Q&A: Tuning in with Saul Williams

Saul Williams is a poet and spoken word artist who is not new to the performing arts scene, but has garnered a wider audience since becoming involved with the Not In Our Name project. He helped write their Statement of Conscience/Pledge of Resistance against the war in Iraq, and wrote songs for the project's soon-to-be-released CD (which are also available for download at NotInOurNameMusic.com). Saul co-wrote and starred in the film "Slam" after winning the Nuyorican Poet's Café's Grand Slam Championship in 1996. His latest book is a collection of poems entitled "She" (MTV Books, 1999), and he is currently starring in the play Tibi's Law.

Saul Williams recently shared some of his thoughts with Rachel Cernansky on art, artistry, and, inevitably, current events.

How do you describe yourself as an artist?

I describe myself as a student and I consider myself an artist. I think that an artist is a vessel and that it's our duty to cleanse and make ourselves as open as possible so that things can enter us and we can filter them out. People relate to [art] and find themselves in it. I often encounter people who say, "Thank you for putting in words something I've been trying to say or have wanted to hear expressed." People relate to the sounds that they've been yearning to relate to, and the people who are able to articulate them through whatever artistic instrument they use -- that's their duty.

How did you get started?

I started out wanting to be an actor. As an eight year-old kid, I enjoyed not only the attention, but the release it allowed me. As I studied acting more over time, I got into the idea of being able to embody a character. Then, studying philosophy and acting, I started realizing that the greatest thing we can do on this planet is come to know ourselves. You can't portray a character without raising the questions that the character raises for yourself. And so I started seeing acting as somewhat of a martial art, where you have to find your center and move from there. Acting allows you to tune in and tune out simultaneously -- you lose yourself and find yourself.

Through practicing that, I eventually started writing my own stuff, and I started writing poetry. I also wanted to be a rapper when I was young, maybe ten or 11, and I started writing rhymes. So it all unfolded over time and turned into what I'm doing now -- which is reciting poetry, writing poetry, but more so, living poetry.

Living poetry -- how so?

I don't believe that poetry is just life on the page. I think that we have to find a way to connect our words with our actions and our actions with our will. When I say living poetry, I mean we have to be courageous in our endeavors. We have to be willing to go places. And sometimes we have to be willing to follow, and I'm not speaking of other people. There've been times when I've written things that have been beyond my own belief system and it's like, Okay, I've been led to this. It is a sort of mathematics -- you're led to a new answer. And it forces me to reevaluate my entire life.

I'm highly inspired by aesthetics -- beauty. I aim to create beauty, because I think that it is perhaps our greatest teacher. A beautiful song or poem -- which may have its harshness, its cruelty -- allows people to pull from it, and grow from it.

Do you feel that politics is inextricably linked with being an artist?

I think that being alive is linked to politics, there is no separation. That's the greatest illusion of humankind, we think that things are separate from each other, that chemistry is separate from biology, and politics is separate from spirituality or what have you. It's all connected. Even for someone to say "I'm not political" -- that's a political statement.

In the realm of artistry, especially in America, where we're dealing with artists (like myself) that encounter the media (like yourself), the question of responsibility comes into play because it is a question of power. The fact that I open my mouth and people listen puts me in a powerful position. Thus I need to think about what I say, because I know that people are affected by it.