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Young people put their anger and hopes into spoken poetry
年青人把他们的愤恨和期望化作口语诗
In a small, dimly lit room one recent Saturday morning, a group of Congolese slammers are chanting about politics and art, poverty and sex. They tower over the seated audience, gesticulating wildly. The listeners laugh, jeer and occasionally join in by repeating refrains or clapping. This is exactly how slam is meant to be. Marc Smith, an American former builder who hosted the world’s first slam event in Chicago in 1984, would be impressed.
迩来一个星期六的早晨，一群刚果诗喃者在一间昏暗狭小的房间里诵读着政治与艺术、贫穷与性活动。他们高高站在坐着的观众面前，张狂地打着手势。听众们不时地大笑或讪笑，偶尔也会经过重复诗句或拍手的方法参加进来。这正是诗喃的原意。1984年在芝加哥举办了世界首场诗喃竞赛的美国前建筑商马克·史密斯对此形象深化。
Mr Smith promoted slam, a form of spoken-word poetry, as a way of liberating rhymes from the page and making them accessible. Like rappers, slammers do battle, but they are judged by the audience. As well as giving marks out of ten at the end of performances, attendees express their opinions by cheering or heckling. Slam reached Goma, a city of some 1m people in embattled eastern Congo, five years ago when a handful of young men began watching YouTube videos of slammers across the world. They were inspired by the raw, uncensored rhymes of artists such as Grand Corps Malade (Large Sick Body), a tall French slammer with spinal injuries who writes about racism and loneliness in suburban Paris.
史密斯先生建议经过诗喃（一种口语诗的方法）将韵文从册页中解放出来并使之广泛。就像说歌唱手之间会进行竞赛相同，诗喃者也会斗成参批诗，但他们的输赢是由观众来评判的。除了在表劣年演结束时按非常制打分外，参加的观众还会经过喝彩或起哄的方法表达自个的观念。诗喃报前将在五年前抵达了戈马——一座有大约100万人员、位于刚果东部的危机四伏的城市——其时有一些年青人初步在YouTube上观看世界各地的诗喃者的视频。他们深受Grand Corps Malade（巨大病体）等艺术家们未经删减、原汁原味的押韵所煽动，Grand Corps Malade是法国的一个高个子诗喃者，他常创造有关巴黎市郊的种族主义和孑立的诗喃。
“There was a lot of appetite for slam here,” says Ben Kamuntu, one of Goma’s early slammers. “Young people wanted to break away from silence, we wanted to express ourselves.” With its sprawling tin-roofed houses and unpaved sidestreets, Goma is a far cry from Chicago’s skyscrapers, but the same slam fervour spread among its youth as it did when Mr Smith first promoted the idea in America. Soon, more than a hundred people were meeting to practise, clubbing together to rent a small house where they could slam. Before the pandemic hit, the b
est exponents put on shows in Goma’s bars and restaurants.
戈马的诗喃者元成本·卡蒙图说，“这儿有许多人对诗喃有稠密的快乐喜爱。”“年青人想打破缄默沉静，咱们想表达自个。”戈马有着漫山遍野的铁皮房顶房子和未铺砌的冷巷，与遍地摩天大楼的芝加哥相去甚远，但戈马年青人对诗喃的张狂却与史密斯先生初度在美国宣传这一主意时的情况毫无二致。很快，一百多个戈马人集合在一同操练，他们一起租借了一间可以操练诗喃的斗室子。在疫情来袭之前，最优良的诗喃者在戈马的酒吧和饭馆举办了表演。
When one slammer, a slight 22-year-old called Rita Zaburi, was asked by a friend why she spent so much time alone in her room, she decided to respond in verse. On the morning of your correspondent’s visit, she stands up, shyly at first, and slams about what it means to be a poet. “It is not about being a sorcerer, healing wounds with the magic of your creativity,” she begins in French. “It is about denouncing the evils that swallow our society.”
当一个名叫丽塔·扎布里的22岁的诗喃者被一个兄弟问?腊彩史考淅锎艉艹な笨痰脑涤墒保裨裼檬创鸶础Ｔ凇毒醚恕芳钦呃捶玫哪翘煸缟希奶逑忠部扇傻悖粘醪交购苄咔樱罄淳驼故玖擞泄亍暗笔艘馕蹲派丁钡氖Ｋ梅ㄓ锍醪剿担暗笔擞氲蔽资Σ灰谎擞么丛炝Φ姆χ魏蒙丝冢送闯馔淌缮缁岬淖锒瘛！
