• Home
• /
• Community
• /
• Arts

Meet the Dubai community bringing poetry to all expats

Dubai - If you've never heard of the Nobel Poetry Club, now is the time.

One quick look into the growing poetry scene of Dubai and the UAE in general shows a large number of events taking place that revolves around spoken word. The region's numbers of poets are increasing and all of them share their view of the world during these spoken word events. But other than spoken word, here's one of Dubai's best secrets - an evening of poetry written by people who have changed the world delivered in languages all expats can relate and understand.
Meet the Nobel Poetry Club, a young group that took centre stage last September when they performed the works of celebrated British author Rudyard Kipling in various languages including Arabic, Russian, Serbian and Hindi. We spoke with some of their members to know more about the club.
Founder Jane Stark believes that Dubai provides artists with the privilege of accessing masterpieces in different languages; she considers this to be an 'Incredible fortune and luxury'. She also said that the club is set apart from the UAE arts scene by a 'Fusion of modern creative approach with everlasting values.'
Expounding on this Ahmed Syed, an actor with the club said: "...we try to explore the poets and their poems, express it the way we feel they were meant to be, their writing styles, their inspiration." Thus differentiating them from the other poetry groups around Dubai who - along with the club are part of Dubai's growing arts scene.
Kirin Hilliar, stage director of the club on the other hand talked about how the group transforms written works into various art forms: '...poetry exists everywhere - in songs, children's books, nursery rhymes, national anthems, ballads, even rap! And we want to show what a beautiful art form it is, how it captures concepts in a way no other form of written word can.
The group also informed us about their upcoming event on the 28^th of November at the Indian Consulate here in Dubai where they will celebrate the life and works of Rabindranath Tagore a noted Bengali poet. The events are free and in line with the group's goal of making poetry accessible to the UAE's expat community
Upcoming events are also in the pipeline which includes recent Nobel prize laureate Bob Dylan. When asked about where they see the club in two years' time, Ivana Vajman Jackson, the researcher of the club put the group's goals in the best of words: "...taking world by storm with passion of a poet."