this episode that a person a story, a story, a story a spoken word this episode is my first guest

[00:02:58] is the gentle giant of the poetry community Yahya Bootwala who who who next up known for her deep understanding of the human condition and her truth bombs fearless and fantastic Priya Malik

[00:03:29] you are right here yes please and lastly who are the whole community and the world who have conquered every creative field after this spoken word Mr. Roshan Abbas

[00:03:53] you have made your age wise colouring young people yellow and senior people blue I like that we thought it was subtle but clearly it has been backfired

[00:04:21] I said it was human condition you can see it from Abbas you can see it welcome thank you so much for being here firstly for doing this let's start basically you all know we are getting to the internet so I wanted to discuss that but one question which I want to start is that spoken word and story telling we will talk about

[00:04:51] recent times in the world it became very popular I actually what you think you have said before beauty and everything actually if you see spoken word as a establishment started in Pune Shantanu Anand and Nandini Varma are two people who have worked

[00:05:20] in the commune they started something called the airplane poetry movement and that actually was the first organized attempt to put poetry into a format because spoken word is a little loose word started with performance poetry and that started in 2013 they started in Pune in the commune we had an idea and we started to do something and other collectives were around

[00:05:50] spill, un-raised taper tail started a little later all these things 17th and all these things were poetry focused and storytelling storytelling I think started coming along the way because I genuinely know that my focus was a lot of stories but in our team including Shantanu who had a lot of focus about poetry so we had to balance everything but everything continued and it was growing well

[00:06:20] the pandemic is almost an inflection point because the thing that happened was everybody started looking for intimacy right this small screen is a screen of intimacy so you look at intimate connections and when you get that intimate connection when you get into all the stars started to become I have a little credit for the commune I will give you one thing to do that when we started Spoken Fest so I started because there was really no North Star where does a poet across India look to go and perform

[00:06:50] and say this is my Mecca right this is my place and what Abhay is talking about the genesis of this you all were not a part of it back then but you all were witness to it I assume you all were aware of what was happening here so my spoken word journey actually started in Australia I used to live there yes and I was going through one of the worst phases of my life I wrote an angry break up poem called when he told me he no longer loved me and I used to be

[00:07:20] an English school teacher at the time so I finished school went straight to the Australian poetry slam which was happening in my city so they used to do heats right and if you win the heat you perform in the state finals and I went and I performed in one of the heats full anger when he told me he no longer loves me and I won that's how I started and then when I came to India I actually spoke with Harnid via Twitter and I asked her that is spoken word happening in India and she named Kormyun and she named Spill

[00:07:49] and she named Anirase but my first ever spoken word poem on YouTube in India was with Kormyun When you started when you did yours so this is already something that was regularly happening like slam poetry or events that it was yes, open mics were constantly happening I think I started around the end of 2016 I was just out of college doing my first job, second job so at that time there were open mics and these were basically like

[00:08:18] a room of 15 people who all wanted to just perform I think video culture around that same time it just started and I think every art form basically works on trying to find a connection just say we have to connect with the audience in theatre in comedy it's about connecting with humour and trying to you know talk about something a shared experience similarly I think in poetry spoken word it's about connecting with the audience over an emotion so I think when people talk about one

[00:08:48] of the things that I think Hussain Hedri spoke very strongly about identity that connected with a lot of people Aranya spoke about being a woman Brown girls Brown girls brilliant piece so that every person found their own space and they were just saying things that they felt and somehow that made a connection with a larger audience so I think 2017 I think the market started booming we started doing college shows and I think

[00:09:17] this was before the social media boom this was still very this was all YouTube like 2017 is when I did a piece that also went viral but they were already viral by the time this was 2017 yeah I remember clearly In 2017 my first Kavita which was online which we just put out there not thinking what's going on but that went around 12-13 million around that time and after that college shows started happening so I think a lot of it translated

[00:09:47] to word of mouth like I think majority for any art form to work is that until you consume it on YouTube or Instagram it has that effect that it looks good but it's when you come to witness it that's when the conversion starts happening that's when you realize that this is a longer format that's going to work for the people so I think 2017 I think I have said that there were small rooms 15 people who wanted to hear and by the end of 2017 we were in rooms

[00:10:16] where there were approximately 500-800 people I think spoken first happened in 2017 so there were 10,000 people coming out there just to listen I think that's where the main conversion started happening for the audience also and for artists also that our art form is replicated in live shows and since both of you did speak about your first experience at this when you wrote these pieces did you write them with the intention

[00:10:46] of recitation? so yes so stage poetry is very different from page poetry I firmly do believe that because I have written both and I have done both page poetry you write a poem which is what we have studied in school right? if you have read Wordsworth, Shelley, Byron or you have read Hindi literature Nirala Harivange Rai Bachchan they are writing and we are writing and we are writing and we are writing so there is always a cadence to it there is a beat to it

[00:11:16] in my mind the beat comes first and I will write a word and I will write a word and I will write a word and I will write a word and there is this joke running in our community as well how I once told Amandeep that we should write a poem together and he got a voice note from me where I told him that the poem will be called Prem Kaise Hota Hai and it goes like Prem Kaise Hota Hai ta ta ta ta ta ta and I sent him like a three and a half minute voice note we are just doing ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta so yeah that's how I do it

[00:11:45] so when you were putting that piece down you knew it was something that you would perform yes because I was writing it to a beat I was writing it for it to be performed and spoken word poetry in nature when it started off in New York and you know button poetry and as a performance art form it was meant to be written it was meant to be performed you know your pauses like if you see Maya Angelou reading Still I Rise you will see how she would read it you know there are videos of her performing the piece

[00:12:13] and when you are reading the piece it reads different but when she performs it it reads different so yeah and also I will just add to that that you know there are two other reasons for it being so successful one is see it is bite sized right and there are 15 people performing 3-3 minute pieces in one hour you are getting such wide variety one doesn't like the other one will come 100% right and often I am telling you the way we used to curate because we all would be in the same places we have 2-3 open mic open mic is a big culture now open mic is a culture

[00:12:43] everybody is like I will get to perform but you are keeping for aces with you Yaya is there I remember at that time you know all these people would be around so 2-3 people have performed 2-3 minutes and 10 minutes has gone average so throw in an ace right now this person will go oh wow it's picked up again so you are building a live performance meter and someone is curating that yes right so there has to be a curator at the same time you know the person has to be around storytelling started because I felt that people don't have a lot of

[00:13:13] no way or format 2016 and again I go back to Airplane Poetry because they did a national slam for which they were able I don't know how to get Sarah K Sarah K was the first big young name Wow along with her brother who came to Bombay and multiple cities Wow I never knew that yeah and she has a big India connection she was born here or something from what I remember because she did a poem called India you know and it was happening at my son's school at Oberoi because they had come and done it

[00:13:43] and you know I just turned and I had one question I said how do you teach the love of words to a generation for whom everything is awesome hmm right that means so she was like you know just just perform she said just perform they'll fall in love and that was true you know that's it it begins when everyone makes that effort Yaya has gone with me to promote spoken fest we went to the canteen Sophia College yeah no one's interest in Sophia's canteen no one's interest no one's interest

[00:14:12] you have a good looking boy let's go ahead we have him ahead and sit on the table suddenly there was a crowd so you must have that it's the fringe when you go to the fringe right the joy for me is not the performances the joy for me is people selling their performances you know when people stand there on the road and give you posters and flyers and that effort they put in that effort today in building the surround performance is one thing

[00:14:42] on the four sides there's a discussion on the backstage about Instagram YouTube what's going on what's going on you have to keep as much of a it's and today in fact only Priya put out one thing saying what time came out that there's a hook or a virality there was a beautiful thing she wrote today which all of us responded to saying that yeah I mean are we performative or are we just doing are we putting our best work forward but that's the thing

[00:15:10] when we started spoken word like I remember when I wrote my first few poems these were things that I felt so strongly about right like that break up it had shattered me to bits I was angry and I wanted to express myself boom comes the poem right the second poem of mine that went viral was called women's rights to pleasure right because I that was a topic that I felt so strongly about you know women's rights to their bodily autonomy then I fell in love you know I met the love of my life

[00:15:40] he was very old school then I was in 2019 I was in 1999 so where and where the Kavitian came either on Instagram or on YouTube they were connected to my life where is that reason right and I'm questioning myself right

[00:16:21] and I'm questioning myself it was very different for our producers to see that art will be consumed where we were putting out our pieces and it was very comfortable for us because people wanted to take those long format videos right they wanted to consume poetry that way right now when things have shifted on Instagram when it's become about a 3 second hook even we've started questioning how art is now how are they consuming so I think it always happens when the mode of consumption changes

[00:16:51] the people who are on on the previous way of how they were selling it before they also have like a that I will do now because you start questioning that I will have to rethink how I am working how I am writing my emotions and I think that becomes a little tricky space when you're talking about spoken word because it's essentially just writing your heart out right so when you write your heart you don't think about it but what do you think about it you don't think about it which one of the things you use but now

[00:17:21] you have to think about it which is not wrong you are still putting out your art it's a new way of consumption for the generation so yeah it's a very internal conflict where we are going to lose and we will win and we will win and we will understand that this is true and we will say what is the generation of the generation but it is there he is saying what is the generation of the generation yes yes yes right now it is more time for the generation for the generation for the generation for the generation

[00:17:50] for the generation correct correct he is the generation you know and people that's why they are modifying it to what their audience is that you have three minute piece he is these are the themes that are working and there will always be someone who will be a contrarian in the room who will be very different or whatever

[00:18:19] and will possibly get people's attention But over a period of time, there is a need for the art form to, obviously I guess a lot of it is just to evolve. I mean there's a lot of introspection which everyone is going through. We don't think that trend is going to be a trend and we get frustrated. That starts dictating what you are doing. Exactly. But it's such a flavor of the month. Exactly. It's also not something that you can actually build on I suppose because and I think everyone is facing that.

[00:18:46] I think just all kinds of content is facing you know that kind of situation. So, but Dorsham what I wanted to ask was that the first time that your foray into the you know where you kind of did a fairly personal piece out there. That was more storytelling than poetry. Yeah. And is that something you had written? Yeah. I think the first piece that I did which is called All You Sleep Tonight was a piece that actually came from it.

[00:19:13] And we at AMAD got about 15 people to just come and said it's going to be an evening of storytelling. Right. If you want to tell a poem you can. Right. So, one person out of the 15 actually did a poem everybody else did a story. Right. And that had Gaurav Kapoor, Ankur Tiwari, Dhu Dukuna, Tess Joseph, all of these people who came. And I had this and it was not a pre-written piece. So, the first time I performed it it was purely instinctive. But… You made it up on the fly. No, like I knew the story.

[00:20:11] Right. Obviously, stand up is something else altogether. That's comedy. Yeah. It's because… It has nothing to do with poetry. But… No, as in but is spoken word only to do with poetry? Can I answer this question? Please. Yes. So, stand up is… Sometimes I have seen people using the word stand up poetry and it irks me so much because it doesn't exist. So, there are three types of things in my opinion. One is slam poetry. A lot of people also confuse slam poetry with spoken word poetry. Okay.

[00:20:41] A slam is nothing but a poetry competition. Right? Where people are given a stipulated time. I started as a slam performer. I participated in the competition. Everyone gave me half a minute. It's a hour and it's a hour. It's 4 people giving you marks. That's a slam culture. Right? When you're not performing a performance poem in a slam setting, that's when it is… spoken word. Spoken word doesn't have to follow a meter. Right.

[00:21:07] Spoken word also, as Roshan rightly said, is a slightly looser term. Spoken word is not necessary to write on the air. Absolutely. Spoken word can be a, what we call Urdu, it's a nasseri nazm. Aazad nazm is a different thing. Aazad nazm has also been rules. We do what we do in a nasseri nazm. Where we are taking the liberty of no rhyme, no meter, more confessional, more like a passionate monologue which has been woven into a structure. That's what happens. Then there is normal poetry. The poetry that is written, which comes in the book.

[00:21:38] These are three things. So there is poetry, there is spoken word and then there is a competition of spoken word which is called a slam poem. And then of course there is story telling which is a different genre altogether. Right. Now one thing that I think is common perhaps across spoken word as we are saying it is that it comes from fairly personal spaces. It has to come from personal spaces.

[00:22:03] So one thing that I've always wondered is that do you be yourself or are you finding yourself playing someone? If I may. Yes. So I have also written a small piece that a lot of times what happens is that you as a person are playing three characters at the same time. Right. One is the human who goes through life, experiences it and you go through your struggles, you go through your victories.

[00:22:31] Then there is the writer behind who is writing, who is jotting this down. He is saying that this struggle is fun. It is a struggle. It will be a struggle in this story. And then there is this performer who is saying that I have a script. So by the time I reach the stage, the human has lived all his experiences and has now moved on. The writer has written the script and is happy and now it's time for the performer to be happy. My process is different. I think when I started spoken word, I was looking for a release.

[00:22:59] You know, I wanted to get on stage and perform. I was actually trying to find myself as cliche as it sounds. I think I spent my entire twenties searching for my purpose. And the only place I found it was at the age of almost 30, which is when you know, I got divorced. I moved back to India and I picked up a spoken word. I have been writing since I was 12. But I was writing page poetry as a child. I performed other poems in other poems and in other elocutions and debates.

[00:23:26] I was performing on stage, but I didn't perform at the same time. It was at that first event with Commune where I did a poem called Where Are You Really From? Yeah, beautiful. And it was all about racism and identity. Because that time I was living in my life. That was the fight I was fighting in Australia. Where are you really from? What's your name again? You know, all that jazz that happens when you go abroad.

[00:23:52] So, Merileth has always been a very personal journey, which became public. And I'm very grateful for that. You also acted in the past. So, there is that life that happened before this. Yeah. So, do you find yourself say even in Indra Danush? Are you being you or is there a theatricality and a performative nature to it? So, the first thing that I did was I wanted to see can I discover a genre? Because that was exciting. So, I call it a live memory broadcast. I don't call it stand-up. Yes, I have seen that. I don't call it storytelling. I don't call it poetry.

[00:24:22] None of those. Because my idea is that when things come from memory, it will not be the same. Like my light and sound guy are shitting bricks. Because I'm going to go where? I know it will come back. I said I will come back. Don't take attention. So, obviously there's a lot of evolution. You see that the audience is younger. Okay, I'll extend the bit about college. I know where I'm beginning. I know where I'm ending. And I'm actually treating it more like a deck of cards. One thing I wanted to ask which is I mean an expected question but also about how you all deal with it.

[00:24:51] Particularly because you all are putting yourselves out there and it's so personal. And now with social media in particular which is an important and necessary tool, it's also so public. Now I understand that one downside of social media is this that it might be dictating how you do your work which is where you've got to maintain your own honesty. But in terms of the vulnerability of it, where you're putting yourself out there to exposing yourself in a sense. So what is the, is there a downside of that?

[00:25:20] Is there, is there, how do you cope with the, you know, the shit that comes your way? Because I'm sure there is. Yeah, can I go on this, there's a very funny incident for this. So I did a story that has like two minutes of me talking about my mental health. Right. And that's vulnerable, that's honest. I put it out there. And I made peace with it. I don't have to worry about that. It went out, it really worked well. Now this was a YouTube video which is like 13 minutes. So now it's got to cut the reels.

[00:25:50] So my team came to say that we're putting mental health. And I said, we're putting it on the right side. I said, we're putting it on the right side. So, I'm thinking about how to do it on Instagram version. So that reel starts like this and then I got an anxiety attack. I put it on the right side. And I also want to laugh at that. Because if I see a reel suddenly popping up and I got an anxiety attack. I will laugh at that. I will laugh at that. But people will reach out to me saying that I exactly feel the same thing.

[00:26:19] And suddenly I feel guilty about laughing on my own piece. I'm like, no, no, people are connecting. So I think I have not received hate from people. I have touched wood, received love and in abundance. You are not afraid to tackle uncomfortable. I have done Big Boss and Big Brother. That's as vulnerable as you can get. 24-7. So my vulnerability was there. People had seen me in every state and form.

[00:26:46] But people have seen me so much on Big Boss that I remember when my first few poems went out on YouTube. I used to go back and read all the comments. I still do. And there used to be comments that are, I was like, no, this is the same thing. I have seen it. We have seen it. We are only watching it. Now you will hear all my poems in the 45 minutes. I was also really fighting with the reality TV image. Because reality TV also comes with a lot of weight that I had on my shoulders of not just one Big Boss,

[00:27:15] two, big brother and big boss. And for the first few years, I had to really shake off that image. Because at that time people knew me for who I was. And I was like, oh, I have seen it. It was very good. To go from there to now people meeting me, you know, that is the Kavita and then they recite it in front of me. That was very necessary for me. And it took me years. It took me years. And it took me a lot of social media to change that perception and to change that image.

[00:27:45] That yes, I know I did reality TV, but hey, I do write and I do perform. So that was a vulnerability. And it took me a lot of hate from there. And obviously on my feminist pieces, people are like, you know, not all men. There were effigies of me which were actually burnt. Why did you take the spoken word in Rekhta? But I think the most beautiful part was that Rekhta invited me not once but twice. And they said that next year, what happened?

[00:28:11] So when the platform is standing with you and your lovers are standing with you along with like a small section of haters, then you can handle being vulnerable. I remember being scared on Rekhta stage because there was so much vitriol online, which was also translating offline. But at the same time, I felt strong enough to go back on that stage and give it back.

[00:28:32] What about you, what have you experienced in this sense? And also, do you find it then necessary to kind of prepare budding artists for this? So, you know, honestly, personally, it doesn't happen to me because I am now really looked on. It's a tough one, let me leave it. But I'm a performer, I'm not a little online. And also I do so many things, I confuse the hell out of people.

[00:29:02] I'm getting a brand reel, I'm writing about my mom. But I'm a human being. I'm saying, I'm not just a brand reels. I'm not just a brand storyteller. I also write a little bit of poetry. I also write some stories. I'll do this. So, I'll do this. So, I'll do it. My audience knows that they're different from each other. So, I personally love the fact that that audience interacts with me on all of those things, certain sections of them. So, that happens.

[00:29:26] As representative of Commune and because there's Tess also who's like the co-founder of the festival, we do need to prepare people. Right. Because sometimes you even have to tell them that this is what you do. So, I think that sometimes you're responsible and I think I'm at that stage. So, I'm happy to do that. I often do that and not just me, everyone at Commune tries to do that. Because I think we are there to help build community. That's it. This Abba Monika is really working. Oh, good lord. It doesn't end.

[00:29:55] You're diving into it in a big way. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Please trust me. I just wanted to actually speak to the two of you a little bit about process. In terms of when you are coming up with something new to write. Like how does it go for you? Is it like a topic that, okay I'm feeling very strongly about this? Like you mentioned then sometimes like the meter is first for you. You know, what about you? Like how do you go about building a piece? So, when I say the meter is first there's always a tag line though. Like how do you go about the time?

[00:30:24] I knew that the poem is going to be about how do you go about it. And then the meter will come. Same happened with me with, I am looking at 1990. It was actually an Instagram caption. I have put a piece of cake on steel, put a piece of cake on the paper, put a piece of cake on the paper,

[00:30:42] and put a piece of cake on the paper. And then the responses I thought, this is something I feel about so strongly. Maybe I can develop this into a poem. Or many other things. So, this is one way. The second way is always to keep my beat. The other way is always to keep one thing in mind. And then the poem is always to keep my beat. Like even some of my English pieces. Like I am not a cool girlfriend.

[00:31:10] It was something I used to say to my husband, who at that time used to be my boyfriend. He was like, you are so uncool. I was like, yeah, I am not a cool girlfriend. That became a poem, right? There is this poem called, We are the difficult women. And I have often spoken about it because growing up, we would try to express ourselves. So, a lot of my poems, A, are very much related to what I have gone through personally, especially the best ones. B, there will be a thought in my head or a tagline in my head.

[00:31:40] And then I will develop it further. How it comes to me is a different process altogether. I wait for it to come to me. I think very similar, just like Priya said, the process is that we know we are the medium of the story, not the creator. It sort of also keeps you humble in a way. But, I always look at the end. Because I feel like I have a lot of stories to say, a lot of experiences have happened. But, why am I saying this to the audience? So, I think,

[00:32:10] I wait for the end. The take back for the audience. Or the take back even for me. Because this whole story has been told, but what will happen in the end? So, I think I wait for the end. And then I backtrack to how to begin with it. So, it's majorly this to the story. And I think Kavita, I think Kavita is like, that when the first two verses come, then you can write your own. Like in one sitting, I will complete the poem. And I don't even think about, what is going on.

[00:32:39] I don't question my writing. I think that is a big important rule for me, that I never question my writing. I get surprised by it. I enjoy it. You never get upset by it? Sometimes. And then I just delete it. And like, I don't know if anyone wants to know. But, yeah, majorly, I am surprised. Because when you write something good, you will also be like, I thought, I have thought. But then, again, I have said, you are the medium. So, the medium is always astonished by what comes to it.

[00:33:09] So, I enjoy what I am writing sometimes. And I will be like, lovely. But, I will never question it. I will never stop. Like, you are talking about it. Why are you talking about it? Don't ask. Let's finish it. When the story is finished, then, sit and talk about it. You have said, this is what happened. But, don't stop the process of writing. Because, the thought cut down. Just because you have stopped to question something. In this,

[00:33:37] in the process of community building, which is obviously happening quite successfully, and it's getting so popular, and poets to whom poems come. How do you manage quality control? So, we built a process. So, first thing which we do is that we organize x number of workshops through the year for people to be able to interact with who we believe. So, I believe that there is a Maslow's hierarchy of creativity as well. Right? So, the food consumption is the food consumption.

[00:34:06] If you look on Instagram or YouTube, it's the food consumption. After that, the layer comes from, which is the layer which is about friends and family, which is community. Right? If you get a food consumption, then, you find friends and support to that degree. Then, you are turning and saying, how do I learn more and how do I earn? So, learn and earn becomes. So, learn and earn is something we have really focused on. And, so, since you are also, I am assuming that you are creating so many, you are consuming so many,

[00:34:38] you are keeping an eye on the stuff that is happening around you in terms of what other people are doing. And, and I think that, of course, it's all coming from the human condition and personal experience. How do you, how do you manage to stay original and unaffected? Or, is that not something you need to worry about? Like, can you imbibe stuff easily from people that you are inspired by? Or, is there a constant struggle to remain like your own unique voice? Um,

[00:35:08] a lot of people sometimes ask me, what is the best way to relieve a writer's block? And, this is my best way to relieve a writer's block. I, uh, go online or offline and I consume what other people are doing. And, I don't only restrict it to spoken word. But, that's my process. Because, when I see what other people are doing,

[00:35:38] and when you consume really good content, um, it makes you want to write more. Um, I don't even worry about this thing that, I don't want to make it sound like that. Yeah, that's what I was asking. Because, I feel like I do have my own unique voice. And, over the years, I think I have, uh, also adhered very strongly to who I am and what I love to write about. So, that has never really fazed me. But, I really do enjoy watching other people's, uh, work as well. in all forms of art. For me, it's not just spoken word and storytelling. Um, it's every,

[00:36:08] everything that moves me. I think, uh, I think, my consumption pattern is tube. Try to consume through books, through theater, through music. And, spoken word, Obviously. But, I quite quickly realized that, the original story was told. That's it. So, everybody is just, replicating the same emotion. in their own experience, in their own style. So, that cannot be copied. because, if I say that,

[00:36:37] maybe anyone else can say it. I have said that I will not say that in Prem but in the same way, they will not say that. And do both of you also find a lot of mimics? Yeah, there are people who have performed our poems and also they tag us like a lot of college students. I recently had a beautiful moment in fact. My show was called NCPA called Ishq Hai. In the show you know how you meet your audiences and there is a school teacher who came to me.

[00:37:04] She was from Balaji International School in Mumbai and she said I have to show you something. And she took out her phone and she showed me a girl from grade 6 at her annual function on stage performing my poem. There is this piece that I have written called Tum Mumbai Ho. And I think that is the most successful I have ever felt in my life. I don't think any Canada tour, UK tour, Badi Brand Deal. I don't think much it was successful because I could see the 12 year old Priya who had sung the other poets' poems in school.

[00:37:34] And it took me a while to digest it and I asked her can you send this video to me and we exchanged numbers and she shared it with me. So when you talk about mimicry I think with me it has been such a positive thing to see that. And I think that in truth I think that we are doing something. One is the one and the other is that people are writing their own versions. You know, I am also in 1999 and they have put their own metaphors. That is also good to see that. I mean imitation is the best form of flattery there is.

[00:38:04] What is the snapping fingers thing? Why don't you let people clap? Look, all communities are built around ritual. True. So the ritual of spoken word is snapping. Why? Because if in the middle of a poem you clap and the person is in their rhythm and the other line is saying, You have appreciated it from snap but you have not interrupted. It is appreciation without interruption. While a clap becomes an interruption.

[00:38:34] So you have to stop. You can all snap. This is something you came up with? Or is this… It was a spoken word ritual which you would read about and whatever. The other thing is it sounds like falling rain. Which is the best time to listen to… Look at that. I just wanted you all to talk a little bit about your theatre experiences. Not necessarily in detail of the experiences per se. But the key differences in terms of the way that you approach it.

[00:39:03] The audiences. And if there were any takeaways from your theatre work because I am assuming yours was after. Yours was before or after? In between. So what do you take from one to the other if at all? So a little bit of that. So 2016, 2017 I hardly had any work. And this actor friend of mine reached out to me saying, you know, we are doing a play. There are five women in the play. The play is called Selfie.

[00:39:32] And Tanaz Irani was directing it. And a lot of seasoned actors were in it. Like Kishwar Merchant was in it. Shweta Gulati. Dimple Vichare. These were all people who have been on stage. TV, films. They have done everything. But we can't find this actor for this character called Sonia Kapoor. And you walk, talk and look like Sonia Kapoor. You want to come audition? I was like, I don't have anything else going on. Let me just go audition. And I went and I auditioned. And I was terrible at it. But then Tanaz looked at me. She was like, I think I can groom you. And I was like, okay done.

[00:40:02] 45 days, for Rose, 10 hours, we practiced that play in Varsova. And I was the worst actress out of all of them. I was able to listen to everyone. You know, everyone came and gave me tips. There was just, I just felt that I had spoken in the house. I was like, I'm a man. And the play was going to open at Bhai Das Auditorium. And there were big producers behind it. Ideas Entertainment's play was Paritosz Painter. And they do very mainstream plays. There are many plays. But there were 500-600 people.

[00:40:32] And then there was this monologue that my character had. And I never did that monologue in rehearsal. At all. But that day on stage, I don't know what came into me. I went on stage. I killed it with that monologue. And I got an applause. And everyone stopped. And they all, all these girls, these other four men looked at me. And they were like, you know, you did it. And I think that's the day I first understood the power of theatre.

[00:41:01] Also, I learned a lot of tricks of the trade. You know, like blocking and you know, like how lighting works, how music works. And how to throw my voice, projection. So I was groomed into theatre. And then our play performed Pan India. We took the play to US. So the play opened up a lot of doors for me. And I feel bad that the play is not on anymore. Because it taught me so much. And it was amazing. It was crazy good. So all those 45 days of 10 hours a day. I remember I used to take a shared Uber.

[00:41:30] That's why I think shared Uber is also. Just to get to Verso of everyday. Because I didn't want to spend money in getting like a proper Uber or an auto. And you know, all of that. But it was all worth it, dude. Like it was, and we made money out of it as well. Like it's not that we live in theatre, so we made a decent amount of money out of it. But it ended up being a great decision. I still have the dress for Sonia Kapoor. I no longer fit into it anymore. Wonderful words, you know, made money of theatre. I'm still trying to figure that out.

[00:42:01] And did you find yourself using stuff like that when you went back to doing your spoken word? So spoken word has a very large component of theatre. Absolutely. You can write an average poem. And perform it. And perform it really well. And that poem will do well. On the other hand, vice versa, you can write the best poem and not perform it well. And that poem will not do well. In fact, the best spoken word poetry, and I say this with a pinch of salt because we've all had that.

[00:42:27] Some of our most popular poems and for all of our contemporaries are teet-ta poems. They're good enough. They're not brilliant, but they've been performed very well. And on the other hand, some of our best written poems have not done very well online. So I think spoken word, I always say 60% performance and 40% writing. As much as I hate to admit, it's true. I am what I am because of theatre. I got on stage. My favourite line whenever I go anywhere is, I got on stage when I was 4 years old and never got off.

[00:42:57] It's been that. I mean, I mean, in my age of four years, I had a little stage with three people with a little slurikwi type. I mean, actually, it was a skit. But it was slurikwi because the other two people forgot their line. They all came. They came up very quickly. They came up very quickly. They came up very quickly. They came up very quickly. They came up very quickly. They came up very quickly. So that was the start of the stage door. When I came to Bombay, I initially produced something with Firoz bhai. So I told them to do theatre.

[00:43:27] I said, don't do it. You know, Firoz bhai said, don't do it. And I said, okay, it's too tough. You have to do events, do it. I said, okay. I continued to do events. But when I was doing Aladdin, it was just that they had called me to audition for Jasmine's father. Okay. I said, yeah, this is something very cute. But it's not a good thing. But it's not a good thing. When Jafar gave it, I said, this is a good thing. So it was so tempting that I did it.

[00:43:57] And yes, I was doing that. And I said, it's a good thing. I said, it's 10 minutes. Backstage, I'm doing a client presentation. You know, and then we will do this. You have the profile of a prince. You know, something else is happening. So, you know. So, theatre is the only, somebody said this. That theatre is the only medium that is purely an actor. The director can tell you anything, Agarsh. You can do that in that moment. You can do that in the end of the day. You can do that in the end of the day. You can do that in the end of the day. You can do that in the night. But that moment is my hand. This sounds like a threat.

[00:44:27] No, no. I'm not saying it. I'm going to try it on the 10-tariq play. When an actor told me, I would say that I would do this scene. That's great. I enjoyed the fact that you could own that moment. I think for me, the biggest change was that after doing this whole mono act of Spokenwood, like for 60-90 minutes that we go on stage, right?

[00:44:54] Which is just you talking, taking your own pauses, your own sweet time with your material, right? When you go back to theatre and you start interacting with people, you know you don't have your leisure time. Because theatre literally works on that, okay, okay, it's done. I've started. So, I think going back on that… You think about me. You know this thing. That was one. And I think the energy.

[00:45:21] Because again, in spoken word, you don't have to be upbeat with energy. Right? You're going with the flow because majority of it talks about emotions, right? So, you don't want to talk about emotion with so much that, you're going to say, I think I've got a break up, it's fun. You have to… Unless it comes. Yes, until unless it comes. If it comes, it's fun. That's the first stuff of the story. But, so I think bringing the energy back to the room was one thing.

[00:45:49] And I think in that case, I will 110% give you so much credit. Because you made that whole process so much easier for me when we were doing Smile Please. You didn't say that you didn't even say that you were able to take energy or you were wrong. You're like, you do what you're doing. Then I will tell you how wrong you were. How lovely. It was so beautiful. 60 minutes of doing the play. Just seeing sir, you're going to be right. And then, you're doing everything better. But better do it, right?

[00:46:18] But I think that's what was fun. Wow, this is new for me. I think that was fun. If there was one piece of advice that you do give to budding spoken word artists, what would it be? And so that maybe they can keep that in mind when they come up. And see if they can quickly incorporate it. But, so yeah, so anyone, you from the top.

[00:46:45] No, I would just say that if it's about performance when you're coming up on stage, find somebody in the audience who's a friend and focus on them. You know, people sometimes start looking everywhere. Right? I found that it is a lot. It's better to try and find a person to talk to. Audience hai, ek-dwo bar karo. But when people shift a lot, you forget that you're getting in camera, it's a lot of shifty. So it's a small thing that fix your eyes at one place. Talk to one person.

[00:47:15] You know, because ultimately, in a camera which will cut a reel out of it, you will talk to one person. So that's one small thing I say. The second thing is that this is beyond the performance. Keep doing it. Only write about things that you honestly feel about. I think especially for spoken word, that is a very very important piece to remember. Don't write because something is in trend, because there is a topic in the news. If you really feel about that topic, write about it. So your the most important thing is your inaam in this profession.

[00:47:45] One important thing, stage performance, I've realized, don't directly start with your piece. Take a minute, adjust with the stage, adjust with the audience. Think of an anecdote, think of a joke. Baat kero pehle. Just catch the audience and talk to them. And the person who laughs the loudest on your joke, that's your main person. I'm going to take this chit pick up. If you have something wrong with this advice, if you have written something from a woman, then you'll disqualify yourself. We'll take one chit.

[00:48:17] We'll go with you. You'll have to read out the name once you… Tejinder Kaur. Tejinder Kaur. Tejinder Kaur. Here, here, here. Do you have to do this? Or do you have to do this? Now do you have to do this? Now do you have to do this? Yes. Why do you have to say this? I'm going to take a mic to the top of the top. You have to get a mic to the top of the top. You have to get a mic to the top of the top. And the Ghabraamat is a very supportive community. I've read about my mom's first time,

[00:48:44] that when we love someone, we see the love of someone. So, this is also written for mom's first time. And I thought that it's love. So, this is like,

[00:49:16] It's a good start. Also, you are allowed to hold the mic yourself as well. I feel the pressure. Ashish Manchandha. So this is a series that I write.

[00:49:46] Mostly poems start with a string of memories. I will just start. I remember, Anand Kaal's 20 minutes after, the last time was the one that was the one that was. When I was in the vision of Vishnu's head, you made a world in your mind. Where you are making a fire, where you are making a fire, where you are making a fire, where you are burning from the trees, and you are always burning from the trees,

[00:50:14] and you are always burning from the trees. Thank you. Thank you.

[00:50:43] Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.

[00:51:13] Thank you. Wow. Wow. Wow. Wow.

[00:51:48] Wow. Beautiful. Three people laugh in the last half. That's a big deal. Sidhanth. No, Sidhanth Savant. Savant, Savant. Peace is a little sensitive, so trigger warning. I was going to do a love piece, but then PMM said that this is what I write, this is what I love to write. Is your voice coming?

[00:52:18] Yes, I am right. Okay. So, I am going to do the love piece, I will do the love piece, I will do the love piece. I will bring water up my heart. I will bring water up my heart, but there will be the water, but there will be the water, which will flow with the water, which will be enough. I will show you with my heart and will be able to breathe water in my heart. I will be able to bring my heart to my heart. I have a confusion in my head.

[00:52:47] I am saying this, that I will only tell you this. I have thought of my heart to drink water. I have thought of my heart to drink water. I have thought of your mind and of that. I will tell you that the heart changes. It is like a heart to drink water. Thank you.

[00:53:40] Thank you. Thank you.

[00:54:35] Thank you. Thank you.

[00:55:05] Thank you. Thank you.

[00:55:56] Thank you. Thank you. Wow. Wow. Wow.

[00:56:24] Sorry, just saying, one of Amman's very loving line is, I am in the door and I am in the door. And I think that's so beautiful. Absolutely. I am in the theater. Because I have to plug the theater. What was the last play you really enjoyed? Old World, Nasiruddin sir and Ratna ji. I just recently watched it last week and I loved it.

[00:56:52] I actually watched a bunch of things which I really really enjoyed. Some outside. So, I saw the MJ the Musical which I just thought was phenomenally performed. I also saw Hades town which was completely the opposite because it was jazz and it was a very small theater. But I mean to use that beautiful story from Greek mythology and convert it. Absolutely incredible.

[00:57:21] Then I saw something around the retelling of Sita and multiple other stories at Prithvi. I am just trying to remember the name and in fact I will... Two girls? Two girls. Glitch in the myth. Glitch in the myth. Glitch in the myth. I enjoyed Glitch in the myth. Tremendous. Tremendous. I think recently when I was in the UK, I saw The Lion King. I watched it and I think I constantly come and watch your other productions.

[00:57:51] So, those are very beautiful. I don't remember the name of it. Spoken word, I know that there are a lot of people who go up there and are doing it in front of an audience at large for maybe the first time or at least the format for the first time. Someone who hasn't done it yet but you would love to see doing spoken word. Boman has still owes me one more favour because he was meant to perform his poetry and he has written some wonderful poetry but he is like, No, no, people will think that I am trying to be...

[00:58:20] I mean, he is just such a wonderful human being. But I want him to actually perform his poetry because he has performed it for me at an event where you were doing something backstage and I think he is very, very good. To some degree, I think he has a lot to still tell that way. I have two names. One is Shabana ji. I did a short film with her a couple of years ago and she is such a wonderful performer and a great theatre actor. So, I think it would be so good to see her on the spoken stage, sir. Shabana ji for next year. Uchai.

[00:58:51] I am sure. And another person, I think Sameh Reina. You know after, no, I really mean it. I don't know if you know but Sameh actually writes poetry. And we recently met at an event and had this conversation. So, I would love to see that side of him too. Wonderful. Because he is a wonderful performer. So, I want to see that side of Sameh. You are using this section for recruitment. Sameh, I am going to come as a creative writer. I am going to ask Priya. I will ask Priya from you.

[00:59:18] I think one interesting person for me would be Manav Kaul. Because I have seen, I have read a lot of his work and there is a little poetic touch to it. So, listening to him in that capacity would be great. I think there is also this one poet, who would not perform much but would be great to see him again. Ramneek Singh. He has got some beautiful pieces out there. Which is like 5 years ago. But amazing work. And if you haven't seen Ramneek's work, you must check it out on YouTube.

[00:59:48] He is one of the best writers in our scene. None of us write as beautifully as Ramneek. He has pieces called Chitia. He has a piece called Paji. In fact, this morning I spoke about him in a podcast. Because it is very, sorry I am taking more time, but it hurts when people who write so well disappear from our scene. Because of social media and YouTube and all these other pressures of life. So, yeah. Great name to think of. The last question, I am asking you a little bit more.

[01:00:19] But it would be wonderful if you could recite something that is unreleased, unperformed, work in progress, underperformed, not very well known. Can be something that you are jamming with, something that you haven't done enough, something from your book. Yaya has written a book by the way. Yaya is now a published author. It is a very small tale. You have just thought that the work has been gone. Spoken people have to be reading.

[01:00:48] I think in the book, the book is basically short stories. So, there is a piece of love letters between two people through years of time. So, we have done well with dialogue. So, there is a piece of dialogue that is written in the book. I think that it is written in the book. I am a poet. I am a poet. I have realized that the mountains are big.

[01:01:13] So, when I was taking your name, the mountains are singing your name. People say that the mountains are singing the mountains. Wow! Wow!

[01:01:42] I will write your name and my name in the night. It's also a happy place. If you don't have a face, it's just names. It's a very big one. That's a very big one. A very deep romantic. I'll listen to you something I remember. My mom will be very happy. I was in class 7th, I was 12 years old. I was in 7th A, 7th B. You know that love assembly line.

[01:02:14] I was in a very angry. I was in my diary, I was in the diary, and I was in the diary. Since that day, my mom always had this grudge with me, why did she write a poem for me? So years after, when my mother had a pancreatitis attack, and she was in the ICU, I remember I had gone to Dehradun. I'm from Dehradun. And in the hospital waiting room, I realized that that day might not come when my mother can hear a poem from me. And that's when I had written this poem. It's called, Kuch Nahi.

[01:02:44] I went to school, I was throwing bags, and asked me to ask me, What is the name of the food? And you took a plate on steel, and took a piece of bread, and took a piece of bread, and took a piece of bread, and took a piece of bread. And I looked and thought, and took a piece of bread, and took a piece of bread, and took a piece of bread,

[01:03:10] and took a piece of bread, that I have been looking for bread for me. And myself, from a giant in my school, I am going to say, I am not sure I am thinking this way. What is the thing? What do I have to say, when I have a good idea, when I have something else, when I have something else,

[01:03:42] So thank you mom. And now my mother is happy. Now she's like, let's go. My disease has been so much. I'm listening to you and listening to you. I'm talking about the show in the beginning and talking about the lakhan. I'm talking about the lakhan. I'm talking about the manta-pida. I'm talking about the abba. So I'm saying something.

[01:04:11] Papa, 35 years old, like a paper, neat, like a paper. A paper, two paper, three bushers, one suit, a paper, a paper, his hands were always clean. He smelled of naisil powder and books. We all had a nice little and the lakhan came to me. It was warm. It was warm. The lakhan's blood. The lakhan's blood. The lakhan's blood. He was released in the suit two times.

[01:04:41] Press, crisp, the declaration of if we are not anything, then what? We are nothing. Papa never raised his voice, ever. He made his feelings known through very precise silence. If you did something wrong, he would simply stop. Quietly become absent by physically being present. This was more terrifying than any shouting. My mother on the other hand, superwoman.

[01:05:06] Like we all have a secretary by day, mother of two by evening, wife and cook and accountant, an emotional anchor by night, cotton salwar kameez or her favourite sari. Muslim people didn't wear us, but we were the Muslim. Our house of force, our ma, leading operation, every thing in our life, except for our love. Papa, the sun is like, when we say, when we say, when we say, when we say, Mommy, the sun is like, always there.

[01:05:36] Sometimes, sometimes, sometimes, sometimes, sometimes, sometimes, sometimes, sometimes, warm. End of the day, there was a little bit of a story.

[01:06:14] Thank you. Thank you so much for your time. This has been absolutely wonderful and very enlightening for me. And yes, thank you so much. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you for having me. Thank you all for being here. Thank you.