This was my second time seeing Joan Thomas read. Having added her book, Reading by Lightning, to my ever-growing pile of new books but not having had the chance to dip into it, I was re-intrigued by her reading.
I also wanted to note how very gracious and intelligent her introductions are.
It makes me hate her a bit, actually. I'm not good at thanking people in private, never mind in public, and sounding intelligent? Well...
In any event, I'm happy to share a longish chunk of today's reading...
I take full responsibility for the crappy sound and none whatsoever for the literary goodness on offer.
(It was a longer longish chunk, which I edited down...you missed camera shake and also a rather loud giggle.)
Tuesday, September 23, 2008
Flickr-ing: throng!
The events alcove filled to the brim at the afternoon book chat.
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Flickr-ing: high noon 3
Janine and bev, writing and publishing types, at Joan's reading.
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Flickr-ing: high noon!
Joan Thomas greets people at her nooner event.
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Behind the Scenes #3: Perry Grosshans, GM
Or, More More More Behind the Scenes at THIN AIR Day 2
Well, we've had Lift Off and now we're in orbit!
Up early this morning to get to MTYP. The next three hours are rush, rush, rush, pray, pray, pray, as I wait for furniture, water, glasses, linens, wine and a fridge to arrive. We hang banners, and drap cloths, and pin skirts for tables, and arrange, arrange, arrange.
It's school event, very entertaining and fun, except that every now and then Ken's lapel mic sounds like a horde of bats is flying over him (really, no fooling...squealing little bats...weird but somewhat fitting).
But that's Day One - little bugs. Eventually Chris C the Tech Guy figures it out: the cordless mic is sharing the same frequency as the cordless mics in another rehearsal room. Fixed.
At the Mainstage tonight, a bunch of little blips and blurps: no quarters for change at the bar (begging people for change); No books for the draw (borrowed them from McNally); Charlene forgetting to mention the surveys and to direct people where to put the finished ones...and really, no designated place FOR them! We still managed to gather a bunch (thanks to all who filled them out), and tomorrow we'll designate a place for finished ones.
All in all, nothing to destroy the Festival, but all those little first night bumps you try to plan for...but can't.
Oh, and Tavia parking in the wrong spot and getting towed, and I had to go and rescue her and Genni Gunn from the U of Wpg and go get her car from the impound lot. Really - hard to plan for that.
Well, we've had Lift Off and now we're in orbit!
Up early this morning to get to MTYP. The next three hours are rush, rush, rush, pray, pray, pray, as I wait for furniture, water, glasses, linens, wine and a fridge to arrive. We hang banners, and drap cloths, and pin skirts for tables, and arrange, arrange, arrange.
It's school event, very entertaining and fun, except that every now and then Ken's lapel mic sounds like a horde of bats is flying over him (really, no fooling...squealing little bats...weird but somewhat fitting).But that's Day One - little bugs. Eventually Chris C the Tech Guy figures it out: the cordless mic is sharing the same frequency as the cordless mics in another rehearsal room. Fixed.
At the Mainstage tonight, a bunch of little blips and blurps: no quarters for change at the bar (begging people for change); No books for the draw (borrowed them from McNally); Charlene forgetting to mention the surveys and to direct people where to put the finished ones...and really, no designated place FOR them! We still managed to gather a bunch (thanks to all who filled them out), and tomorrow we'll designate a place for finished ones.
All in all, nothing to destroy the Festival, but all those little first night bumps you try to plan for...but can't.
Oh, and Tavia parking in the wrong spot and getting towed, and I had to go and rescue her and Genni Gunn from the U of Wpg and go get her car from the impound lot. Really - hard to plan for that.
Flickr-ing: the writer, the volunteer
Madeline coopsammy, poet, personing the hosp suite.
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Consider yourself warned
I have made a horrible discovery. The Winnipeg International Writer’s Festival uses addictive psychotropic drugs to lure people into a life of literacy. I know this because I can feel them working their heinous magic this very second. I would have told you sooner, but I showed no signs of infection until today.
I suspect I’m feeling their effects faster than you because they got to me early (I knew I shouldn’t have taken Ariel’s lunch recommendation at that blogger meeting. The drugs were in the chicken).
I first noticed something was wrong around 8:00 pm last night. I was minding my own business, enjoying a quite a family gathering that had taken me away from the festival, when all of a sudden I started to get this funny feeling in my stomach. It was like there was a 5lb rock playing trampoline on my diaphragm. Within a few minutes I was having heart palpitations and difficulty breathing. I considered calling an ambulance, but it was too late, I was chasing the dragon.
Before I knew what was happening I was lost in a wash of memories. Soon the rock in my stomach and the flutter in my chest seemed familiar. In one brief moment I saw every party I wasn’t invited to and every school dance I couldn’t attend. I was feeling the regret of missing something that could be special. I was feeling it like I was sixteen. I was feeling it about the festival.
Luckily, I had enough of a grasp on reality left to remember that special moments at the writer’s festival only happen once in a life time. And since I had already seen one of those moments in my lifetime (my good friend George’s reading way back when), I knew that there was no way one could’ve happened tonight. I knew I shouldn’t be feeling this way. I knew it was impossible. I knew I must have been drugged. It was the only possible explanation.
At first I was frantic. Should I go to the hospital, should I try to vomit, should I call Chandra and yell at her for getting me into this mess? What should I do?
And then it came to me...warn as many people as you can.
So here it is:
They’ve got the drugs, they’ve got the writers and eventually, if you keep coming around, they’ll get you too.
Consider yourself warned.
* * *
Jason Diaz is a Winnipeg-based writer and bookstore employee. His poems and prose have been previously published in dark leisure magazine. He was interviewed for the Uniter once and is probably the only blogger here licensed to drive forklift. He doesn’t have any books coming out, but would most likely write one if asked.
I suspect I’m feeling their effects faster than you because they got to me early (I knew I shouldn’t have taken Ariel’s lunch recommendation at that blogger meeting. The drugs were in the chicken).
I first noticed something was wrong around 8:00 pm last night. I was minding my own business, enjoying a quite a family gathering that had taken me away from the festival, when all of a sudden I started to get this funny feeling in my stomach. It was like there was a 5lb rock playing trampoline on my diaphragm. Within a few minutes I was having heart palpitations and difficulty breathing. I considered calling an ambulance, but it was too late, I was chasing the dragon.
Before I knew what was happening I was lost in a wash of memories. Soon the rock in my stomach and the flutter in my chest seemed familiar. In one brief moment I saw every party I wasn’t invited to and every school dance I couldn’t attend. I was feeling the regret of missing something that could be special. I was feeling it like I was sixteen. I was feeling it about the festival.
Luckily, I had enough of a grasp on reality left to remember that special moments at the writer’s festival only happen once in a life time. And since I had already seen one of those moments in my lifetime (my good friend George’s reading way back when), I knew that there was no way one could’ve happened tonight. I knew I shouldn’t be feeling this way. I knew it was impossible. I knew I must have been drugged. It was the only possible explanation.
At first I was frantic. Should I go to the hospital, should I try to vomit, should I call Chandra and yell at her for getting me into this mess? What should I do?
And then it came to me...warn as many people as you can.
So here it is:
They’ve got the drugs, they’ve got the writers and eventually, if you keep coming around, they’ll get you too.
Consider yourself warned.
* * *
Jason Diaz is a Winnipeg-based writer and bookstore employee. His poems and prose have been previously published in dark leisure magazine. He was interviewed for the Uniter once and is probably the only blogger here licensed to drive forklift. He doesn’t have any books coming out, but would most likely write one if asked.
Line of Inquiry: Andrew Hood
Andrew Hood studied in the creative writing program at Concordia in Montreal and won the Irving Layton Award for Undergraduate Fiction there. His first collection of stories, Pardon Our Monsters (Vehicule Press), won the 2007 Danuta Gleed Literary Award for the best first collection of short fiction in English. The Montreal Review of Books called it “a powerhouse of artistry” and the Globe and Mail calls it “uncannily, magnificently good.”
After graduating from Concordia, Hood filtered beer at the McAuslan Brewery, and then returned to his home town of Guelph where he now lives and writes.
* * *
1) As a writer (i.e. someone whose artistic practice is predicated on time spent alone) how do you approach performance? What do you get out of it?
The last step of editing I take - before I consider a final draft "done" - is reading the story out loud, refining the rhythm and diction that way, so I think my prose is generally conducive to performance. And performing a story is certainly more immediately gratifying and constructive, what with your being able to gauge a listening audience's reaction in a way you'll never be able to with a reading audience. When I'm alone and plugging away, I really relish the thought of eventually taking that piece out of that shut off place and into the fresh air. Over the two or so years that I was working on the stories in Pardon Our Monsters I had a lot of chances to perform the work, usually in a rough form, and I think that really helped shape them. At that time in Montreal (and probably still) poetry was fairly ubiquitous and I was often the only story writer on those bills.
The thing with poetry is that there's always something lost in either direction from page to the stage - I find that poetry which works really well on the page often falls flat when done live, and poetry that works well live just doesn't work in a book. Prose yarns, on the other hand, tend to be gangbusters in either medium. So much of reading poetry has to do with rumination over time, whereas fiction relies much more heavily on reaction in time. I find that nothing susses the proof out the pudding better that reading a story for a live audience; it either works or it doesn't, and your listeners will let you know.
2) What do you want people to know about Pardon Our Monsters?
Trying to work out a brief synopsis for the back of the book was all kinds of painful. The thing should speak for itself, hopefully. But if I had to speak on behalf of the book, then I'd probably assure people that, for the most part, the stories in there are all about love. There is plenty of violence, ugliness, confusion, rancor, and cruelty in the stories, sure, and it's easy to dwell and focus on those elements, but maybe more difficult is seeing that all of that bad business comes from want of love, or loss of love, or the stress of love. There's a line in the first story that, for me, sums up those that follow. It goes something like: "It's the hardest fucking thing in the world to love someone who hates themselves so much." The "fucking" might have been edited out, but that's the way it was originally written, and that sentiment is at "the heart" of the book. Probably.3) Will this your first time in Winnipeg? What have you heard?
I drove from BC to Montreal this summer. A friend was supposed to join me, though he bowed out on the trip a day or so before. I had planned the trip to get him to Toronto in time for a wedding in Toronto, and I just went ahead and kept that schedule anyway, so instead of taking my time, I blew through the country in five days, driving for as long as I had sun. So I passed through Winnipeg, but was then fairly delirious and pushing for Kenora.
That's the only time I've been to Winnipeg and I haven't heard much about Winnipeg except for that Weakerthans song that goes "I hate Winnipeg." And the people I have known from Manitoba have expressed the same sort of attitude. (On the other side of dour, I've also heard a great deal of good things about the tight, but crazy active art scene there.) But, like any real hate, there has to be a fundament of love. I think you can't help but hate the place you're from. I've moved back to my hometown, Guelph - which is the Corbet in the book - to do some research and some work, and I say every day that I hate it. But nowhere else feels like this place. I don't think you can have any sort of full, round love without a stain of hate somewhere in there. I suspect that we resent most those things that mean the most to us. So I'm sure Winnipeg is lovely.
4) What are you reading right now? What are you writing right now?
Flannery O'Connor's Everything That Rises Must Converge blows my hair back; I read it at the beginning of summer and have been coming back over and over again. Just recently I've read Capote's Other Voices, Other Rooms along with his Collected Stories. Those two - maybe by dint of their both being Southern - create these amazing children - children characters I mean - kids that are as smart as the Glass kids, but without the intelligence. Besides those, I've been reading a lot about the Russian Mennonites that settled in the prairies, so a lot of Rudy Wiebe and this guy Frank Epp. I just finished Lee Henderson's The Man Game. I enjoyed that.
As for writing, I've been about as distractable as a cat in an aviary this summer, so it's been all over the place--I can't seem to sit still with a story these days. I've been working away at some short stories that I've mentally collected as "Traps and Attractions", the title coming from a novella-in-progress about the vortexes in Sedona, the recreationists in Tombstone, and the notion of "sexual tourism." Alongside those stories, I've been working on some connected historical yarns that I see as, if not a sort of history of Canada, then at least one of Ontario, ranging from the Scots failed attempt to create a colony in Panama, the founding of Guelph by the novelist John Galt, the Great Toronto Fire of 1904, the Mennonite Selbstshutz during the Bolshevik Revolution, and the moon landing, with some diving horses, two headed colts, and decapitated cats thrown in there somewhere. (If it never gets around to being written, then I figure I'll at least have this description of it to remember it by.)
5) How is filtering beer like/unlike writing?
I'm glad you asked. Filtering and editing share many similar qualities, I've found. During the time I was editing the manuscript of POM and finishing up a few final stories for it I was working the 10pm to 6am shift filtering beer, so I had a lot of time to think about the correlations - it's called the graveyard shift because you're basically dead to the world. What it comes down to (or distills to, ha!) is patience. Brewing, filtering, and bottling beer on a rather strict weekly schedule is no easy feat, as you can't do squat with the brew until it decides it's ready. The beer calls the shots. Fermentation time can be predicted and controlled fairly well, but each batch will behave uniquely. Sometimes the beer will ferment quickly, and sometimes the yeast will be sluggish and take forever. When the time comes to filter the beer, the objective is to get all the shit out of there - the yeast is gotten out with a centrifuge, and the proteins with diatomaceous earth. Beer needs time to sit before it's filtered, the yeast that is suspended during fermentation needs to settle, otherwise your filtration will be hell.
Given time to sit, I find that a story sort of edits itself - all the redundant and cockamamie elements fall to the bottom, will separate themselves in time. For me, the best thing I can do from a story is walk away from it for a while, so I can come back to it with a perspective that's a little bit more on the outside, somewhat closer to a reader's perspective. And oftentimes, for me, it is those initial elements of the story, those impetuses and self-prompts, that are necessary to the writing of the story, that are the first to go in editing. The story has used up those activating ingredients, like the yeast eats up the sugar to make the alcohol, and when you've got your story just boozy enough, you need to get out the yeast.
Granted, all that's a bit of a stretch, but it made perfect, clear, sterling sense at the time.
* * *
Andrew Hood will be appearing at THIN AIR, Winnipeg International Writers Festival:
September 23 - Mainstage, with Maurice Mierau, Mary Swan, and Saleema Nawaz.
September 24 - Campus Program, Red River College, with Rosanna Deerchild.
Monday, September 22, 2008
Flickr-ing: audience reaction
Morley Walker, Winnipeg Free Press Books Section editor, and Carol Dahlstrom, publishing woman-about-town, chat, post-mainstage.
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Flickr-ing: ready for company
Karen makes the hosp suite pretty...
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AFTERNOON BOOK CHAT: Davidson & Friedman
Andrew Davidson and Elyse Friedman both have a flare for eccentric characters. Whether it's a burn victim who is convinced there is a snake crawling up his spine or a grown man who gets sexual gratification from being treated like a baby, complete with soother and diaper and smoochie-gootchie speaking, these writers have an amazing ability to stick themselves into some twisted, twisted shoes.
This afternoon, at McNally Polo Park, they spoke about their writing, how they accomplish such leaps of imagination, how they edit and how they become inspired.
What was interesting was how different their approach to writing was. When asked about where their stories and their characters originate, Andrew said that "I don't find my characters, my characters find me." Elyse, on the other hand, finds that by taking common pop-culture characters and flipping them on their heads (her example was, instead of a celebrity stalker, a celebrity that stalks his fans), she can create some interesting people to write about.
When it comes to the editing process, they also had completely different methods.
Elyse prefers to edit as she goes, writing small amounts daily and then going over it before she moves on. Andrew, on the other hand, says that he throws out 85% of what he writes, preferring to get his ideas onto the page and giving himself complete freedom to throw away anything and everything.
He also had a piece of editing advice that I thought was really good, saying that, while he needs to write in absolute silence, he prefers to do his editing in coffee shops. His reasoning was that he needs the little distractions public places provide, because without them he would over-think every word.
There was plenty of good advice aside from the stuff I've posted here today, and I understand that there will be a video posted of the conversation later on the WIWF website. I encourage everyone to check it out.
* * *
Brad Hartle likes books. One day he may try to write one, though nothing is certain. For now, he spends his days in the basement of a big stone building in Downtown Winnipeg and his evenings in a big brick apartment in Crescentwood, where he lives with his wife, two cats, and a scattering of toothpicks, needed because he refuses to see a dentist. He is almost always happy.
This afternoon, at McNally Polo Park, they spoke about their writing, how they accomplish such leaps of imagination, how they edit and how they become inspired.
What was interesting was how different their approach to writing was. When asked about where their stories and their characters originate, Andrew said that "I don't find my characters, my characters find me." Elyse, on the other hand, finds that by taking common pop-culture characters and flipping them on their heads (her example was, instead of a celebrity stalker, a celebrity that stalks his fans), she can create some interesting people to write about.
When it comes to the editing process, they also had completely different methods.
Elyse prefers to edit as she goes, writing small amounts daily and then going over it before she moves on. Andrew, on the other hand, says that he throws out 85% of what he writes, preferring to get his ideas onto the page and giving himself complete freedom to throw away anything and everything.
He also had a piece of editing advice that I thought was really good, saying that, while he needs to write in absolute silence, he prefers to do his editing in coffee shops. His reasoning was that he needs the little distractions public places provide, because without them he would over-think every word.
There was plenty of good advice aside from the stuff I've posted here today, and I understand that there will be a video posted of the conversation later on the WIWF website. I encourage everyone to check it out.
* * *
Brad Hartle likes books. One day he may try to write one, though nothing is certain. For now, he spends his days in the basement of a big stone building in Downtown Winnipeg and his evenings in a big brick apartment in Crescentwood, where he lives with his wife, two cats, and a scattering of toothpicks, needed because he refuses to see a dentist. He is almost always happy.
Thoughts from Oodena
"How long will $100 last in a crack pipe?"
"Not long."
"If you smoke the memories of your son, will they last longer?"
"Yeah."
The words above are from a poem Jordan Wheeler read at the opening night of the Writers Festival (and forgive me if they are not Jordan's exact words, I'm quoting from memory). Before last night, I had never heard of Jordan Wheeler. When he took the stage, the small cobblestone circle at the bottom of an amphitheatre near the point where the Assiniboine River flows into the Red, a place called Oodena, he told us how he was asked to write something about Winnipeg, something that speaks to his relationship with the city.
Before beginning, he apologized to the City Councilor standing behind him for what he was about to say. He laughed a little, and so did the 100 or so people seated and standing around him. He then went on to read three of the most honest and unflinching pieces about the lives of aboriginal people in Winnipeg that I have ever heard. He spoke about disease, about addiction, about tasers, about poverty, about "Sweet Honey Brown" women found in the river downstream from where we sat, and about fathers who have lost their sons. He spoke of the cycles that keep people living these lives, and he did so in a way that could shock the complacency from anyone.
I had intended for my contributions to this blog to be about the craft of writing, and I went to last nights readings hoping to glean some insight into this topic. But Jordan's poems really grabbed me, as they probably did to so many of the people there, and they haven't let go.
I spent the next while trying to figure out why. Was it the fact that there was a City Councilor seated behind him, that he was speaking truth to power? Was it the immediacy of the images he conveyed? Was it the tone he spoke in? The experience he spoke of? I couldn't pinpoint it. I still can't.
As he finished, as people began clapping, I noticed a few gulls swooping through the sky above. As they flew, some turned their stark white stomachs towards the last glint of sun still showing, warming themselves in that warm dusk-light. I thought of how they have always flown over this spot and how I hope they always will. I thought of how, for thousands of years, people have sat where I was sitting and have listened to others tell stories, and how I hope people always will.
I then thought of the stories Jordan told. I hope he will continue to tell them, but I do not hope that he will always have to. I thought of how, with writers like Jordan telling their stories, there are good reasons to hope.
Thank you Jordan.
* * *
Brad Hartle likes books. One day he may try to write one, though nothing is certain. For now, he spends his days in the basement of a big stone building in Downtown Winnipeg and his evenings in a big brick apartment in Crescentwood, where he lives with his wife, two cats, and a scattering of toothpicks, needed because he refuses to see a dentist. He is almost always happy.
Line of Inquiry: Genni Gunn
Genni Gunn is a writer, musician and translator who has published two novels, two short story collections, two poetry collections, and two translations from the Italian of Dacia Maraini’s poetry. Her work has been recognized with nominations for a host of prizes, including the Commonwealth Prize, the Gerald Lampert Poetry Award, the Journey Prize, the John Glassco Translation Award, and the Premio Internazionale Diego Valeri. Her most recent projects are the 2007 poetry collection, Faceless (Signature Editions), and an opera libretto, Alternate Visions, produced in Montreal in 2007.
Genni Gunn has a B.F.A. and an M.F.A. from the University of British Columbia. She lives in Vancouver.
* * *
1) As a writer (i.e. someone whose artistic practice is predicated on time spent alone) how do you approach performance? What do you get out of it?
Performance, for me, is a natural extension of creation. I say this, because I spent many years as a musician, and in that genre, although the practice and creation of new work took place in solitary confinement so-to-speak, it would have been useless without performance. Does music exist if there’s no one to hear it? When it comes to writing, sometimes in fiction, the performance takes place between the reader and the page. But poetry – a language of rhythms and sounds – begs be read aloud, so that its music can be heard.
2) What do you want people to know about Faceless?
In Faceless, I’m exploring the impulse for the edge, that intriguing attractive place between safety and disaster, and the faces and masks we don while journeying through our lives. I began the title poem when I heard that odd, interesting, ironic story about the woman whose dog clawed her face off, and her subsequent facial transplant. It naturally set me thinking about faces and identity, and the multiple facades and personas we adopt in our dealings with others.3) Will this your first time in Winnipeg? What have you heard?
I’ve been to Winnipeg several times – once earlier this year for a day – and during my musician days on various occasions. I hear it’s a hotbed of art. Many of our finest writers come from Winnipeg, so there must be something in the water or the air. Oh yes, I hear it’s windy too.
4) What are you reading right now? What are you writing right now?
I read constantly, so this answer will be out of date within days. However, two books I’ve really loved recently are Damon Galgut’s The Impostor and Daphne Marlatt’s The Given. In terms of my own writing, I’ve just completed a new novel, and I’m working on a collection of stories.
5) You've written both fiction and poetry. Do ideas come pre-packaged as fiction or poetry or do you have to live with them for a while before a form suggests itself?
I keep a journal of ideas, and don’t think about form until those ideas insinuate themselves into my consciousness. Sometimes two disparate ideas come together to suggest a story or a poem. Sometimes an image surfaces. Or a scrap of conversation. There’s no set rule. Whatever sets me off in whatever direction.
* * *
Genni Gunn will be appearing at THIN AIR, Winnipeg International Writers Festival:
September 22 - Campus Program, University of Winnipeg.
September 22 - Mainstage, with Duncan Thornton, Andrew Davidson and Elyse Friedman.
The big confrontation
I’ll have to be honest with you; I thought it’d take me longer to figure out who ruined my life. I thought I could stretch it out all week long and have a really cool detective-type thing going on, but unfortunately the festival screwed me again.
Turns out the person in charge of booking the festival is also in charge of introducing everyone on opening night. So that’s it. I’ve already solved the mystery. All the festival has left me with is “the big confrontation”.
And let me tell you, if this Charlene woman keeps wearing pant suits like she did tonight, that’s definitely not going to happen. It was a very powerful pant suit. She topped it with a shiny blazer. It had a nice line.
But enough about her smart outfit. What it all boils down to is that because of this festival, my big shot at being a real writer is in the toilet. I don’t have an angle. Without an angle I’m a reporter and who wants to be that?
Anyway, what am I going to write about now? I guess I could write about the authors, but why would anyone want to hear about them. In my experience, they’re kind of boring. Mostly they just sit around and write. Sometimes they throw things, but that’s about it. I figure most of them live their lives in the twenty foot radius around their desks and that’s not exactly the stuff that’s going to keep people glued to their computer screens. As of opening night, this gig sucks.
Ah whatever, I have to write something so here is a rundown on opening night.
The thing starts up with this Charlene women saying hi. It was pleasant enough. She thanked some people and tried to hock some raffle tickets. I was not thanked, nor did I buy a raffle ticket. If I had an expense account I probably would have bought one, but I don’t. Once she was done, we move onto the politicians.
Normally politicians annoy me, but I’ll have to say, today they didn’t. I think it had to do with two things. First, without the government the arts don’t happen. They give us creative types the money necessary to do what we do. But more importantly, they didn’t “eat the microphone,” so you couldn’t really hear them.
Next, one of the festival’s board of directors spoke. I can’t really tell you what she said either cause I wasn’t really listening, but she seemed like a cool lady. I caught her bobbing her head, slapping her lap and grooving to the rhythm of the spoken word guy. That lady’s got beat.
When she finished, the formalities came to an end and the writers finally started reading.
They were all commissioned to write something about Winnipeg. All of them did except one guy, but he was from St. Boniface. You know about them.
The first guy, Wheeler I think his name was, he was great. He took a risk and led off with the tough side of this city. He painted the picture we don’t like to share. I liked it. You have to be tough to live here. Al Purdy tough.
I think Carol Matas was next. She talked about how no matter how hard you try, this city always pulls you back. To that I say, sing it sister. The place is a black hole, not even light can escape.
After Carol came a guy with a jaunty hat. Him I liked a lot. Not only was he dressed to kill, but he almost sold a painting and had the best gimmick ever. He wrote his piece about Winnipeg on what was presumably a map of Winnipeg. I need to start thinking like him. I need a better gimmick. Cranky just doesn’t sell anymore. Oh yeah, his poem was good too.
Chandra Mayor was up next. She looked fabulous. She got caught on her chair, but she looked great doing it. She read about places in this city that no longer exist. It was kind of sad.
Actually, come to think of it, everybody was making me feel sad. Is there anything about this place that doesn’t involve loss, heartache and the desire to run?
Oh yeah, there was the guy with the hat.
The last person to read was the guy from St. Boniface. Like I said, he didn’t really write about Winnipeg, but what he did write was a lot like here. He talked about the kiss to end all kisses. How it is the best and the worst, the up and the down, the everything and the nothing. To me that’s a pretty good description of here. It’s everything I wanted, but not.
Well, I guess that’s all I really saw tonight. I’m sure it wasn’t as exciting or riveting as a detective story, but what can you do when you’re being persecuted by an entire festival. Bye for now.
* * *
Jason Diaz is a Winnipeg-based writer and bookstore employee. His poems and prose have been previously published in dark leisure magazine. He was interviewed for the Uniter once and is probably the only blogger here licensed to drive forklift. He doesn’t have any books coming out, but would most likely write one if asked.
Turns out the person in charge of booking the festival is also in charge of introducing everyone on opening night. So that’s it. I’ve already solved the mystery. All the festival has left me with is “the big confrontation”.
And let me tell you, if this Charlene woman keeps wearing pant suits like she did tonight, that’s definitely not going to happen. It was a very powerful pant suit. She topped it with a shiny blazer. It had a nice line.
But enough about her smart outfit. What it all boils down to is that because of this festival, my big shot at being a real writer is in the toilet. I don’t have an angle. Without an angle I’m a reporter and who wants to be that?
Anyway, what am I going to write about now? I guess I could write about the authors, but why would anyone want to hear about them. In my experience, they’re kind of boring. Mostly they just sit around and write. Sometimes they throw things, but that’s about it. I figure most of them live their lives in the twenty foot radius around their desks and that’s not exactly the stuff that’s going to keep people glued to their computer screens. As of opening night, this gig sucks.
Ah whatever, I have to write something so here is a rundown on opening night.
The thing starts up with this Charlene women saying hi. It was pleasant enough. She thanked some people and tried to hock some raffle tickets. I was not thanked, nor did I buy a raffle ticket. If I had an expense account I probably would have bought one, but I don’t. Once she was done, we move onto the politicians.
Normally politicians annoy me, but I’ll have to say, today they didn’t. I think it had to do with two things. First, without the government the arts don’t happen. They give us creative types the money necessary to do what we do. But more importantly, they didn’t “eat the microphone,” so you couldn’t really hear them.
Next, one of the festival’s board of directors spoke. I can’t really tell you what she said either cause I wasn’t really listening, but she seemed like a cool lady. I caught her bobbing her head, slapping her lap and grooving to the rhythm of the spoken word guy. That lady’s got beat.
When she finished, the formalities came to an end and the writers finally started reading.
They were all commissioned to write something about Winnipeg. All of them did except one guy, but he was from St. Boniface. You know about them.
The first guy, Wheeler I think his name was, he was great. He took a risk and led off with the tough side of this city. He painted the picture we don’t like to share. I liked it. You have to be tough to live here. Al Purdy tough.
I think Carol Matas was next. She talked about how no matter how hard you try, this city always pulls you back. To that I say, sing it sister. The place is a black hole, not even light can escape.
After Carol came a guy with a jaunty hat. Him I liked a lot. Not only was he dressed to kill, but he almost sold a painting and had the best gimmick ever. He wrote his piece about Winnipeg on what was presumably a map of Winnipeg. I need to start thinking like him. I need a better gimmick. Cranky just doesn’t sell anymore. Oh yeah, his poem was good too.
Chandra Mayor was up next. She looked fabulous. She got caught on her chair, but she looked great doing it. She read about places in this city that no longer exist. It was kind of sad.
Actually, come to think of it, everybody was making me feel sad. Is there anything about this place that doesn’t involve loss, heartache and the desire to run?
Oh yeah, there was the guy with the hat.
The last person to read was the guy from St. Boniface. Like I said, he didn’t really write about Winnipeg, but what he did write was a lot like here. He talked about the kiss to end all kisses. How it is the best and the worst, the up and the down, the everything and the nothing. To me that’s a pretty good description of here. It’s everything I wanted, but not.
Well, I guess that’s all I really saw tonight. I’m sure it wasn’t as exciting or riveting as a detective story, but what can you do when you’re being persecuted by an entire festival. Bye for now.
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Jason Diaz is a Winnipeg-based writer and bookstore employee. His poems and prose have been previously published in dark leisure magazine. He was interviewed for the Uniter once and is probably the only blogger here licensed to drive forklift. He doesn’t have any books coming out, but would most likely write one if asked.
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