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THIS WEEK ART maltatoday | SUNDAY • 12 JANUARY 2020 4 Academic and cartoonist Ġorġ Mallia speaks to TEODOR RELJIC about My Love Had Eyes of Blue and Dreams, a confessional collection of self-published poetry dealing with love and loss and spanning a period of work ranging from the late '70s to the present day, precipitated by the collapse of the author's second marriage Decades of heartbreak in Teodor Reljic The spontaneous (self-) publication of a themed poetry collection literally spanning decades of work seems like an intense creative and career decision to take... what was it that led to the publication of My Love Had Eyes of Blue and Dreams, and why did you think that the timing for it was now? It was an intense happening that trig- gered the decision, in actual fact. The breakdown of my second marriage and long-term relationship, which literally undermined my world. My verse is lyri- cal. It has been written only in moments of massive love, or, otherwise, in mo- ments of deep pain. But almost all of the verse I have written in my life has had as its subject a lover. Plunged into the depths of love or swimming in the abyss of a love gone sour. The verse belonged to those lovers... not legally, but mor- ally, and that is why I never published it. But when this last, incredibly cherished relationship ended very very suddenly, I was shocked into thinking that there was no one left for these to belong to, so they should belong to the reading pub- lic. Hence the sudden decision. I do not write a lot of verse. There might be 10 years in between one work and another, or there could be a clus- ter over a very short period of time. What has been published in the book is almost comprehensive, though, of course, some selection has been made. I self-published for a number of reasons. The first is that getting a publisher for a book of poetry is always a tricky busi- ness, because poetry really does not sell in Malta, and secondly because I wanted total control over the book. I wanted it to look and feel the way it eventually turned out. The publication is limited to a few hundred copies, so I know that only people who will cherish my words will own one. This is extremely personal verse... very intimate, though there is no doubt that it is also accessible, with the sentiments expressed writ large, so to speak, so in that sense it will also trigger emotions in those who read it. Most writers cringe at even the thought of looking at some of their earlier work, let alone deciding to publish it for the first time. What is your relationship with some of the earlier poems in this collection? The very first work is from 1979, mak- ing the duration of the writing 40 years exactly. I had just finished my first de- gree (in English literature) at the time so I suppose there was a bit of pretentious self-consciousness about my writing. But over time, the verse became more fluent... more a direct pronouncement of what I was feeling at the moment. I never belaboured the verse... it always sort of flowed out the moment I got inspired to write it and sat down to do so. I'd tweak things a bit afterwards, but never much. So what you have in the book are pretty much slightly modified "first drafts". I think I wrote some in- teresting, heartfelt bits back in the '80s and the '90s. And of course, I wrote all my Maltese verse then, too. I only wrote in English in the noughties and 'tens, except for the last poem in the book... the epilogue, which was written just be- fore the book went to print. It was an attempt to inject some hope into the bleakness of my life at that point... and also a need to reclaim my language after having abandoned it for two decades as far as verse was concerned. I got better with time, I think. The im- agery flowed much more naturally later, as can be seen in the last section of the book. There's more of a tightly con- trolled rhythm. I found I could make language dance to the tune of my feel- ings and it worked nicely in the verse. As I said, I have not written a lot of verse, and I think it was about time I put it out there. Apart from the personal cathartic effect of writing and publishing these poems, what do you hope your readers will get out of them? Well, the book has had an amaz- ing reception so far by those who have read it. It seems my words do reach out and touch people. Obviously, the verse was written at a time when I was going through intense emotion, and, yes, the externalising of that emotion through writing does help organise thoughts and feelings and at the same time create an aesthetic construct that preserves the instigating emotions. Logically, readers will only find an affinity with the verse if it touches in them strong emotions they themselves will have experienced. I think that is the onus of all lyrical verse, not least the ones published in My Love Had Eyes of Blue and Dreams. Some told me they wept through association as they read them. Others said they could feel me in the poetry. Most said the words washed over them and touched them. I don't re- ally hope for more than that. Apart from being an academic and writer, you are also a cartoonist. How has the recent political crisis galvanised that part of your creative process, and what kind of role (and even perhaps obligation) do you believe satire has within that context?