We are aware – Creative writing, concrete poetry and writers’ resistance

Abstract

In this article, the focus is on the artist’s book – Sanity on the line – a catalogue of individual work (of students) compiled from a cut-up poetry project that was exhibited as part of the Transgressions and boundaries of the page artist’s book project. Amongst others, the phenomenon known as concrete poetry, which was developed by Hunley (2007) as an alternative approach to teaching through the creative art of writing workshop method, is explored. Furthermore, a few individual works in the cut-up poetry project are discussed by relating them to existing South African examples of concrete poetry. A strong focus is placed on examples from Afrikaans literature as well as the work of Willem Boshoff and Wopko Jensma.