1 2 The Aesthetics of Bass 3 4 5 Aesthetics and Postcolonial Politics in 6 Linton Kwesi Johnson’s Poetry 7 8 Louisa Olufsen Layne 9 10 11 13 15 17 19 21 23 25 27 29 31 33 34 35 36 Master’s Thesis in Comparative Literature 37 Department of Literature, Area Studies and European Languages 38 Supervisor: Anne Birgitte Rønning 39 UNIVERSITY OF OSLO 40 Spring 2013 41 I 42 43 II 43 44 III 44 45 46 47 48 49 50 51 52 53 54 55 56 57 58 59 60 61 62 63 64 65 66 67 68 69 70 71 72 73 74 75 76 IV The 77 Aesthetics 78 of Bass 79 80 81 Aesthetics and Postcolonial 82 Politics in Linton Kwesi 83 Johnson’s Poetry 84 85 86 87 88 89 90 91 92 93 Louisa Olufsen Layne 94 95 Master’s Thesis in Comparative Literature 96 Department of Literature, Area Studies 97 and European Languages 98 Supervisor: Anne Birgitte Rønning 99 University of Oslo 100 Spring 2013 101 102 103 104 105 V 105 106 107 108 109 110 111 112 113 114 115 116 117 118 119 120 121 122 123 124 125 126 © Louisa Olufsen Layne 127 128 2013 129 130 The Aesthetics of Bass: 131 Aesthetics and Postcolonial Politics in Linton Kwesi Johnson’s Poetry 132 133 Louisa Olufsen Layne 134 135 http://www.duo.uio.no 136 137 Trykk: Reprosentralen, Universitetet i Oslo 138 VI 139 140 VII 140 VIII 141 IX 141 X Abstract 142 This thesis examines the relationship between postcolonial politics and aesthetics in Linton 143 Kwesi Johnson’s poetry. The thesis shows how Johnson’s poems are predominantly analysed 144 and discussed in a political context. Less examined, however, are ways Johnson’s poetry 145 engages in a discussion about poetic form and aesthetics. Johnson is inspired by reggae 146 music, and he discusses how reggae can inspire a new literary form. In the poems, bass and 147 rhythm can transform people and the society they live in. This thesis examines why studies of 148 Johnson, and of many postcolonial authors in general, tend to extract explicit political 149 messages from the texts and neglect their aesthetic features, and discusses the problematic 150 consequences of this critical praxis. The thesis will discuss Elleke Boehmer’s claim that there 151 is an institutionalised opposition between ‘the postcolonial’ and ‘the aesthetic’. I argue that 152 Johnson’s poems challenge this opposition, and that they offer the ongoing debate over the 153 role of aesthetics in postcolonial literature some new perspectives. 154 155 XI 156 XII 156 157 158 XIII 159 XIV Acknowledgments 159 I would like to thank Anne Birgitte Rønning for being an encouraging supervisor, Jane Darcy 160 for all the support, and Svein Paulsen for ten years of good advice. I would also like to thank 161 Adrian Eidem, Mikael Fløysand and my father Jan Olufsen for valuable feedback and 162 inspiration. 163 XV 164 XVI Table of Contents 165 1 Introduction.............................................................................................................................. 1 166 1.1 Life and work ..................................................................................................................................2 167 1.2 Scholarly reception of LKJ’s poetry .........................................................................................5 168 1.3 Scope and structure of the thesis .......................................................................................... 11 169 2 Theoretical framework: the postcolonial vs the aesthetic.....................................15 170 2.1.1 Aesthetics as distraction and indulgence ................................................................................... 16 171 2.1.2 Postcolonial critique of the universal .......................................................................................... 19 172 2.1.3 The ‘purely’ aesthetic vs struggle................................................................................................... 20 173 2.2 The separation of autonomous and heteronomous art................................................. 22 174 2.2.1 Liberating aesthetics from luxury and power.......................................................................... 24 175 2.2.2 Autonomous experience and autonomous art......................................................................... 25 176 2.3 Beyond the postcolonial vs the aesthetic ........................................................................... 26 177 2.3.1 Art against art‐divided........................................................................................................................ 27 178 2.3.2 Postcolonial literature beyond autonomous literature or ‘mere’ writing................... 28 179 3 Dub poetry: a self­aware form of literary criticism..................................................31 180 3.1 Jamaican: Blurring the written and the spoken............................................................... 32 181 3.2 Dub as technique and genre.................................................................................................... 33 182 3.3 Dub as literary device and cultural reference .................................................................. 34 183 3.4 Dub: Confusing pleasure and pain, good and bad............................................................ 37 184 4 Bass as aesthetic experience .............................................................................................40 185 4.1 Reading the bass line: Bass as form and content ............................................................. 40 186 4.2 The a priori and physical experience of bass.................................................................... 41 187 4.3 Bass culture: Bass and history ............................................................................................... 44 188 4.4 Revolution in the bass............................................................................................................... 46 189 5 Defending the sound system: a postcolonial struggle .............................................48 190 5.1 Frightful form: Violence and militancy ............................................................................... 48 191 5.2 Aesthetic experience interrupted by the police............................................................... 53 192 5.3 Defending the sound system: Defending aesthetic experience ................................. 56 193 5.4 Representing sensory and intellectual experience ........................................................ 57 194 5.5 Bass as postcolonial struggle.................................................................................................. 59 195 6 Rhythm and the everyday: The sound ‘system’ beyond location.........................62 196 6.1 More Time: The importance of leisure................................................................................ 62 197 6.2 Skanking down the street: Rhythm and style integrated in everyday life ............. 63 198 6.3 Time for rave: aesthetics perceived as a human right................................................... 66 199 7 The reggae literary form.....................................................................................................68 200 7.1 A dubwise view of poetry......................................................................................................... 69 201 7.2 Dub poetry’s reference to the real........................................................................................ 71 202 7.3 Dub literarity ............................................................................................................................... 72 203 7.4 The selective critical reading of dub poetry...................................................................... 74 204 7.5 The sound system as politics vs the police......................................................................... 76 205 7.6 Police suspicion of leisure and the sound system ........................................................... 77 206 8 Conclusion: the politics of bass culture .........................................................................80 207 8.1 Dub and the universal............................................................................................................... 82 208 8.2 Aesthetics without the concept of ‘aesthetics’.................................................................. 84 209 8.3 Subverting high and low poetry ............................................................................................ 86 210 Works Cited....................................................................................................................................97 211 212 XVII 1 Introduction Linton Kwesi Johnson is the poet who gained a place in literary history by writing ‘inglan is a bitch’: a poetic line full of spite and anger stripped of ambiguity and double meaning, a kind of poetry which shares many similarities with simply giving the middle finger. Johnson is widely known as a social commentator, activist, and political poet. He is especially known for voicing disillusionment and anger against racism in Thatcher’s England. However, he is also a poet strongly influenced by the reggae tradition and Jamaican musical subcultures. His work expresses the belief that music and poetry challenge the mechanism of oppression and exclusion: for di time is nigh when passion gather high when di beat jus lash when di wall mus smash an di beat will shif as di culture alltah when oppression scatah’ (Johnson, 2006, 16). How can the rhythm and the bass violently smash down walls and alter a culture?