News Archive
Last chance to fill out our readership survey
Wednesday, July 07th, 2010
Our Readership survey will be running for another three weeks. It takes about five minutes to complete and you will be entered into a draw for one of five free subscriptions to Canadian Literature.
Current Issue: 50th Anniversary Interventions, #204 (Spring 2010)
Thursday, June 10th, 2010
Canadian Literature's Spring 2010 issue (CL#204), "50th Anniversary Interventions", looks back on Canadian Literature's 50th Anniversary Gala, and celebrates Canadian culture with papers about Duncan Campbell Scott, book policies, copyright, civil war poetry, and new Québecois literature.
We are still dining out on stories of the 50th Canadian Literature Anniversary Gala, which was a rich literary and intellectual feast. We have titled this issue after the interventions provided by many of those who came to our workshop. Laura Moss, who took the lead on this wonderful event, has more to say about these pieces below. However, suffice it to say here that we asked the participants to comment on the future both of the field of Canadian literature and the journal. They provided us with many specific suggestions on how the journal might meet the challenges to come. With the help of our Editorial Board (many of whom were present), we will consider all of this advice seriously.
—Margery Fee, "Past, Present, and Future"
The written interventions compiled here showcase some of the round-the-room conversations we had in October, but they are incomplete. The sessions were ninety minutes long, with five or six interventions presented in each, and an hour of discussion. We can’t capture those conversations here, or the ones we shared around the sushi, salmon, tea, or cookies. For instance, a good deal of time was spent noting very practical ways to combat funding cuts to the arts and culture, and to universities, other time was spent discussing the logistics of an academic life, and still other time was passed in conversations about new works of fiction and poetry. Not all interveners opted to submit their interventions for publication here either: David Chariandy spoke of the concept of being "post-race," Jeff Derksen focused on the dangers of neoliberalism, Sneja Gunew commented on cosmopolitanism, Julia Emberley deconstructed promotional material for Canadian Girl dolls, Judy Brown modelled the value of slowing down in the classroom, Richard Cavell noted the presence and absence of Marshall McLuhan in the journal, Glenn Deer talked about the politics of reviewing, and Manina Jones highlighted the need for close readings. And here we do not have the keynote addresses beautifully delivered by Aritha van Herk, Reingard Nischik, or W.H. New, or the important research being done by the graduate students at the workshop: Matthew Hiebert (on George Woodcock), Margo Gouley (on Isabella Valancy Crawford), Brenna Clarke Gray (on Douglas Coupland), Paul Huebener (on time), Kathryn Grafton (on reading publics), Cristina Ivanovici (on European Atwoods), Allison Hargreaves (on indigenous reconciliation), David Gaertner (on limits of reconciliation), and Samuel Martin (on Alistair MacLeod and Wayne Johnston). Eight students were selected, first by their home universities and then by our adjudication panel, to receive travel awards to present fifteen-minute papers on their doctoral research at the workshop. Their contributions to the event were invaluable. So, these interventions should be read as important segments of the myriad conver- sations that occurred in a glass-walled room surrounded by cedars on the unceded Musqueum territory of the UBC campus in the fall of 2009.
—Laura Moss, "Introduction: Generous and Grounded Connections"
See our Media page for pictures and video from the Gala.
Website news
Tuesday, May 11th, 2010
There have been a few changes at canlit.ca over the past few months and I want to give a quick update:
Cumulative search engine
Major changes have been made to our Cumulative search engine. You can search our back issues in a number of different ways and, when available, will be linked directly to content. Bonus infographic of our most popular search terms here.
Back issues archive
We put downloadable PDF versions of issues #1 - #155 in our archive. They are broken up in to full issues, individual articles, and the books reviews section.
Readership survey
We are conducting a readership survey. It takes about 5 minutes to complete, and you have the option to enter yourself into a draw for 1 of 5 free subscriptions to Canadian Literature.
CanLit Poets
CanLit Poets has been given a makeover and new content has been added. A new administrative application that allows updates from the poets themselves is almost done and will be released, along with a new batch of invitations, very soon.
Real-time canlit.ca
On the right side of every page is the "Real-time canlit.ca" sidebar that lets you see what (and where!) other people are reading.
Call for papers
Lots of interesting research ideas are in our Call for papers section. See our submissions details if you are interesting in submitting an article on any of those (or any other) subjects.
Social media
We are on Facebook, Twitter, Flickr, and Vimeo. For a trial period, Facebook "like" buttons have been added to Book Reviews and CanLit Poets pages.
—Matthew
Possible downtime today
Friday, April 30th, 2010
Canlit.ca might be inaccessible today for maintenance. Apologies for any inconvenience.
Readership Survey
Thursday, April 22nd, 2010
We are conducting a readership survey at canlit.ca/survey. It takes about 5 minutes to complete, and you will be entered into a draw for 1 of 5 free subscriptions to Canadian Literature.
Interview with Thomas King
Wednesday, April 14th, 2010
Jordan Wilson interviews Thomas King during our 50th Anniversary Gala celebration.
[W]riting is a maturation process. It's a journey. You don't know where it's going to take you.
—Thomas King
See the interview page for the second part of the video and a full transcript.
Steven Galloway's Dorothy Black Lecture
Thursday, March 04th, 2010
As part our 50th Anniversary celebration, we presented the 2010 Dorothy Black Lecture on September 30, 2009.
Introduction by Judy Brown, associate book review editor at Canadian Literature and professor at UBC's English department
Current Issue: Home, Memory, Self, #203 (Winter 2009)
Tuesday, February 23rd, 2010
Canadian Literature's Winter 2009 issue (CL#203), "Home, Memory, Self", celebrates the home with papers about migrant identities, ghettoization, comics history, Alzheimer's disease, settlement narratives, and exile writing.
Since this is the first issue for which I have been the designated editorial writer since our 200th issue, and as part of my resolve to learn more about the history of the journal, I decided to see how [George] Woodcock marked important anniversaries.
—Margery Fee, "Home, Memory, Self"
Visit our archive for more information.
Laurie Ricou's “Top Ten Sports-in-Can-Lit Moments”
Wednesday, February 17th, 2010
To celebrate the 2010 Winter Olympic and Paralympic Games in Vancouver, Canadian Literature presents Laurie Ricou’s "Top Ten Sports-in-Can-Lit Moments" (from his editorial, "Thinking Tremolo and Backflip," in Canadian Literature #202).
Please submit your own list of ten (or less) moments and we'll (maybe) publish them!
Editing The Cambridge History of Canadian Literature
Wednesday, January 20th, 2010
Coral Ann Howells and Eva-Marie Kröller, co-editors of The Cambridge History of Canadian Literature, reflect on their experience of editing the volume.
As, for example, Bruce Greenfield's chapter on explorers' narratives and Marta Dvorák's discussion of writing related to migrations and multiple allegiances from Frances Brooke to Thomas Chandler Haliburton make clear, global mobilities have always affected Canadian literature to some extent. We found particularly interesting the case of the Black United Empire Loyalists, because of the bestselling success of Lawrence Hill's novel The Book of Negroes and because of George Elliott Clarke's role as educator in keeping the public memory of this particular migration alive. Mobility, as imperialist quest or as enforced exile, is a key theme in Canadian writing that deserves to be studied further.
—Eva-Marie Kröller
Fold-over poetry
Wednesday, January 06th, 2010
For Congress 2008, I made a Fold-over poetry game (writing poetry one line at a time with multiple people) to get some traffic at our booth. It was a lot of fun and people kept coming back to see what lines were getting added.
While I wasn't looking, some people went ahead a wrote a pretty good one:
Fold-over Poem #22
Everything starts somewhere
Except the times it don't
make any sense to worry about
who's judging your decision
it's a whole bunch of shame for a whole bunch of reasons
leaving him at home so I could go and bed Edith
who came from the coast, looking like a dream
on a navy night we parted
the stars crying their sympathies
tearing down the nighttime solitude with light
empty streets, empty faces passed us by as we parted
submitting a smirk that would surprise a porcupine
smarmy enough to smother the sharp spine
of the gargantuan monster made out of twine
Add a line to the next one here.
Current Issue: Sport and the Athletic Body, #202 (Autumn 2009)
Thursday, December 10th, 2009
Canadian Literature's Autumn 2009 issue (CL#202), "Sport and the Athletic Body", celebrates the Vancouver Olympics with papers about sport, postcolonialism, masculinity, race, culture, multiculturalism, globalization, disability studies, and creative writing. Guest edited by former Canadian Literature editor, Laurie Ricou.
I was sitting in the campus cafeteria wondering how to introduce this issue when two Japanese students approached with a questionnaire on health and fitness—part of their English-language training. Question 3 was “What is the greatest benefit of physical activity?” They are probably still puzzling over my ready answer: “It fosters an ability to appreciate poetry.” “Oh,” they said smiling demurely, “that’s a good answer.”
—Laure Ricou, "Thinking Tremolo and Backflip"
UPDATE: Canadian Literature issues #101 - #150 now online, too!
Wednesday, December 09th, 2009
Big thanks again to Hung Te for doing such a great (and quick!) job getting our back issues online. See the archives to explore almost 40 years of Canadian Literature.
Thomas King at the Museum of Anthropology
Wednesday, December 09th, 2009
As part our 50th Anniversary celebration, we presented Thomas King as the 2010 UBC English Department Sedgewick Lecture on October 1, 2009.
Introduction by Dennis Danielson, Head of UBC English, and Linc Kesler, Director of the UBC First Nations Studies Program.
Canadian Literature issues #1 - #100 now online!
Tuesday, December 08th, 2009
Issues #1 - #100 of Canadian Literature are now available as PDFs (#101 - #150 coming soon) from our issue archive pages. Special thanks to our co-op student, Hung Te Tjia, for his time spent cutting up articles.
[...] Just as technology has meant that proofs are no longer assembled on kitchen tables, so now it means that those who want to browse through the back issues of the journal will be able to do so via the internet. We have just started to put the back issues of the journal on-line: issue number one, up for only a few days, has already had 30 hits. We hope to have the first 150 issues up by the time you read this. Then we’ll pause while we turn to transforming our submission process so that instead of requiring authors to stick those colourful little paper squares on envelopes to send in their articles, it will all happen on the web.
Our more recent issues are available electronically to anyone who belongs to a library which has a subscription to one or more of the aggregators to which we licence the journal, which certainly includes most university libraries in North America and Europe, and many public and school libraries in Canada. However, on a visit to Hungary last spring, I discovered that not all university libraries can afford either the paper or the electronic subscription. Even universities with courses in Canadian literature fall into this category, and there are many such universities in the world now, thanks to the efforts of the International Council for Canadian Studies. So we will keep moving to make more and more of the journal freely available, insofar as this is possible without becoming a drain on the university’s finances.
—Margery Fee (forthcoming editorial in Canadian Literature #203)
Interview with Reingard Nischik
Wednesday, December 02nd, 2009
We just posted audio and a transcript of Sarah Banting's interview with Reingard Nischik from our 50th Anniversary Gala.
And you should never be surprised again, no Canadian should ever be surprised again, that international scholars, scholars from abroad, take a large interest in your literature.
—Reingard Nischik
Larissa Lai reads "Rachel" from The Automaton Biographies
Wednesday, December 02nd, 2009
Featured CanLit Poet: Daniel David Moses
Tuesday, November 03rd, 2009
Every couple of weeks, we will be promoting a "Featured Poet" from the CanLit Poets archive on this site and @canadianlit. This week is Daniel David Moses:
Playwright, poet, essayist, and teacher, Daniel David Moses is a Delaware from the Six Nations lands in southern Ontario, Canada. He holds an Honours B. A. in General Fine Arts from York University and an M. F. A. in Creative Writing from the University of British Columbia. His plays include his first, Coyote City, a nominee for the 1991 Governor General’s Literary Award for Drama, The Indian Medicine Shows, a winner of the James Buller Memorial Award for Excellence in Aboriginal Theatre and, his best known, Almighty Voice and His Wife. He is also the author of Delicate Bodies and Sixteen Jesuses, poems, and co-editor of Oxford University Press’ An Anthology of Canadian Native Literature in English, 3rd Edition, 2005. His most recent publications are Pursued by a Bear, Talks, Monologues and Tales (2005) and Kyotopolis, a play in two acts (2008), both from Exile Editions. His honours include the Harbourfront Festival Prize, a Harold Award, a Chalmers Fellowship and being short-listed for the 2005 Siminovitch Award. He teaches as a Queen’s National Scholar in the Department of Drama at Queen’s University, Kingston, Ontario.
Visit CanLit Poets for more info.
CanLit Poets wins a Canadian Online Publishing Award
Wednesday, October 28th, 2009
Canadian Literature's poetry archive, CanLit Poets, won a Canadian Online Publishing Award (presented by Masthead) in the Best Cross Platform category!
George Elliott Clarke, who has been involved with the archive since the very beginning, attended the ceremony to accept the award on our behalf and read a speech:
On behalf of Canadian Literature, I would like to thank all the poets who have generously donated their time to make the archive a success. CanLit Poets draws on the many poems published in Canadian Literature since it was founded in 1959—it is not only moving poetry from print to web, but is also an offshoot from an academic journal designed to educate and inspire young poets.
Canadian Literature is delighted to win an award for online publishing and is excited that we have been able to make our website appealing and useful to a wider audience than university students and researchers. The main drive is to expose high school students to great poetry, no matter where they live in the world, so that they will be inspired to write poetry themselves. Canadian Literature staff member Matthew Gruman deserves credit for having this idea and carrying it through to completion. This award from Masthead will give Canadian Literature inspiration to be more creative with its website.
Film Screenings: The Snow Walker and Fugitive Pieces
Wednesday, October 14th, 2009
In cooperation with the Vancouver International Film Festival, we will be presenting The Snow Walker (November 2, 2009 @ 7pm) and Fugitive Pieces (November 4, 2009 @ 7pm) at the VanCity Theatre (1181 Seymour St., Vancouver, BC).
The Snow Walker
A pilot who delivers supplies to tribes in the backwoods of the Canadian north is implored to escort a sick young Inuit woman to a hospital. On the flight back, the plane's engine fail and they crash in the wastelands. Rescuers are unable to locate them and the two are left to struggle for their survival. The ailing woman thus teaches the hot-headed pilot the way to live in these regions.
Fugitive Pieces
Fragments of past and present create a haunting kaleidoscope of words and emotions. Lyrical and complex, Jeremy Podeswa's adaptation of Anne Michael's beloved novel builds into a breathtaking mosaic as fragments of the past and present reveal the inner depths of a writer who can't let go of the ghosts that haunt him.
Athos is directing an archaological dig in Nazi-occupied Poland when he discovers a little boy hiding. After witnessing the massacre of members of his family, seven-year-old Jakob does not know the fate of his beloved sister Bella - a mystery that will haunt him for the rest of his life. As Jakob grows into a man, he becomes progressively more consumed by his family's tragedy and his longing for Bella, coloring his relationships. A truly moving and unforgettable story.
Featured CanLit Poet: Steven Heighton
Thursday, October 08th, 2009
Every couple of weeks, we will be promoting a "Featured Poet" from the CanLit Poets archive on this site and @canadianlit. This week is Alan R. Wilson:
Steven Heighton is the author of the novel Afterlands, which has appeared in six countries, was a New York Times Book Review editors' choice, and was recently optioned for film. He has also published The Shadow Boxer (a Canadian bestseller and a Publishers' Weekly Book of the Year), Flight Paths of the Emperor and The Address Book. His poems and stories have appeared in many magazines and anthologies, including London Review of Books, Poetry, Tin House, The Walrus, Europe, Agni, Poetry London, Brick, and Best English Stories. Heighton has won several awards and has been nominated for the Governor General's Award, the Trillium Award, a Pushcart Prize, the Journey Prize, and Britain's W.H. Smith Award.
Visit CanLit Poets for more info.
Canadian Literature 50th Anniversary Gala photos
Wednesday, October 07th, 2009
Photos from our 50th Anniversary Gala are in!
Featured CanLit Poet: Alan R. Wilson
Wednesday, September 02nd, 2009
Every couple of weeks, we will be promoting a "Featured Poet" from the CanLit Poets archive on this site and @canadianlit. This week is Alan R. Wilson:
Alan R. Wilson was born and brought up in New Brunswick and now lives in Victoria, BC. His work has appeared in over 40 journals and anthologies, includingIn Fine Form: The Canadian Book of Form Poetry (Raincoast) and Jailbreaks: 99 Canadian Sonnets (Biblioasis). He has written one novel and three volumes of poetry. The most recent, Sky Atlas (Fitzhenry and Whiteside), was shortlisted for the 2009 Atlantic Poetry prize. His novel, Before the Flood (Cormorant) was shortlisted for the Stephen Leacock Memorial Medal for Humour, the BC Book Prize for Fiction, and won the 2000 Books in Canada/Chapters First Novel Award. A screenplay based on a chapter was a winner in the Atlantic Film Festival Competition and was produced and aired on CBC and Global. He has recently completed his second novel, Lucifer's Hair, and hopes to see it in print before his daughter starts grade one.
Visit CanLit Poets for more info.
Canadian Literature 50th Anniversary Gala
Wednesday, September 02nd, 2009
In 2009, Canadian Literature marks its 50th year of publication. To celebrate, The University of British Columbia, and its Faculty of Arts, will hold a Canadian Literature Gala September 30 to October 3, 2009. The program includes:
- Distinguished Canadian writers and scholars reading and speaking. Confirmed speakers are Thomas King, Steven Galloway, Roch Carrier, and Aritha van Herk.
- A reception and auction of works of art donated by Canadian writers including Margaret Atwood, Leonard Cohen, Dennis Lee, and Joni Mitchel. Visit the auction page for a complete list. Proceeds to support the Canadian Literature 50th Anniversary Tuition Awards for undergraduate students interning at Canadian Literature.
- A two-day conference featuring presentations by distinguished academics and graduate students from Canada and abroad. 35 Canadian literature specialists representing 21 universities across Canada will be presenting 5 minute "interventions" on the future of the field, writing, and academic publishing over the course of the two-day conference. Students, nominated by their own departments, will be selected for 50th anniversary travel awards to enable them to present their research.
- Launch of From a Speaking Place: Writings from the First 50 Years of Canadian Literature, to be published by Ronsdale Press.
- In cooperation with the Vancouver International Film Festival, a mini-festival of films based on Canadian literary works, late October 2009.
- A literary tour of Vancouver.
- To conclude the Gala, a no-host luncheon, with featured speaker W.H. New OC, FRSC, Editor of Canadian Literature, 1977-1995.
Visit the 50th Anniversary Website for more information.
Featured CanLit Poet: Crystal Hurdle
Thursday, August 20th, 2009
Every couple of weeks, we will be promoting a "Featured Poet" from the CanLit Poets archive on this site and @canadianlit. This week is Crystal Hurdle:
Crystal Hurdle teaches Creative Writing and English at Capilano University in North Vancouver. In October 2007, Crystal was Guest Poet at the International Sylvia Plath Symposium at the University of Oxford reading from her After Ted & Sylvia: Poems. Crystal's poetry has been published widely in anthologies and journals, including Canadian Literature, Fireweed, The Dalhousie Review, and The Capilano Review, of which she was Fiction Editor, and on whose Board of Directors she currently sits.
Visit CanLit Poets for more info.
Current Issue: Strategic Nationalisms, #200 (Spring 2009)
Wednesday, August 19th, 2009
The current issue of Canadian Literature "Strategic Nationalisms," celebrates our 50th anniversary. It features essays by Tony Tremblay, Ellen Rose, Erica Kelly, Janice Fiamengo, Tim McIntyre, Joubert Satyre, and Eileen Lohka; poetry by Russell Thornton, Lolette Kuby, Helen Guri, Richard Harrison, Dave Margoshes, and Neile Graham; and our regular collection of book reviews.
In September 2008, a most extraordinary thing happened in Canada. Culture became the central issue in a federal election campaign, briefly eclipsing discussions of climate change and the economy. It ignited, in the bellicose language of the day, the latest rendition of "Canada's culture war." National attention was sparked by the announcement of 45 million dollars in cuts from the government arts and culture budget. Speaking in Saskatchewan, Prime Minister Stephen Harper clearly miscalculated public opinion on the importance of the link between culture and national identity when he called culture a "niche issue": "You know, I think when ordinary working people come home, turn on the TV and see a gala of a bunch of people, you know, at a rich gala, all subsidized by the taxpayers, claiming their subsidies aren't high enough when they know the subsidies have actually gone up, I'm not sure that's something that resonates with ordinary people"(qtd. in O'Malley) … If Harper was trying to tap into what Scott Bakker calls the "low-brow resentment" of culture, he seems to have failed. Instead, he resurrected a longstanding ideological debate about government support for the arts …
—Laura Moss, "Strategic Cultural Nationalism"
Visit the archives for a full Table of Contents, poetry, and links to Book Reviews.
Featured CanLit Poet: David Margoshes
Tuesday, August 04th, 2009
Every couple of weeks, we will be promoting a "Featured Poet" from the CanLit Poets archive on this site and @canadianlit. This week is David Margoshes:
Dave Margoshes is a Regina poet and fiction writer. He's published a dozen books, including three volumes of poetry, the most recent being Purity of Absence, in 2001, from Beach Holme Press. Earlier books were Walking at Brighton (Thistledown) and Northwest Passage (Oberon). A new book of poetry, The Horse Knows the Way, is appearing in fall 2009 from Buschek Books. His last book, Bix's Trumpet and Other Stories, won two prizes at the 2007 Saskatchewan Book Awards, including Book of the Year. He's won a number of other writing awards, including the Stephen Leacock Prize for Poetry and second prize in the League of Canadian Poets' National Poetry Contest. He's a past vice president of the League of Canadian Poets.
Visit CanLit Poets for more info.
An Interview with Thomas King
Thursday, July 23rd, 2009
Thomas King (1943 - ) grew up in California. He has a PhD in English and American studies from the University of Utah and is currently Professor of English and Creative Writing at the University of Guelph. He is the author of fifteen novels and short story collections, including A Coyote Columbus Story (1992) and Green Grass, Running Water (1993), which were both nominated for the Governor General's Award. In 2003, he was chosen to deliver the prestigious Massey Lectures, published as The Truth about Stories. A year later, Thomas King was made a member of the Order of Canada.
I think maybe Native writers in Canada feel a little bit like a piece of furniture that gets moved in and out of the house at periodic points. So, with me it's sort of like, "We don't need the Cherokee anymore, let's find an American. Oh my God, he's an American. Leave him in the corner there." I don't know how to deal with that particularly and it's kind of fun because I'll do talk shows every so often. And they'll say, "Well, how does it feel to be an American in Canada?" And I'll say, "Well, I'm a Canadian, you know. I've got citizenship." "Really. But you're still an American, right?" "Well, yeah, but I'm Cherokee, too." "What's that got to do with anything?" they'll say. "Well, you know, I guess it doesn't for this show, but the next one I'm going to be on..."
—Thomas King
Featured CanLit Poet: Robert Kroetsch
Wednesday, July 22nd, 2009
Every week, we will be promoting a "Featured Poet" from the CanLit Poets archive on this site and @canadianlit. This week is Robert Kroetsch:
I grew up on a farm in central Alberta and attended the University of Alberta. I worked in the North for six years, then went to graduate school in the US for another six. By the time I was in my thirties I was ready for serious writing. Since then I've published nine novels and numerous books of poetry, essays, a travel book, a journal. I forget what else. I worked for 34 years as a professor, half that time in Upstate New York, the other half in Manitoba. I received the Governor General's Award for my 1969 novel, The Studhorse Man. In 2004 I received the Order of Canada. I have a book of poems coming out next spring with the University of Alberta Press. The title is Too Bad: Sketches Toward a Self-Portrait.
—Robert Kroetsch
Visit CanLit Poets for more info.
Canadian Literature in Chinese
Thursday, June 11th, 2009
From the latest Charlesworth promotion for Canadian journals in China.
Featured CanLit Poet: M. Travis Lane
Thursday, June 11th, 2009
Every week, we will be promoting a "Featured Poet" from the CanLit Poets archive on this site and @canadianlit. This week is M. Travis Lane:
Poetry prizes won by M. Travis Lane include the Mary Harding Baylor Prize 1952, Northern Light 1975, the Pat Lowther Memorial Award 1980, Arc 1982, Fiddlehead 1991, New Brunswick Writers’ Federation 1994, Amethyst Review 1997, the Atlantic Poetry Prize 2001, the Alden Nowlan Prize for Excellence 2003, and the Banff Centre Bliss Carmen Poetry Award 2006. She is included in The Dictionary of Literary Biography: Canadian Writers Since 1960, ed. by W. H. New. Her work is included in over two dozen anthologies. She is a Lifetime Member of the League of Canadian Poets and Honorary President of The Writers Federation of New Brunswick. Her 11th book, The All Nighter's Radio, will be released in late 2009.
Visit CanLit Poets for more info.
An Interview with Elizabeth Bachinsky
Wednesday, June 10th, 2009
Elizabeth Bachinsky was born in Regina, Winnipeg and grew up in Prince George. She is the author of three books of poetry, Curio (BookThug, 2005), Home of Sudden Service (Nightwood, 2006), and most recently God of Missed Connections (Nightwood, 2009). Her work has been nominated for the Governor General's Award for Poetry in 2006 and the Bronwen Wallace Award in 2004. She currently lives in Vancouver, BC, where she teaches creative writing at Douglas College and is Poetry Editor for Event magazine.
[T]here is an economy of language that gets ideas across quickly to other people in poetry. It can. That possibility is heightened with poetry. And there is an intimate quality to poetry, and an expectation that people have of poetry to fulfill intimacy. And it's interesting that people do connect with the work. But that's really revealing to me. It tells me a lot about readers rather than about myself so much. I feel very fortunate when people come and talk to me about being connected to anything I've written. I think wow, that's a real honour for people to come up and talk to me that way.
—Elizabeth Bachinsky
David Bromige, 1933-2009.
Tuesday, June 09th, 2009
On the beautiful blogsite (http://bromige.wordpress.com/) dedicated to the memory of English-Canadian-Californian poet David Bromige, who died on June 3 2009 in Sebastapol California, he is described through multiples illustrative of a full life. He was a "poet, writer, reviewer, actor, farmer, explorer, cartographer, storyteller, illustrator, piano player, driver, swimmer, traveler, brother, uncle, father, grandfather, husband, friend, and mentor." He was a Canadian poet who was born in England and lived most of his life in California. Bromige's writing and career maps the trajectory of much contemporary poetry. As an undergraduate at UBC in the early 60s, he was involved with the TISH group of poets and participated in key events such as the 1963 Vancouver Poetry Conference and the 1964 Berkeley Poetry Conference. After attending graduate school at UC-Berkeley, he became a teacher at Sonoma State University and published over thirty books of poetry including The Gathering (1965), Ten Years in the Making (1974), Birds of the West (1974), Tiny Courts in a World Without Scales (1991), As in T, As in Tether (2002), and Ten Poems from Clearings in the Throat (2005). He published with Canadian presses New Star, Brick, talonbooks, and Coach House, as well as American ones Black Sparrow and dpress. One of his most remarkable works is Piccolo Mondo (1998), a collaborative novel written with George Bowering, Angela Bowering, and Michael Matthews, and published by Coach House Books. Bromige's work garnered many accolades, including awards from the National Endowment for the Arts, the Canada Council, the Pushcart Prize for Poetry, and the Western States Arts Award for Desire: Selected Poems 1963-1987. (Black Sparrow Press, 1988). Visit the blog to read many touching tributes to this close friend of poetry.
Featured CanLit Poet: Cyril Dabydeen
Wednesday, June 03rd, 2009
Every week, we will be promoting a "Featured Poet" from the CanLit Poets archive on this site and @canadianlit. Our first is Cyril Dabydeen:
Cyril Dabydeen has written eight books of poetry, five of stories, and three novels. He also edited A Shapely Fire: Changing the Literary Landscape and Another Way to Dance: Contemporary Asian Poetry in Canada and the U.S. His poetry and fiction have appeared in over 60 magazines in Canada, the U.S., the U.K., Australia, Asia and the Caribbean, and anthologized in over 20 volumes in seven countries, including in Best Canadian Short Stories (Oberon) and Caribbean New Wave: Contemporary Short Stories (Heinemann). An editor of the Journal of Caribbean Studies (US), his most recent books are Uncharted Heart: Poems (Borealis Press) and Drums of My Flesh: Novel (long-listed for the IMPAC/Dublin International Prize, co-winner of Guyana Prize for Fiction, and finalist for the City of Ottawa Book Prize). He juried for Canada's Governor General's Award for Literature (Poetry) and the Neustadt International Prize for Literature (University of Oklahoma) in Year 2000. He has read from his books across Canada, the US, UK and Europe, the Caribbean and Asia. He currently teaches English at the University of Ottawa, Canada.
Visit CanLit Poets for more info.
Interview with George Elliott Clarke
Wednesday, May 27th, 2009
George Elliott Clarke, born in 1960 in Nova Scotia, is a poet, playwright and literary critic who also writes verse novels, operas and screenplays. He holds a PhD in English from Queens University, as well as several honorary degrees from other Canadian universities. He is currently the E.J. Pratt Professor of Canadian Literature in the Department of English at the University of Toronto. In 2002, he won the Governor General's Award for poetry for Execution Poems (2001), and in 2006 he received the Order of Nova Scotia.
Our household was not one that was really into watching hockey games, although we would do that when there were the Stanley Cup playoffs happening or something, of that sort, but more into presidential nominations, or speeches by the prime minister, or the Ed Sullivan show. If the Beatles were on, we were made to watch. It was like, you have to watch this! We were forced to watch; it's history. You have to watch this.
—George Elliott Clarke
CanLit Games
Wednesday, April 29th, 2009
Fold-over Poetry
An online/poetry version of fold-over stories. Collaborate with people around the world and add a line (or two)!
CanLit Poetry Trivia
Test how well you know Canadian Literature's poetry!
Call for Papers: Queerly Canadian
Thursday, April 16th, 2009
"Queerly Canadian: Changing Narratives"—Special Issue of Canadian Literature—will highlight scholarship that explores fictional and non-fictional narratives that document individual, political, community and cultural change through the very act of enunciation. Specifically, we invite contributions to the special issue that ask how queer narratives have changed, not only the changes from l/g to l/g/b to l/g/b/t to queer, but broad shifts in codes, contexts and practices of complex identification in relation to society and to history.
See Call for Papers for more information.
canlit.ca Updates
Wednesday, April 15th, 2009
canlit.ca Updates is a way to keep track of what is happening on the Canadian Literature website. Every time we add new content, a short note appears on the box at the upper right. This includes:
- New Book Reviews
- CanLit Poets
- Interviews
- News
- CanLit Scholars
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Canadian Literature Podcast
Wednesday, April 08th, 2009
Canadian Literature's podcast—featuring audio and video from our Interviews section, and an exclusive interview with Québébecois author Yves Beauchemin—is available through iTunes.
You can subscribe by clicking here, entering "http://www.canlit.ca/feeds/podcasts.rss" in the Advanced>Subscribe to Podcast..." menu, or searching for "Canadian Literature" in the iTunes store.
Call for Poetry: Everything New is Now and Again
Wednesday, April 01st, 2009
Canadian poetry is not what it used to be. Not that it was ever a definable entity, however much we might long, at key moments, to delineate a shape. Its concerns have always been diverse. What is newness now? It might still embrace the lyric. It might fly off the page. It might examine the shapes and mutations of the letter as graphic. It might shake up the sentence, or toy with the line. It might have deep ethical commitments. It might love the shiny surface of style. It might outrageously claim the specificity of race, class and/or gender experience. It might inject the body with new DNA, creating biotech chimeras. It might dance digitally, hypertexting itself into virtual space. It might sing fresh "Inglishes" for bodies other than those that English was designed for. It might route itself through non-Western language, sound, form or thought. Without raising Pound, or the not-so-new millenium, might we talk about repetition as the unpredictable that knocks on the door?
Canadian Literature invites poetry submissions from across the range of poetic practice among Canadian writers. We are particularly interested in poetry that experiments with form, sound, and compositional method; poetry with social and/or political concerns; and poetry that engages or pushes beyond the possibilities suggested above. Emerging, mid-career and established poets are all equally encouraged to submit. Please submit poems to a maximum of two pages in length. Attach a cover letter that lists a few of your most recent publications, if any. Canadian Literature publishes only previously unpublished poems. Submissions can be mailed in hardcopy and include a self-addressed envelope with return postage attached, or by email in PDF format (to ensure proper layout) to cl.poetry@ubc.ca. Each submission should be limited to five poems or less. We do not accept multiple submissions. Submitting poets must be Canadian citizens or residents of Canada.
New Interviews
Thursday, March 26th, 2009
We are pleased to publish two new interviews:
Richard Van Camp
Richard Van Camp is a proud member of the Dogrib (Tlicho) Nation from Fort Smith, NWT, Canada. A graduate of the En'owkin International School of Writing, the University of Victoria's Creative Writing BFA Program, and the Master's Degree in Creative Writing at the University of British Columbia, Richard currently teaches Creative Writing with an Aboriginal Focus at the University of British Columbia in Vancouver, BC. He is also an online instructor with the Emily Carr Institute teaching Creative Writing and Storytelling. As well, Richard works with Musqueam First Nations youth with the Musqueaum Youth Project.
Addena Sumter-Freitag
Addena Sumter-Freitag is a 7th generation African Canadian. She grew up in Winnipeg's North End, and has lived all across Canada. Addena is well known for her provocative poetry and powerful performances and has been likened to Maya Angelou.
Please visit our interview section to read, watch, and listen to these.
Current Issue: Asian Canadian Studies, #199 (Winter 2008)
Wednesday, March 25th, 2009
The current issue of Canadian Literature, "Asian Canadian Studies," is a special issue guest edited by Guy Beauregard. It features essays by Guy Beauregard, Christopher Lee, Ikyo Day, Donald C. Goellnicht, Marie Lo, Glenn Deer, Roy Miki, Rita Wong, Lily Cho, and Henry Yu; poetry by Tim Mook Sang, Angela Long, Dale Lee Kwong, Changming Yuan, and Terry Watata; and our regular collection of book reviews.
In an essay that investigates “why interethnic antiracism matters now,” George Lipsitz asserts that “while ethnic studies is doing very well, ethnic people are faring very badly” (296). In making this assertion, Lipsitz seeks to identify and confront the implications of “the disparity between the sta- tus of ethnic studies and the status of ethnic communities” in the United States (296–97). He acknowledges that this disparity stems in part “from the personal failings of individual scholars, from the elitism and ideologi- cal conservatism at the core of academic career hierarchies, and from the isolation of many ethnic studies scholars from the activities of actual social movements” (297). But he also underlines that “the ethnic studies para- digm itself, as it has emerged historically, is also partly responsible for the problems we face” (297)—a point that has been addressed in a variety of ways by prominent ethnic studies scholars in the United States over the past twenty years (see, for example, Hirabayashi and Alquizola; Kim; and Omi). Particularly problematic for Lipsitz is what he calls “a one-group-at-a-time story of exclusion and discrimination rather than an analytic, comparative, and relational approach revealing injustice to be the rule rather than the exception in our society” (297). For Lipsitz, new forms of capitalist exploi- tation and new forms of racism in the postindustrial United States demand “new methods, theories, and strategies” to help us investigate what he calls “the interconnectedness of oppressions” (297).
Guy Beauregard, "Asian Canadian Studies: Unfinished Projects"
Visit the archives for a full Table of Contents, poetry, and links to Book Reviews.
Publishers Survey
Thursday, March 05th, 2009
We are conducting a quick (2 - 3 minutes) survey at http://www.canlit.ca/survey for Canadian publishers. We value your input, and would greatly appreciate knowing what you think.
Call for Papers: Prison Writing / Writing Prison
Wednesday, March 04th, 2009
Guest Editors: Roxanne Rimstead (Université de Sherbrooke) and Deena Rymhs (St. Francis Xavier University)
While prison writings from other national contexts have increasingly occupied the attention of critics, little scholarly attention has been paid to Canada's own prison narratives. This special issue of Canadian Literature responds to such a critical gap at a historical juncture when the number of those incarcerated in Canada continues to rise. With the ascendance of the prison as an industrial complex, and with a disproportionately high number of Native people incarcerated by the state, we might consider the "new garrisons" by which the Canadian imaginary organizes itself.
See our Call for Papers page for more details.
Call for Sports Poetry
Tuesday, January 27th, 2009
In recognition of Vancouver 2010, the Winter Olympics and Paralympics, Canadian Literature proposes to publish a special issue devoted to "Canadian Literature and Sport." We welcome any submissions that embrace the two elements of this topic. An Olympic or winter sport connection is not essential.
We would like to extend this theme to the issue's selection of poetry. Please see our Submission Guidelines for more information on how to submit your poetry. The deadline for submissions is March 1, 2009.
Canadian Literature 50th Anniversary Gala
Thursday, November 20th, 2008
In 2009, Canadian Literature marks its 50th year of publication. To celebrate, the University of British Columbia, and its Faculty of Arts, will hold a Canadian Literature Gala 30 September to 3 October 2009. The program includes:
- Launch of From a Speaking Place: Writings from the First 50 Years of Canadian Literature, to be published by Ronsdale Press.
- In cooperation with the Vancouver International Film Festival, a mini-festival of films based on Canadian literary works, late October 2009.
- A reception and auction of works of art donated by Canadian writers. Proceeds to support the Canadian Literature 50th Anniversary Tuition Awards for undergraduate students interning at Canadian Literature.
- A one-day conference featuring presentations by distinguished graduate students from Canada and abroad. Students, nominated by their own departments, will be selected for 50th anniversary travel awards to enable them to present their research.
- Distinguished Canadian writers and scholars reading and speaking. Confirmed speakers are Thomas King, Steven Galloway, Aritha van Herk, and Reingard Nischik, University of Constance.
- A literary tour of Vancouver.
- To conclude the Gala, a no-host luncheon, with featured speaker W.H. New OC, FRSC, Editor of Canadian Literature, 1977-1995.
En 2009, Littérature canadienne célèbre ses cinquante ans de publication. à cette occasion, l'Université de Colombie-Britannique et la Faculté des arts organisent un Gala du 30 septembre au 3 octobre 2009. Le programme comprend les activités suivantes:
- Lancement de l'anthologie D'un forum d'échanges : choix de textes des cinquante premières années de Littérature canadienne, à paraître chez Ronsdale Press.
- En collaboration avec le Festival international du film de Vancouver, un mini-festival de films réalisés à partir de l'adaptation d'oeuvres littéraires canadiennes; à la fin d'octobre 2009.
- Réception et vente aux enchères d'oeuvres données par des écrivains canadiens. Les profits sont destinés à assumer les frais de scolarité des étudiants de premier cycle qui travaillent comme assistants à la revue.
- Un colloque d'une journée réservée aux meilleur(e)s étudiant(e)s en littérature canadienne à la maîtrise et au doctorat. Les nominations des étudiant(e)s sont présentées par leur département avant qu'un processus de sélection n'attribue des bourses de voyage permettant aux candidat(e)s choisi(e)s d'exposer leur recherche.
- Lectures et conférences d'écrivains et de spécialistes canadiens. Parmi les présences confirmées sont celles de Thomas King, Steven Galloway, Aritha van Herk, et Reingard Nischik, de l'université de Constance.
- Une visite littéraire guidée de Vancouver.
- La clôture du gala sera ponctuée par un déjeuner-conférence dont l'orateur invité sera W.H. New, qui dirigea la revue de 1977 à 1995.
CanLit Poets
Thursday, November 20th, 2008
Canadian Literature has always published poems along with its critical articles. We would like to encourage young Canadian students both to write poetry and to learn how to read it more critically. In fact, we think these two processes are intertwined.
This collection of poems, with questions answered by the poets about their writing process and experiences with poetry, is intended to be appealing to high school students and to be useful for high school teachers both of creative writing and of literature. One focus is on the poet's early writing experiences, including those in high school, as well as advice they would give to high school writers.
Our aim is to encourage high school students and teachers to use it as a resource to better appreciate the great writing that is going on in Canada now.
— Margery Fee, Editor of Canadian Literature.
Constance Rooke (1942-2008)
Tuesday, October 14th, 2008
Connie Rooke will be remembered as a passionate and intelligent supporter of Canadian literature and Canadian writers throughout her career. She arrived in Canada with a PhD from the University of North Carolina with her husband, writer Leon Rooke, to take up a position in the English department at the University of Victoria. While at Victoria, she was editor of The Malahat Review and one of the founders of the Women’s Studies program in 1979. She left Victoria for the University of Guelph in 1988, where she became chair of the Department of English and, in 1994, Vice-president, Academic of the university. She and her husband founded the Eden Mills Writers Festival in 1989, and ran it for 10 years. The festival, held on the first weekend after Labour Day each year, continues to celebrate Canadian writing.
In 1989 the first public readings took place outside the old General Store in the centre of Eden Mills. At that time Leon Rooke and his wife Constance were living in the former stagecoach hotel on the other side of the street. The store owners, Don and Mark Holman, suggested that Leon should launch his latest novel A Good Baby from the stone platform outside their property. Leon invited other writers, including Rohinton Mistry, Michael Ondaatje and Linda Spalding, to join in the fun; an audience of 350 materialized and the Eden Mills Writers' Festival was born.
She was President of the University of Winnipeg from 1999 to 2002. She was the founding director of the Master of Fine Arts in Creative Writing program at the University of Guelph. She served two terms on the board of PEN Canada, an organization that advocates for authors’ right to freedom of expression, most recently as president, from 2005-2007.
She edited three anthologies, Writing Away (1994), Writing Home (1996) and Writing Life (2006) created as fundraisers for PEN Canada. Other published works include Night Light: Stories of Aging (1986) and Fear of the Open Heart: Essays on Contemporary Canadian Writing (1989). She was honoured for her writing, especially her short stories, with the 2005-2006 Gjenima Prize, an international prize which honours an individual’s lifetime literary contribution. She also served the World University Service of Canada (WUSC) as chair of the Board of Directors from 2002-2005, promoting its mission to foster human development and global understanding through education and training.
This long list of contributions cannot begin to convey fully her impact on a wide community of writers, friends, and colleagues, who valued her for her hospitality, warmth, curiosity and creativity.
The Purdy A-frame Project
Thursday, October 09th, 2008
So we built a house, my wife and I
our house at a backwater puddle of a lake
near Ameliasburg, Ont.
—Al Purdy "In Search of Owen Roblin"
The House That Al Built
And that A-frame house, made out of second-hand lumber and original poetry, became the most famous writer's house in the country. Hundreds of writers and their housemates found their way to Roblin Lake to visit the Purdys and talk about poetry and history while downing beer or wild grape wine. Coleridge and his friends had their lake country, and now the Canadian poets would have theirs. A lot of poetry and prose came out of that hard-to-find place.
To prevent its second-hand wood from ending up on someone's scrap heap, and with the blessing and support of Eurithe Purdy, The Purdy A-frame project is raising funds to purchase and preserve the property, create an endowment and establish a poet-in-residence program.
Please write a letter of support and circulate this message to others who might be interested. If you wish, donations can be made to the Al Purdy A-frame Trust.
Letters and donations can be sent by mail or email to:
Jean Baird
4403 West 11th Ave.
Vancouver BC
V6R 2M2
604 224 4898
jeanbaird@shaw.ca
If you knew Al or have been to the A-frame, have written about the A-frame, have pictures of the place or stories to tell, please get in touch with Howard White at Harbour Publishing (howard@harbourpublishing.com), who is putting together The A-frame Anthology.
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