10/30/2011

look what i found...


... on the way to the Cross-Border Pollination reading!

The reading itself was very enjoyable - they're producing some lovely writers up there in Alaska (and Toronto and Vancouver, for that matter, in Maureen and Rhea).

All that, and I finally found my poem!


Thank you so much to Rachel Rose and her band of collaborators for putting the reading together, and for running the Cross-Border series all these years (I was surprised, and saddened, to learn at the reading that it will be the last for the series). As Rachel said in her "closing remarks", let's hope that the energy generated around the Cross-Border series finds new, equally enriching homes elsewhere in the city.

10/27/2011

mic check

It looks like there'll be an open-mic poetry slam at Occupy Vancouver this Sunday, running from 2:30 to 5:30 (sign up at 2:30).

That is, unless Gregor decides to get all Jean Quan on us. Or if Suzanne Anton hulks up and tears down all the tents with her bare hands. Barring any of that, there should be poetry on Sunday.

For all you Facebook lovers out there, a Facebook group has been established for the event.

10/25/2011

two readings with me in common

I've got two readings coming up soon, both of which I have thus far inadequately HYPED here on the blog. That ends now.

The first is the October installment of the Cross-Border Pollination Reading Series, which seeks to unite Canadian and American writers. I'll be reading with fellow Canadians Maureen Hynes and Rhea Tregebov, and we'll be joined by three Alaskan poets: Peggy Shumaker, Joan Kane and Sherry Simpson. I will attempt to read my more masculine poems to address the gender imbalance. Sorry, 90% of my book...

It should be a fantastic early-evening of poetry. Here are the details:

Cross-Border Pollination Series
Saturday, October 29th, 5:00 PM - 7:30 PM
SFU Harbour Center, Room 1415
515 W. Hastings Street, Vancouver
Featuring: Rob Taylor, Maureen Hynes, Rhea Tregebov, Peggy Shumaker, Joan Kane, and Sherry Simpson
Free!
Poster:


Five days later I'll be reading at the Kranky Reading Series, along with Elee Kraljii Gardiner and Wanda John, and a (loud?) preamble by Garry Thomas Morse. The details:

Kranky Reading Series
Thursday, November 3rd, 7:00 PM
Kranky Cafe
#216 - 228 E. 4th Avenue
, Vancouver
Featuring: Rob Taylor, Elee Kraljii Gardiner and Wanda John
Free!
No Poster!

And while I'm HYPING events, remember that People's Co-op Bookstore will host the launch of the anthology The Bright Well: Contemporary Canadian Poems about Facing Cancer this Wednesday. My post on that launch, including all the event details, can be read here.

I hope to see you at any (or, dare I say, all?) of these events!

10/24/2011

some days all i startle

It's been a while since I mentioned anything about One Ghana, One Voice here on the blog. This is in part because I took a hiatus over the summer, my first in five years. Well, we're back at it, and I'm very pleased to be able to present two poems by one of my favourite Ghanaian poets, L.S. Mensah, over the next two weeks. Both poems look at Nigerian literary characters from the perspective of their mothers (whose stories were overlooked in the original texts). The first, Mother of Ikemefuna, is already up on the site, along with a Q+A with L.S., which is, as always with L.S., both thoughtful and informative. My favourite answer of hers this time was in response to a question about her opening line (the title of this post):

Looking back, I believe that phrase started life in one of my Congo poems but it always impeded my efforts to do anything with it. It became the starting point for this poem, but even then I wouldn't say the outcome was guaranteed. Seamus Heaney makes a point about how the right opening line can lead one to generate a whole poem, but one does need some luck too. A lot of the time I feel like an Accra cobbler, making shoes out of those worn car tyres, hammering them into place with oversized Kantamanto nails!
The second poem in the series, along with another Q+A, will be published next Saturday.

To see more of what OGOV has been up to of late, check out the archives. And if you, or someone you know, is somehow connected to Ghana + poetry, get those submissions coming!

10/21/2011

ekphrastacy

Hey Vancouver poets, here's a chance to ekphrasise your pants off. The show closes at the end of the month, so act quick! The press release:

CALL FOR SUBMISSIONS | CUTTY CONTEMPORARY ART | OCTOBER 30th

Call for Submissions:

As visual artists we recognize the importance of writing in relationship to the art as a document of the discussion. Artwork is never self-contained once it has been exhibited; it is open for interpretation, inspection, reaction and reprocessing. Our goal with art has always been the inciting of conversation and discussion.

We’re looking for writers to collaborate with us on the catalogue for our most recent exhibition at the gallery, Randy Grskovic’s Reoccurring Themes. We are going to be printing a newsprint periodical with documentation from the exhibition and are accepting writing to accompany the images. What we’re searching for is a response to the artwork itself. Each piece has it’s own story/context. It could be in the way of a review of the physical piece, an idea sparked by the work. A previously written work that relates to a certain theme… a poem… a drawing… a post it note… whatever… It could be positive; it could be negative. It could be real; it could be fiction. It could be short; it can be long.

Our main goal is to collaborate with writers on this project. If you would like to have a conversation with us please let us know and we can start the process.

The work can be viewed on weekends from 12pm – 6pm or by appointment. Please feel free to email us and make an appointment:

cuttycag(at)gmail.com

The show closes on October 30th and the deadline for submissions will be no later than November 6th.

More information about the exhibition can be found here:

www.cuttycag.com

10/17/2011

hope too is an old and unusual growth - "The Bright Well" Book Launch

Medicine - Glen Downie

I have travelled in cities of the East & held out
my paper token    The black-suited subway man bites
a neat piece of it with his metal punch & in between
passengers his tic tic tic continues    The tiny jaws continue
tic tic tic    In Seoul's medicine shops are glass bottles
where herbalists display unusual growths
of ginseng shaped like people    All this beneath the city –
trains worm their way through cold tunnels
& the ginseng sellers advise on the endless complaints
of middle-age while at produce stalls I hear
the nervous tic tic tic of the vendor's trimming shears

And I have travelled in cities of the West where radioactive cobalt
must be replaced in the machines before reaching its half-life
A patient gingerly fingers the bulge of his cancer & calculates
whether he's too young to die or too old to be tortured
on the slim chance of cure    No one is sure    Even the doctor
speaks as if ticking down
a list of well-practised evasions    Experience tells him
that truth is too potent & must be replaced
with half-truth   as a dose of radiation is dispensed
in fractions   although hope too is an old & unusual growth
often strong as the roots of stones & human-shaped

(Wolsak & Wynn, 1999). Reprinted with permission.


Glen Downie's "Medicine" is one of the many standout poems included in Leaf Press' new anthology The Bright Well: Contemporary Canadian Poems about Facing Cancer. Featuring contributions from twenty Canadian poets, including Lorna Crozier, Michael Harris, Maureen Hynes and Anne Simpson, the anthology launches in Vancouver on October 26th. The details:

Launch of The Bright Well: Contemporary Canadian Poems about Facing Cancer
Wednesday, October 26th, 7:30 PM
People's Co-op Books
1391 Commercial Drive
Featuring: Elise Partridge, Miranda Pearson, Rachel Rose, and Betsy Warland
Free!


The anthology is a very good one, and rarely if ever depressing, despite the subject matter. It's even (dare I say it?) inspirational at times. I hesitate in saying that only because "inspirational" has gotten a bad wrap in our current popular culture (made-for-TV movies on the Lifetime Network, anyone?). This isn't that kind of inspirational. This is the real deal, the kind that's earned through attention and honesty and persistence.

I had the opportunity to correspond via email with anthology editor Fiona Tinwei Lam.
Fiona, eagerly anticipating our email correspondance
Here's our exchance, in which we discuss the origin of The Bright Well and walking that fine line between the two types of "inspirational":

Rob: You've mentioned in a past interview how much losing your father to cancer at a young age shaped your life. Was that the primary inspiration for your taking on this anthology? Can you tell me a bit more about how the project came together?

Fiona: There were a variety of factors that led me to initiate this project. I'd had my first experience editing an anthology with Cathy Stonehouse and Shannon Cowan putting together Double Lives: Writing and Motherhood (McGill-Queen's University, 2008), an anthology of creative non-fiction, Cathy convinced me that such a book could become a valuable resource to the many writers who were struggling to juggle parenthood with writing. As we gathered the material, I was moved by the way the contributors wrote so compellingly about their frustrations and their triumphs, and wanted to do what I could to ensure their voices and stories would be heard. This same impetus lay behind The Bright Well.

Canada has such a wealth of extraordinary poetic talent, a wealth I feel is taken for granted and undervalued. Poetry, like other art forms, has the potential to communicate ideas, feelings, experiences, and insights very powerfully, deeply and concisely. People often turn to poetry during the most important transitional periods in their lives (graduations, births, deaths, weddings, funerals), but they can be intimidated by poetry outside of those occasions. I believe that poetry can lead to a deeper understanding and connection within ourselves as well as on a broader scale between individuals across the borders and boundaries that can divide us.

But because Double Lives ended up being a huge amount of work over three years trying to solicit, select and edit the essays, as well as pitch publishers and then market the book, I hesitated to jump into another anthology project again. However, after publishing my second book of poems, I decided that I was ready for a defined, small-scale project collecting work by other authors.

I wanted to reach readers by delving into a significant life challenge and by offering poems that they would find moving, meaningful, and accessible. A collection of poems about cancer was the first thing that came to mind. My father died of cancer when he was almost forty-two years old and when I was eleven years old. He died very quickly after his diagnosis, about three months later. As an adult, I felt some of that same helplessness, turmoil and shock when a poet friend was diagnosed with cancer, and later, a family member. When I had to undergo ultrasound testing and a needle biopsy myself, I finally very concretely, if briefly, experienced a small portion of the terror that so many others have gone through.

I consulted Elise Partridge (who had published some superb poems about her experience of breast cancer in her book, Chameleon Hours) about the possibility of putting together a chapbook of poems by Canadian poets on the subject. Elise’s encouragement and feedback were invaluable to me as I gradually gathered poems. I already knew about poems written on the subject by a few other poets, such as Mari-Lou Rowley, Maureen Hynes, Rachel Rose, and Anne Simpson. In a few cases I contacted poets directly whom I had heard or known had had cancer. But in most cases, by word of mouth and by email enquiries, I gathered names, requested more books from the library, read through them carefully. When I found the kind of poems I wanted — beautifully crafted poems that had a first person perspective of cancer that offered kernels of hard-won insight, wisdom, beauty, self-awareness, or truth - I contacted the poets in question to tell them about the project and ask them if they would be interested in having their work included in a chapbook, the proceeds of which would be put toward cancer research and/or treatment.

I also ran a short writing workshop at InspireHealth for cancer patients, and got a sense of the kinds of poems that moved them, and read through a number of chapbooks produced by the non-profit Callanish Society that holds retreats for cancer patients and their families. It was pretty clear what kind of poems appealed and what kind were upsetting. Cancer patients and their families understand suffering, discomfort, pain and the fear of death intimately — they might be experiencing these things daily. So poems of witness by outsiders observing family members’ or friends’ suffering or pain, let alone poems of mourning and loss, didn’t seem appropriate. For this reason, I decided to choose poems with a first person perspective.

I had to winnow out many very fine elegies, even ones written by established or well-known poets, which reduced my file by half. I also left out several poems that focused on describing pain without providing other layers of feeling or context. I narrowed the poems down to those which cancer patients and their caregivers would most identify with and not turn away from, that were about their own experience from their own perspective, and ultimately about trying to stay alive and survive in the face of death. I wanted to put together a book that would honestly reflect the experiences of those who have faced cancer so that readers who are facing or who have faced cancer would feel understood, and less isolated. My aim was also to help family members, friends and medical professionals understand those experiences that are often challenging to convey.

Ursula Vaira of Leaf Press, a press that has produced wonderful high quality poetry chapbooks over the years, expressed interest in my project early on. My file of poems eventually turned out to be a slim volume rather than a chapbook, but I chose to stay with Leaf Press because of Ursula’s commitment to poetry and to this project.


Rob: In the introduction to The Bright Well, you note that the book is "a way to name the unnameable, stripping away platitudes, clichés, and new age pseudo-spiritualism." This reminded me of an essay by Joshua Mehigan in which he noted that "Two-thirds [of readers] think I’m repugnant for suggesting that poetry isn’t soul magic." But isn't it the spiritual, or pseudo-spiritual, or "magical" that some (many?) people who are facing cancer turn to, and that some would expect (or even hope for) in picking up your book?

Did you find it a tricky line to walk as an editor: to gather together poems that were both honest and unflinching, and yet still hopeful? That contained the soul-lifting without being "soul magic"? How do you think the best poems in the book accomplished this?

Fiona: In my introduction I was trying to distinguish between a true spiritual, soulful quality and the pseudo-spiritualism of some new age writing that relies on clichés and abstract sentiment (.e.g poor modern imitations of Rumi). Contemporary poetry can be very spiritual and soulful, yet remain quite concrete and specific. Many of the poems in The Bright Well are about the experience of facing death, and these poems not only depict or name an experience, but transform or transcend it through original, startling imagery or other poetic means. For example, Sue Downe’s poem, “Little Horse”, which in a few short phrases transforms a tumour by way of a metaphor into the symbol of a complex and unexpected journey. Sue Wheeler’s “The Sound of No Shore” is but one example of a poem that shows the kind of gut-wrenching life/death questioning that goes on during treatment. There are also other poems where the imagery plays an alchemical or a connective role - transforming painful experiences or imbedding them in a meaningful context. I think of Sandra Dunn’s pantoum, with its rounds of repeated lines about her grandmother’s words and protective presence during a childhood swimming lesson alleviating the terror of going under anaesthetic. Or the use of wool and thread images in Lois Lorimer’s poem, “Knitting”, to depict that basic need for connection and comfort from family while recovering from surgery. I chose the poems in the collection because they were deeply heartfelt and very much from the soul, as well as well-written. And yes it was a difficult process — that’s why the process took so long and why the book is as slim as it is.


Rob: When I heard about your book, I immediately thought of Elise Partridge's Chameleon Hours, specifically her two standout "Chemo Side Effects" poems (one of which, "Memory", is in The Bright Well). In first considering the anthology, did you have certain "must include" poems that immediately stuck out in your mind? Were there any poems you very much wanted to include but, for whatever reason, could not?

Fiona: A number of contributors had written entire books or long sequences of poems about the experience of cancer (e.g. Michael Harris, Susan Wheeler, Susan Downe, Richard Sommer, Luciano Iacobelli, Betsy Warland, Elise Partridge, Marianne Bluger). By selecting individual poems or excerpts, an editor is bound to lose the overall impact or effect of a series of poems by one author on one subject. The way the poems will play off each other or accumulate cannot be captured. Instead, an editor has to choose individual works by individual authors that will work as a cohesive whole, playing off each other and accumulating in a different way. In the end I chose a representative excerpt or sampling from those sequences or books that would cover various stages and aspects of the cancer experience.

One of my key objectives was that this book would whet readers’ appetite for more, hence the list of titles at the back of the book and the contributors’ comments and statements to readers that accompany their bios. I wanted to ensure that the important work of the contributors on this subject would not be forgotten. The Bright Well does not pretend to be a comprehensive compendium of cancer poems: rather it is a selection of fine poems by twenty accomplished Canadian poets about aspects of facing cancer. It might very well lead to more such collections — I hope so!


The Bright Well can be ordered from the Leaf Press website, or, if you're in Vancouver, in person at the launch on October 26th. See you there?

10/14/2011

some more efficient form of rescue

I will do anything to avoid writing. I hate every second of it. The only part of the process I like is having written, which I don’t think counts. If you’re now wondering why I write - I realise you’re not - the best answer I can give is that it’s the closest I’ve been able to come to song, to singing. I mean by this that my intent is always to reach some unbearable moment where time slows down and the sensual and psychological details compress and the language rises into what someone smarter than me once called the “lyric register”. The rest is just chewing gum and string. Honestly, if you can find some more efficient form of rescue, I recommend you do so.

- Steve Almond, in his lecture to the Tin House Writer's Workshop, entitled "Everything They Told You In MFA School is Wrong, Except The Part About The Debt" (podcast here). I quoted this a couple days ago, and I'm back because it's so damn quotable. Here's another quote from this talk posted somewhere else.

10/13/2011

two (ok, four) more october events

First up is a cool little project, spearheaded by Catherine Owen, entitled "Hot Sonnets". It's a 14 month calendar featuring photos of 14 Vancouver poets by Patrik Jandak with a 14 line poem by each. Poets in the calendar are Maxine Gadd, Fred Wah, Steve Collis, Miranda Pearson, Warren Dean Fulton, Diane Tucker, Catherine Owen, Judith Copithorne, Sonnet L'Abbe, Heidi Greco, C.R. Avery, George Bowering, Sandy Shreve and Kate Braid. Here are the details:

Hot Sonnets: 14 Vancouver Poets
Saturday, October 15th, 2011, 6:00 - 9:00 PM
W2 Media Café
#250-111 West Hastings Street, Vancouver
Featuring: Music, and readings by the poets
$20 (includes a calendar)

Second up, as if in response to my poverty-stricken-poet routine in my original post on the Vancouver 125 Poetry Conference, the V125PC has added three free readings on Friday, October 21st. To make things simple for you, they will all take place at the exact same place as the "Hot Sonnets" launch. The details:

V125PC Free Reading - Steven Heighton
Friday, October 21st, 11:00 AM
W2 Café
#250-111 West Hastings Street, Vancouver
Featuring: Steven Heighton
Free!


V125PC Free Reading - David Seymour
Friday, October 21st, 1:00 PM
W2 Café
#250-111 West Hastings Street, Vancouver
Featuring: David Seymour
Free!


V125PC Free Reading - Stephanie Bolster
Friday, October 21st, 3:30 PM
W2 Café
#250-111 West Hastings Street, Vancouver
Featuring: Stephanie Bolster
Free!


I've added them all to the big list for October.

10/12/2011

throwing beautiful words at the page and hoping to produce truth

When an inexperienced writer presents me with a story in which he or she exhibits style, what I tend to see is a writer pushing too hard, stepping between the reader and the fictional world. Style is doomed to the exact extent it implies a conscious effort to shape the language - maybe I should say “a self-conscious effort to shape the language.” When I really admire an author, somebody like Saul Bellow or Jane Austen or Toni Morrison, I don’t think of them as having a style. They’re not writing to impress the reader, but to implicate them. They’re not throwing beautiful words at the page and hoping to produce truth. They’re trying to capture complex and painful truths, which is what lifts the language into beauty. Style, in other words, is the residue produced by the dogged pursuit of truth.

- Steve Almond, in a lecture to the Tin House Writer's Workshop, entitled "Everything They Told You In MFA School is Wrong, Except The Part About The Debt." You can listen to a podcast of the lecture here, and I recommend you do. It's very, very good. Thanks to Mike Hingston for pointing it out.

10/11/2011

vigilant instead of receptive

When I begin work on a script I go from the beginning and distill each scene down to its essence. And then I try to name each scene with a word or two or more. It’s almost as if I’m trying to write a poem for each scene; articulating the inchoate, indescribable, unknowable. So, I go through the script and I go through and through it, with my mind and without it. Much the same way as when I’m reading a poem. And then I put the script down when the play or movie begins. Good acting, like a good poem, remains mysterious to me. I couldn’t tell you what it means, but I know it.

I used to try so hard to understand a poem. I was being vigilant instead of receptive. If the poem is saying the unsayable, I don’t need to articulate it back to myself with words. The poet has done that for me. If poems are about emotions, then that is the language I need to use when I’m reading them. Poetry has helped me become more versed, so to speak, in the language of emotion.

- Actress Lili Taylor, as part of Poetry Magazine's consistently enjoyable "The View From Here" series, in the October 2011 issue. You can read her whole essay here.

10/07/2011

the bloodsuckers are better organized



Poet Charles Bernstein at his rambling best, dark energy and all, at an Occupy Wall Street march. The Occupy Movement comes to Vancouver on Saturday, October 15th. You can get more information on the Occupy Vancouver website.

Poetry readings have begun at Occupy Wall Street. Hint, hint, Vancouver...

10/06/2011

i'm not writing books for people whose lives are perfectly great

Terry Gross: Why did you want to write about depression in your novel?

Jonathan Franzen: People who have a depressive cast of mind are usually the funniest people you meet, and there's nothing like putting a couple of Eeyores into the text to make it at least a little bit funny. What else? Why did I want depressives in here? It's, you know, most interesting people become somewhat depressed at some point in their life, and I'm not writing books for people whose lives are perfectly great. People whose lives are perfectly great probably don't need to read books like the kind I write. Only if you have some regular connection with some kind of darkness or difficulty or conflict does serious fiction begin to matter. And so it's simply realistic to let people, as the stories of their lives build toward dramatic peaks, to enter these dark woods from time to time.

- Jonathan Franzen, in interview with Terry Gross on Fresh Air. You can listen to the whole interview here and read the transcript here.

10/05/2011

some october readings

Vancouver is hosting three big-dog events this month, namely the Vancouver International Writers Festival, Surrey International Writers' Conference and Vancouver 125 Poetry Conference, which - in classic Vancouver style - are all happening at exactly the same time (well, October 18th - 23rd for VIWF, 21st - 23rd for SIWC, and 19th - 22nd for V125PC). Sometimes I want to line up all of Vancouver's lit event organizers and then run down the line slapping them.

Two of the three (VIWF and V125PC) are collaborating a bit, with two "shared" readings between the two festivals on the evenings of the 20th and 21st. In response, I have decided to temper the intensity of my slaps. But the slaps are still a-coming, people.

If you want to save some money and still take in great writers (often the same writers as at the big events), here are fifteen other (free or cheap) readings happening this month:


Twisted Poets Literary Salon
Thursday, October 6th, 7:00 PM — 10:00 PM
The Prophouse Cafe
1636 Venables Street, Vancouver
Featuring: Susan McCaslin and Duncan Shields
$5 (suggested donation)


The Kranky Reading Series

Thursday, October 6th, 7:00 PM
Kranky Cafe
#216-228 East 4th Avenue
, Vancouver
Featuring: Rebecca Keillor, Kevin Spenst, and Jenn Farrell
Free!


Robson Reading Series
Thursday, October 13th, 7:00 PM
UBC Bookstore, Robson Square
800 Robson St, Vancouver
Featuring: Martha Schabas and Johanna Skibsrud
Free!


TWS Reading Series
Friday, October 14th, 7:00 - 9:00 PM
Take 5 Cafe
429 Granville Street, Vancouver
Featuring: Jude Neale, Anthony Dalton, Adrienne Gruber and more!
Free!


Hot Sonnets: 14 Vancouver Poets
Saturday, October 15th, 2011, 6:00 - 9:00 PM
W2 Media Café
#250-111 West Hastings Street, Vancouver
Featuring: Music, and readings by the poets
$20 (includes a calendar)


Writing for Social Change Reading Series
Sunday, October 16th, 2:00 - 4:00 PM
Historic Joy Kogawa House
1450 West 64th Avenue
Featuring: Eric Enno Tamm
Admission by donation


V125PC Free Reading - Steven Heighton
Friday, October 21st, 11:00 AM
W2 Café
#250-111 West Hastings Street, Vancouver
Featuring: Steven Heighton
Free!


V125PC Free Reading - David Seymour
Friday, October 21st, 1:00 PM
W2 Café
#250-111 West Hastings Street, Vancouver
Featuring: David Seymour
Free!


V125PC Free Reading - Stephanie Bolster
Friday, October 21st, 3:30 PM
W2 Café
#250-111 West Hastings Street, Vancouver
Featuring: Stephanie Bolster
Free!


Third Friday Reading Series
Friday, October 21st, 8:00 PM
People's Co-op Bookstore
1391 Commercial Drive, Vancouver
Featuring: George Stanley and Mystery Guest (Oooooo...)
Free!


Emerge Anthology Launch
Saturday, October 22nd, 8:00 PM
Room 2555, World Art Centre, SFU Woodwards
149 West Hastings, Vancouver
Featuring: Readings by students of the SFU Writers Studio program
$10 (suggested donation)


Book Launch for The Bright Well: Contemporary Canadian Poems About Facing Cancer
Wednesday, October 26th, 7:30 PM
People's Co-op Books
1391 Commercial Drive
Featuring: Elise Partridge, Miranda Pearson, Rachel Rose, and Betsy Warland
Free!


Robson Reading Series
Thursday, October 27th, 7:00 PM
UBC Bookstore, Robson Square
800 Robson St, Vancouver
Featuring: Susan McCaslin and Christopher Patton
Free!


Cross-Border Pollination Series
Saturday, October 29th, 5:00 PM - 7:30 PM
SFU Harbour Center, Room 1415
515 W. Hastings Street, Vancouver
Featuring: Rob Taylor (that's me!), Maureen Hynes, Rhea Tregebov, and from Alaska: Peggy Shumaker, Joan Kane, and Sherry Simpson
Free!


Writing for Social Change Reading Series
Sunday, October 30th, 2:00 - 4:00 PM
Historic Joy Kogawa House
1450 West 64th Avenue
Featuring: Tara Beagan
Admission by donation

10/04/2011

nine? that seems a bit high

Quincy Lehr gives you the run down on promoting your poetry book:
And you might even get a review in a prestigious journal. The journal has a subscription base of 1,800 people, of whom 200 subscribed because they’d heard the thing was highbrow but give it a desultory look-over. Five subscribed online while high. Another 250 are shipped out to university libraries. Some 600 are subscriptions from former and would-be contributors largely looking to see what work of theirs might be appropriate to send in, given what’s been running lately. Thirty subscribers graduated from the same creative writing program as the editor, while another ten are undergraduate chums. Then there are the thirty or so contributors of poems, fiction, and critical articles. The reviewer of your book won’t buy a copy; she has the review copy. The editor might, except that the magazine reviews sixteen or so books of poetry a year, and he knows five of those under review, who take priority. Most of the poets look at the issue to check for typos and to make sure that the poems next to theirs don’t suck. Ditto the fiction writers. Of the seven contributors who read the review, one buys the book reviewed immediately after yours; two decide that your book doesn’t sound like their thing at all, four think they may well buy the book some day, and one actually buys it when you’re booked for a double-feature together nine months later. The subscribers, of the 400 who make it to the review in the back of the magazine, skim the review as a rule, noting the kind of poetry it is. Of these, 146 decide they might be interested, and nine actually buy it (out of the twenty-one who decided they should), one of whom because he lives in the same town as your publisher’s second cousin (who owns a bookstore and actually has your book on the shelf).

- from Lehr's article "Quincy Lehr on Selling Your Poetry Book" on the Contemporary Poetry Review website.

10/03/2011

someone who wears a lot of scarves or something

I took part in a couple noteworthy activities last week, starting with Word on the Street last Sunday.

As happens at what seems like every second Vancouver WOTS, we were rained out. This time, though, the wind got in on the action as well, blowing over half of the outdoor tents, including the poetry tent. So we all piled into the Poetry in Transit bus (which, to add to the occasion, had died and needed to be jump-started) for the reading, which was a real pleasure. The events of the day, including my reading, have been summarized elsewhere by Raoul Fernandes and Todd Wong (who snapped this photo of me post-reading. Thanks Todd!).


As Raoul notes in his post, Garry Thomas Morse really impressed with his reading - check out his new book, Discovery Passages, if you get the chance. In the darkness/excitement of the powerless bus reading, I forgot to snap any pictures of my Poetry in Transit placards. I have proof that they exist and are out there on buses, though, in the form of this tweet by a stranger - it was a fantastic way to find out that the placards have started going up! Thanks to WOTS and the ABPBC for making Sunday's events possible.

A couple days later I was off to Heritage Woods Secondary in Port Moody for my first attempt at reading my book (and some other poems) in a high school. I read all day, to classes of students ranging from grades 9 - 12. It was challenging at times, and deeply rewarding at others. A couple highlights included having fun with Ron Padgett's "Nothing in That Drawer" and chatting about living in Ghana (one of the student's in one of the classes was from the Volta region, and was able to provide all the context needed for my reading of the two "Ghana poems" in The Other Side of Ourselves). One of the best parts of the visit didn't come until the following day, when the teacher sent me a ream of comments the students had written after the visit. Some of the funniest:

“I think it was pretty cool that an actual poet talked to us. I liked his poems.”

“I think it was very interesting to see a poet come to our school. It made me realize that writers aren’t that special. They’re just ordinary people with extraordinary talents... which means that they’re extraordinary... confusing. It was interesting.”

"Yesterday was different than I expected because my idea of a poet is someone a bit older and more either artsy or depressedish, someone who wears a lot of scarves or something.”

“I finally learned what 'Pumped Up Kicks' was about.”

Yes, I talked with a class of high school students about a song about school shootings. I wonder if that will hurt my chances of getting invited back? But hey, I got confirmation that I was an actual poet, and I didn't have to wear a lot of scarves or anything. So that's cool.

Thanks to Ms. Van Gaalen and her students for giving me the opportunity!