Curious links for September 2014...
1) Lit Live, Hamilton's foremost reading series, is preparing to kick-off its 2014/2015 season on Sunday, September 7th at Homegrown Hamilton.
Details are here. Those of you living in Toronto, Niagara or other southern
Ontario locales might like to plan a day-trip some Sunday soon, as the full
line-up promises to bring writers from all over Canada. I followed the second
half of last year’s series and wrote about it here, here and here.
2) 49th Shelf has compiled a “Most Anticipated” list of poetry books that will hit shelves in September and October. It features new titles by the likes of Ken
Babstock, Clare Caldwell, Nelson Ball, Laura Farina, and so many more. (For
some Lit Live crossover anticipation, it also includes forthcoming books by
John Terpstra and Ellen Jaffe!)
3) Ottawa poet
Sandra Ridley is writer-in-residence at Open Book Toronto for the month of
September, and already it's mesmerizing. In her first two posts, entitled "Hello, My Name is Diane", Ridley
details her relationship with anxiety and how it has shaped her performances
and social life. As someone who occasionally shames his own intense anxiety
(hence the impetus for my outsider status), I find it downright exciting to
read Ridley’s brave accounts of actions and thought-patterns that casual
onlookers might see as flighty or distracted. Bringing awareness to mental
health is as important in the writing community as anywhere else, so the more
sharp and observant voices, the better.
4) I have several
Puritan related hi-jinx to share in the space of a paragraph. Besides releasing
their crazy-big Summer Issue and counting down the days until the Thomas Morton Memorial Prize
deadline (September 23rd), most Puritan writers are hard at work on
their own essays, interviews and projects. Caryn Cathcart interviewed The Darcys’ bassist Dave Hurlow for his first collection of short stories, Hate
Letters From Buddhists. Jess Taylor wrote a stunning essay on the state of
Toronto’s literary union. And Phoebe Wang will bring her micropress workshop back to Artscape Youngplace for a second run beginning September 24th.
5) Chaudiere Books’ Indiegogo campaign might end in two weeks but not before rob mclennan
and Christine McNair dish up an assortment of new, tantalizing perks! Late-breaking collectibles
include signed, out-of-print Stephanie Bolster books and rare, complete runs of
STANZAS magazine (1993-2006). As further incentive to support this revived
press, we're getting fresh hints about future releases such as The
Complete Poems of William Hawkins, edited by Cameron Anstee, and Chris Turnbull’s
Continua. As of post-time, Chaudiere's within $1000 of their goal; let’s help get them through the homestretch!
Comments
Post a Comment