Laban Carrick Hill: Bowling Us Over

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By Shanti Menon September 16, 2010

Laban Carrick Hill pays tribute to a fellow poet in Dave the Potter (Little, Brown, 2010), an illustrated book about a slave from South Carolina who was a creative genius.

Hill, the author of 25 books for children, adults and young adults, is also the cofounder of the Writer's Project of Ghana, a literary nonprofit based in Ghana and the United States.

How did you hear about Dave the Potter, and what inspired you to write about him?

I was inspired by seeing a photo of one of Dave's pots during a conference about the Middle Passage in 2003. I was entranced by the idea that a slave used the sides of his pots to publish his poems. His desire to express himself and speak to others seemed to be stronger than the very real danger of revealing that he could read and write. I couldn't help but admire his commitment to his art. Somehow I wanted to honor Dave and his poetry.

Tell us about how you researched Dave's story.

The Internet, of course! I googled Dave and came up with a hit at the McKissick Museum at the University of South Carolina. They had an exhibit of his pots and published a catalog for the show, which included an appendix of Dave's poems as well as a well-researched essay into Dave's life. I also found another website where someone had posted all of Dave's poems.

Were you able to get a feel for Dave as a person?

I think so. If you read his poems you discover a complex man who wrote humorous poems as well as thoughtful and emotional verse. And just by looking at his pots—some of them immense—you get a sense of a skilled and ambitious artisan. Dave was one of only two people who made such large pots at that time in America.

Why did you decide to write this book as a poem, rather than a straight narrative?

My initial response to trying to write about Dave was a feeling of being overwhelmed. I did not have a clue how to write about him. That's why it took me a year to even begin to put words on the page. As I struggled with this, I came to the conclusion that the best way to honor Dave and to tell his story was to tell it in verse. Poetry is a tool that I often reach for, especially when I'm challenged. Once I began to write about Dave in verse, it felt right. I felt that the only honest way to speak about Dave was in the same form that he spoke.

How would you compare your style of poetry to Dave's?

It can't really be compared. I'm a mediocre poet with an MFA in poetry writing in the early 21st century, while Dave was a self-taught poet writing in the 19th century. Without a doubt Dave is an important American poet.

Did your read most of his works?

Over the years as I've read and reread his poems, I've come to appreciate and respect his work. Let me explain. I've always been taught that there were two threads to the American poetic canon: Walt Whitman, who self-published Leaves of Grass and Emily Dickinson who chose not to publish at all. Whitman represents the external thread while Dickinson embodies the internal. Reading one of Dave's poems, which he self-published on his pots a good 20 years before Whitman and Dickinson, I was struck that there might be a third strain to the American poetic canon, one that has an aphoristic quality. With its idiosyncratic punctuation, not unusual for the early 19th century, Dave's poem "I, made this Jar, all of cross / If, you dont repent, you will be, lost" is at once sophisticated and transparent. His poems have a koanlike quality, which deepen and burrow into the soul. As a poet, it is an amazing honor to celebrate his life, his creativity, his pots and his poems.

Which poem of his is your favorite?

Well, the poem I use as the last lines of the book: "I wonder where is all my relation / Friendship to all—and, every nation." This poem reveals an immense generosity on the surface while underneath, coded in the text, is a sadness. Is he speaking about his family being sold away? And is he missing them? Is he thinking about his relatives in Africa and aching about the circumstances of the diaspora? Also, the rhyme of "relation" to "nation" emphasizes a big-heartedness that speaks very much to the notion of inclusiveness that we celebrate right now in the 21st century.

What is it about Dave and his story that you think kids will respond to?

Big pots! Don't we all love digging our hands in a mound of cool clay? I also think the poems I've included in the back of the book are extremely appealing to kids. They are playful, concrete, and descriptive. You never know, the book just might inspire a future potter or poet. Or perhaps both!

Have you ever tried pottery yourself?

I tried pottery when I was researching the book. When I would bring my thrown pots home after class, my teenage daughters would laugh and try to find inventive uses for my small, undersized pots—like holding lint. Recently, I made a trivet at an art camp, and I don't know if I will ever live it down. They are always saying at mealtime, "Let's use that weird thingy Dad made!"

Your next book is a biography of hip-hop pioneer DJ Kool Herc; in the past you've written about the Harlem Renaissance, and you also run a literary nonprofit in Ghana. What sparked your interest in Africa and African American culture?

There's a wonderful quote by Ralph Ellison: "Whatever else the true American is, he is also somehow black." This quote resonates with me because I am deeply interested in American identity. The questions I find myself asking all the time are: Who am I? What does it mean to be an American? And the deeper I look the more I find African American culture. To give you an example, there is no true American music without African Americans. No jazz, no R&B, no rock and roll, no hip-hop. My interest in Africa is just an extension of this. As I looked into African American culture, I began to explore the diaspora.

Tell me more about the Writers Project of Ghana.

While I was teaching African American Literature at the University of Vermont, I met Dr. Nana Jane Opoku Agyemang, who was the Dean of the Faculty of Arts at the University of Cape Coast in Ghana. She invited me to come to her institution, and I was thrilled to teach there for a semester in 2008. I began a creative writing program and became very involved in the literary culture of Ghana. By the end of my stay, I couldn't just walk away, so I partnered with the physicist/writer Martin Egblewogbe to start the Writers Project of Ghana. It's a nonprofit that promotes literacy and literary culture through writing workshops, readings, high school writing/reading clubs, and a number of other activities.

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