Drum Rider in Finnish

Drum Rider appears in the current issue of Finland's Kääntäjaa-översättaren journal, translated into Finnish by Taija Mård. The onomatopoiea of the title makes me grin: Rumpuratsastaja

The double-page spread on my work includes this article by the translator:

I hear the rumbling of drums, I feel the heat of Zanzibar on my skin, I’m stunned by the swaying hips, I sink into the lines on the old woman’s face. My throat feels tight, a tear squeezes out of my eye, along with the audience of hundreds I burst into applause that have no end. Shailja Patel has just performed her poem Drum Rider: A Tribute to Bi Kidude, at the opening ceremony of WALTIC.

Writers’ and Literary Translators’ International Congress, held last summer in Stockholm, was proud, and we participants edified, to have on stage this woman poet from Kenya with Indian looks and perfect English accent.

Patel has received many awards for her work, and her poems have been translated into many languages; used in high schools, colleges and workshops from South Africa to Japan; exhibited on the web on such respected forums as International Museum of Women, Museum of the African Diaspora and New York University’s Asian Poets Collection.

When Patel then performs her poetry, it’s not a reading nor even a recitation but a dazzling one-woman theatrical performance. No wonder that she has performed around the world, in arenas in New York as well as in different parts of Africa, in different festivals and conferences as well as at universities. Usually she receives standing ovations and curtain calls, and afterwards people go and thank her personally. And so did I here up north, at Folkets Hus.

Later during the week we heard Patel’s presentation of the poem – and due to numerous requests, its repeat performance – and about the conflict situations it has aroused. Such work is dangerous stuff in many corners of our planet. Patel has been forced off stage in the middle of Drum Rider, because one should not say that god could be a 95-year-old ebony black Swahili woman, let alone say out loud the word clitoris!

Bi Kidude is a living legend, the renowned master of Taarab and Unyago music from Zanzibar. She started performing in the 1920s and is now almost 100 years old. She, too, is internationally known, and she has received the prestigious WOMEX award for her achievements in the field of World Music.

Of her Shailja Patel wrote the poem. I am now proud and honoured to be her bridge to Finland and Finnish. You hear the rumbling of drums, you feel the heat of Zanzibar on your skin…
Taija Mård