Literary Event: Poetry Out Loud

Because I have a personal preference for prose, I have a tendency to go to readings of those who write prose, specific fiction. In fact, something I realized when I was at this event is that “Poetry Out Loud” was the first poetry reading I have attended during my time at Stanford even though I have been to more readings than I can count. It was a bit different than I expected but proved to be very dynamic nonetheless.

Perhaps my favorite aspect of this competition was how diverse all the different readings were. “The Walrus and the Carpenter” for example was read very playfully, as expected, but the student brought into the piece a different, humorous voice for each one of the characters in the poem. It was impressive to hear all of these distinct parts be imagined, breathing new life into this poem which is already pretty humorous and entertaining in itself. I felt as though children could have sat there and listened and, although they may have not understood each word, they would have enjoyed the story immensely.

There was one spoken-word piece of the night titled 'Beethoven.' I realized, upon completion of the competition but, before the announcement of the winners, that I am clearly biased toward the genre. Although the actual piece was not as strong because it is not a poetry classic, wholeheartedly enjoyed how dynamic the reader’s performance of the piece was. However, speaking with others about the aims of the competition made it clear how out-of-place this piece sort of stood when compared to the others. I thought that it was this reader’s vibrant reading that made me really feel and see this piece. However, when I saw it online that night and watched the same poem performed with much less theatrics, I realized it was more the nature of the way spoken word pieces run and flow that allow them to induce emotional responses from their audience.

Along the same vain, one thing that really surprised me was the third place prize. "The Idea of Key Order" by Alicia Triana was read confidently and steadily, but that was about all I thought of it throughout the night. When commending Alicia for her reading, the judges mentioned that she did not seem to try to impose any meaning or emphasis on the piece but instead just read it as is. In my opinion, the lack of theatrics made this piece fall a bit flat and I was not sure I understood why this would be the ideal for a poem like this. I also wondered if any performance would have been favored because if it lacked some of the theatrics it had or if Alicia’s piece was favored for this reason because of the kind of poem it was. In my opinion, it may have just been inappropriate to add much emotion to the kind of poem she had. But I did not agree that a piece like “The Walrus and the Carpenter” was taken away from, only supplemented, by the reader’s bringing in a more creative performance.

Sylvia Plath's 'Daddy' was the very last poem read and was incredibly strong, eventually winning first place. I am very familiar with this piece and while it is already a pretty loaded poem, I felt amazed that the reader’s performance still made me see Plath’s words again for the first time. Something that was very masterful about this reader was how evident it was that each choice she made was purposeful and full of meaning. Her dealing of line breaks and punctuation was great and even though I did not have the physical poem ahead of me, I could almost hear the places in which Plath meant for the piece to sit and linger over the reader. This reading was violent but also matter-of-fact, displaying the intensity of the poem but not relying solely on it, but instead very professionally and carefully dealing with each detail.