Poets looking for guidance on how to best conduct their readings tend to rely on suggestions made for public speakers. Understandably, since there is much overlap, and there are so many resources for public speakers on the internet. Are they all good for poets, though?
There is one public speaking tip that seems to have been endlessly repeated and drummed into poetry readers, which is: ‘make eye contact with your audience.’ As one random but representative public speaking guide out there says:
the audience is there to see you and to hear what you have to say. They deserve to be included and to be made welcome. Lack of eye contact creates a barrier between you and the audience; it makes you look untrustworthy, shifty or unsure of yourself; it drags down your presentation and sucks the life out of it.
So why doesn’t this necessarily apply to poets? Sure, when you come up to the podium and introduce yourself, or when you’re chit-chatting about a poem before reading it – absolutely, make eye contact with your audience. But when you’re reading? If you can’t do it well (which usually means you have memorized chunks of your poems ahead of time so you don’t need to look down at the book), I say, don’t do it. Some people can do it well, but for many – most – people, I submit that the need to keep looking at the audience leads to awkward head-bobbing, meaningless unfocused millisecond glances in the general audience direction, losing of place in text, and ends up being a general distraction for the audience, instead of an aid to their enjoyment. I personally find it distressing to watch. I’m not going to post any videos in demonstration, but there are plenty out there.
I submit that what the audience wants is a connection with you, a sense of authenticity and engagement from you, they want to see you perform for them. Can that involve eye-contact? It can, of course. But is eye contact a must for audience connection? No – it’s not, I say. It can even diminish audience connection and enjoyment, as just described.
As an illustration, I’d like to point to this video of a reading by Canadian poet Jordan Scott (which was brought to my attention by Hannah Stephenson at The Storialist – thanks Hannah!). Scott, who stutters himself, explores ‘the poetics of stuttering’ in his collection Blert, from which he reads in this video.
Scott is clearly not someone who enjoys making eye contact with his audience – watch how he doesn’t do so in the first couple minutes of chit-chat. As an audience member, that strikes me as a pity, but ok, so maybe he’s a bit shy. What I’m really waiting to see how he performs during his reading. He begins reading about minute 1:50 and really gets into his stride about minute 3:30.
When he is reading his poems he is still not making eye contact with the audience, but it absolutely ceases to matter. He has gone inward and is focusing on the text, you can practically see his vibrant engagement with the text – his whole body, voice and energy are fully committed to voicing the text for the audience. It’s a wonderful performance that engages his whole being. As an audience member, I believe in it and want more. And all without any eye contact with the audience.
Now take a look at this video, which is a performance of Ravel’s Bolero conducted by Andre Rieu (and seems to have garnered some 5.5 million hits on You Tube). The camera does a great job of following each of the soloists and the musicians at large.
And what I’m thinking as a member of this audience, is that they remind me of Scott – they have gone inward, are focused on the score, on working their instrument, the music, the conductor. Not the audience. None of them even considers looking at the audience. The audience is implicit and deeply recognized on a level that transcends mere eye contact.
OK, so Scott was one performer and this is a whole orchestra and in many ways this is an apples-and-oranges scenario. But the point is that as a member of the audience, I don’t need, or want, to be looked at. I just need to be convinced of the performers’ authenticity, their passion, and to hear them play well.
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November 16, 2010 at 3:48 pm
I think you are right about connection and authenticity–that’s what we are there for as audience members if we choose to go to a performance or reading. And poets can do that in a number of ways, authentic to them.
If I go to a poetry reading, I am there for the experience of the poems, and I am always hoping to have a pure, clear, intense experience of the poems from the poet hirself because ze wrote them and knows what’s going on in them! (Using the gender neutral pronouns I learned recently!) So that’s why I’m disappointed if the poet mumbles or doesn’t project at all or makes the poems sound false or flat or somehow less than the reading experience, instead of equally or even more wonderful than if I read them on the page. A not-so-good reading seems somehow to do a disservice to the poems, and to poetry itself.
As you point out, eye contact may or may not contribute to the good reading aloud of poetry. The inward trance of the poet who loves hir poems and loves sharing them here and now with listeners is something I have witnessed! It’s a thrill.
(Of course some people are not there to experience the poems. They might be there to be seen, to hob nob, to find fault with the poet’s reading or poems, to cozy up to the editor or organizer, or to compare themselves with the featured poet. Sigh. I don’t have much time for the people this wrapped up in themselves.)
November 16, 2010 at 6:34 pm
“a pure, clear, intense experience of the poems from the poet hirself”
Yes, exactly. There is so much potential and actual clutter that gets in the way of that ideal. Each reader has to analyze hirself (correct usage, I hope!?) for purposes of identifying personal clutter and figuring out the best way to get to ‘pure, clear, intense’ despite it.
November 17, 2010 at 12:38 am
Eye contact with audience strikes me as a minimal requirement of reading — performing might be a more accurate word — one’s poetry. I rehearse before giving a reading — usually two or three times. It seems to me the audience deserves to hear someone who’s prepared if they have come out to listen. And part of being prepared is being willing to connect with the audience, not only by making eye contact, but also by telling little stories about the circumstances of a poem’s creation. I find such stories are often an occasion for humor and make the atmosphere of a reading far less forbidding. It can puit the audience on a poet’s side.
November 17, 2010 at 10:23 am
Hey Howie – Great to hear from you! Certainly if one can do eye contact well (and it sounds like you do!), one should certainly employ it. My point was more directed to people who can’t do it well but somehow feel they HAVE to do it. I don’t believe they do, and that, as poets, we have other ways at our disposal to honor and demonstrate our respect for an audience. Best, Nic
November 17, 2010 at 2:49 am
So good to see this site springing up. A classic case of ‘why didn’t anyone think of it before?’ Good on you, Nic and Dave.
As for poetry out loud, frankly, most poets (in the UK, anyway) are crap at reading their own verse. And verse-reading per se needs to be wrenched away from that awful bored, adenoidal canting that at some point became the house style. I’m looking forward very much to what might emerge to that end from this site.
November 17, 2010 at 10:27 am
Hi Dick – thanks for stopping by and commenting. I hope we will be able to get lots of discussion and a range of viewpoints on this issue. I, for one, would be very interested in reading a blog post with more on that awful bored, adenoidal canting that at some point became the house style. Email it to me if you ever write it! nic_sebastian at hotmail dot com
Best, Nic
November 17, 2010 at 3:44 am
Interesting debate. I agree that the poet making eye contact with me is not necessary for me to connect with the poems. As a matter of fact, I often will close my eyes or look at the floor if the poet seems to be trying too hard to force that. It helps me to focus on the sounds of the poem and be enveloped by it.
I know that I work hard at reading my poems well – I don’t memorize, but I do record myself and listen for spots that might trip up a listener, spots where I tend to slur words together or go too slow/too fast. I have seen poets who didn’t “wow” me on the page really win me over with their reading style, but I have unfortunately seen many more poets whose reading does not live up to the connection I had with the work on the page.
November 17, 2010 at 10:27 am
Hm, you’ve just given me a new idea, Donna! Thanks – more soon. Nic
November 17, 2010 at 12:44 pm
Oh this is interesting. I like to feel i have some contact with the poet on stage. I dislike poets who literally hide behind their books and mumble away to themselves, but it can be mesmerising to see the type of performance where the poet has gone inward.
I used to try to memorise my poetry but apart from a few poems I never have been able to do it perfectly and the trying gave me incredible stagefright. Since accepting that I can’t memorise most of my poems I have been much more comfortable on stage. I do know my poems well enough to be able to make eye contact (or actually pretend to make eye-contact!) with the audience a few times in most poems.
Great new blog by the way!
Juliet
Crafty Green Poet
http://craftygreenpoet.blogspot.com
November 17, 2010 at 1:01 pm
Thanks for stopping by and commenting, Juliet. Please let us know if you find any material online we can link to on Voice Alpha (or if you’d like to guest-blog here yourself!) Best, Nic
November 18, 2010 at 9:26 pm
A good trick is to bring a trustworthy friend have him or her sit smack in the middle of the audience and read looking occasionally at your friend. The audience will think you’re looking right at them. I think also that if you’re a very good reader with good poems this won’t matter a whit.
Rebecca