The fourth time I have had the privilege to teach alongside Bard Torgersen for his course at Hoyskolen Kristiania in Oslo. It is no exaggeration to say that my earlier trips to work with Bard and his students have changed my pedagogy at large. The nature of his program of teaching, and the structure of the contact time (it being full days with the students, consecutively, not restricted lectures, weekly, and there being so much freedom that the content can be improvised in collaboration with the students in situe) allowed me to imagine things in my regular work in the UK I simply would not have otherwise. Each time I have returned to London with new ideas.
A lot of this is specifically down to Bard himself. He is a very inspiring collaborator. He balances a palpable and sincere care for his students with a sense of active responsibility that they should be challenged, aesthetically, intellectually, emotionally, psychologically. There isn’t a knowing bone in his body, and his students are exposed to such a complex idea of what literature is, given in such an authentic and committed mode.
Each year we’ve worked together we’ve taken on a completely different subject. At first it was film, and this devolved into a frankly provocative and emotional meta-narrative which echoed early Dogme films. Then we did theatre, and the students ended up performing to a packed audience after a few days work presenting brand new plays. Then it was collaborative poetry and performance, and we curated a big Camarade in Oslo, blending the students with poets and artists well established across Scandinavia.
For this year, we chose sound poetry, perhaps the most intensive, emotive, vulnerable of the mediums to put in front of startled students. It was such a wonderful experience in the end. The students were brave, attentive, kind hearted and very mature. After a day of lectures and videos they then worked in groups, rehearsing, with one to one mentoring, and then they performed a series of sound poetry duets. The standard was so high, professional even, and the most important element was how seriously they took themselves. Here are some of the performances that the students were happy to be filmed and put on youtube.
Once again a superb experience, I hope the fourth time teaching with Bard becomes a fifth, and that I’m able to stay in touch with some of the students, who showed great talent and unfailing hospitality toward me.