Poetry, irrevocable time and Myanmar's political transition

This article is concerned with the response of Myanmar’s early contemporary poets to the experience of dictatorship and oppression, and the response of more recent poets to the uncertainty that followed political transition in 2010. The article argues that aesthetic differences in the styles of poetry that emerged during different periods reflect different understandings about temporality and the corresponding possibilities for claims of justice. The article suggests that the earlier poems, written during the period of military rule, represent what the philosopher Vladimir Jankélévitch calls ‘irreversible time.’ Later poems, written after the period of dictatorship, reflect an aesthetic of ‘irrevocable time.’ The article explains that we are yet to see, in Myanmar, the emergence of poetics representing time’s third domain: imprescriptible time (the time of jurisdiction, redress for crimes against humanity and the claims of justice).