Tom Wilson (Kulcha/RTRfm) on poetry of the Caribbean

Hey Poetry People! This week’s featured Fremantle person is Tom Wilson of Kulcha.

Tom Wilson is the Venue Manager of Western Australia’s main world music venue: Kulcha. He has a PhD in English literature and hosts an environmental radio show on RTRfm. Literature and music are both large parts of his life: “Through literature and poetic English language I am intimate with a tongue that gives shape to the world with limpidity and freshness. I am galvanised by stylish music.”

Here’s what Tom had to say about his favourite poetry:
“I’ve always loved the oral poetry of the Caribbean poet Derek Walcott. I’ve developed a knowledge of Jamaican oral heritage ranging from the whimsical Louise Bennett, AKA Miss Lou, to the biblical Mutabaruka, whose deep dub poetry can often be heard powering out of the sound system in my sitting room. Derek Walcott is one of the greatest poets of that region. Do yourself a favour and check out his recordings of his own poetry. Poetry should have music in it, and I relish the patois and traces of history in his big, narrative poems. You can listen to some Jamaican riddims from the seventies and again sense the continuity in that whole oral tradition.”