Some Notes on the Print History of William Hawkins’ Ottawa Poems

"Give this meaning as you may, or must,"

William Hawkins, #27 (from Ottawa Poems)

I’m a newcomer to Ottawa poetry, but by no means a newcomer to Ottawa. I was born here, and raised, and am presently on the verge of completing my “higher” education in the city. I’ve been working to catch up on our literary history, as well as present, and am fascinated by anything that makes an effort to write Ottawa in the way that other cities seem to have been written with greater regularity. Naturally, the first time I came across the title, Ottawa Poems, I set out to find and read it. I’m not going to attempt a critical reading of the poems here. Suffice to say, I love the book and think its poems wonderful. My concern here is with the bibliographic history of the book, and the various incarnations of the poems in Hawkins’ published books. I think that these are fascinating notes from the perspective of book history, and I will resist drawing conclusions from them. I think the print journey of the poems themselves more than justifies a brief account here.

The book was published by Nelson Ball’s Weed/Flower Press in July 1966 (and reprinted in 1967). Weed/Flower had been created the previous year, 1965, and ran for the following eight. Jack David wrote an annotated, descriptive bibliography of the press that was published in Essays on Canadian Writing (Number 4, Spring 1976). According to David, Ball purchased a “pre-WW II mimeograph machine [...] for $35” (34), and proceeded to mimeograph everything produced under the name. Along with Hawkins, Ball published the likes of George Bowering, bp Nichol, John Robert Colombo, Victor Coleman, John Newlove, himself, and a score of others.

Like many others produced by Weed/Flower, Ottawa Poems has a wonderful cover design by Barbara Caruso. A series of overlapping, thick black lines look like poorly laid out streets, and two hands offer the only recognizable point of reference on a thick, brown cover stock. The interior pages are mimeographed from a typewriter proof onto brown paper. Hawkins is credited simply as WM HAWKINS.

The book is a set of twenty-eight relatively brief lyrics in a mere thirty six pages. Roy MacSkimming, in his introductory essay to 2004’s Dancing Alone: Selected Poems, writes “because they belong to a loosely linked sequence, these are more abstracted and discursive poems than the tighter, imagistic, self-contained pieces in Hawkins. And perhaps because they often look outward to the surrounding society, they’re also more anxious and fearful, occasionally a touch paranoid” (15). This sequence is disrupted and broken differently in all future appearances of parts of the book.

His first selected poems, The Gift of Space (new press, Toronto, 1971), would reprint only twenty four pieces from the book. The twenty four retained would be renumbered sequentially, suggesting a new, coherent and complete edit. The pieces removed were #8 (POEM IN RED INK), #20 (THE LAST POEM FOR PEOPLE), #24 (CHARACTEROLOGY), and #26 (ALMOST A POEM). Interesting, if accidental, #21 (SORRY, THIS IS IT) in the Weed/Flower edition is printed 19^th in The Gift of Space, but numbered 21, only to be succeeded by a second #21 (HELLO FROM THE SHADOWS), #23 originally.

A further iteration of the poems comes in 2004 in Dancing Alone: Selected Poems (Broken Jaw Press, Fredericton, Cauldron Books 5). In this edition the original numbers are restored, and the excised poems are left as gaps. This time twenty two poems are printed, removing six. Those cut are: #8 (POEM IN RED INK), #9 (A STUPID CANASTA POEM), #13 (So much of me is not), #20 (THE LAST POEM FOR PEOPLE), #24 (CHARACTEROLOGY), #26 (ALMOST A POEM). The four removed in The Gift of Space are still absent, #9 and #13 have been freshly cut.

As has been widely documented, 1966-67 were landmark years in Hawkins’ publishing career. On top of Hawkins (Nil Press) and Ottawa Poems, he was anthologized in Raymond Souster’s seminal New Wave Canada: The New Explosion in Canadian Poetry (Contact Press) as well as in the A.J.M. Smith edited Modern Canadian Verse (Oxford University Press).

New Wave Canada came first in 1966. Hawkins appeared in its pages alongside early work from Michael Ondaatje, Daphne Marlatt (then still Daphne Buckle), Robert Hogg, bp Nichol, Fred Wah and Victor Coleman among others. Hawkins' biography in New Wave Canada appeared in quotation marks, and is reproduced in its totality below:

What’s to say in a biography? All my life I’ve worried about the propriety of our definitions. Because the times are as they are I’ve lived in fear, movies my only escape, economics keeping me from more drugs, booze & girlies than I was able (meagre, really) to steal. I have stolen every single idea I have heard, transposing them into my own terms. A wife & two children share my scene & seem happy. I write poems because I like to.

Living now in Ottawa. (171)

Whether selected by Souster or by Coleman (who aided Souster in the editorial choices of the anthology), Hawkins is afforded 11 pages in the book. The poems included are drawn from Hawkins and Ottawa Poems. However, reproductions from both are marked by changes in numbering. For example, from Hawkins, “Mysteriensonaten” #1, #3 and #4 are reprinted as #6, #10 and #7 respectively. In the case of Ottawa Poems, #5 (how can I describe the anger) is reprinted as #7, #11 (your hair electric) is reprinted as #17, #13 (so much of me is not) is reprinted as #24, and #16 (“BEAUTY WILL NOT WAIT”) is reprinted as #25.

New Wave Canada itself has a convoluted print history (see Bruce Whiteman’s “Raymond Souster’s New Wave Canada: A Bibliographical Note”). His appearance in New Wave CanadaModern Canadian Verse did not reprint any of the Ottawa Poems, but did print three from Hawkins; “Spring Rain”, “A New Light” and “The Wall.” directly resulted in his appearance in Modern Canadian Verse, when A.J.M. Smith “happened upon the page proofs [of the book]” (MacSkimming 15) as a result of Coleman’s work at Oxford UP at the time. These poems are listed as “uncollected” (xxi) in the acknowledgements.

Some of the poems also saw periodical publication before the book proper. #24 (CHARACTEROLOGY), often excised from later versions, was printed in 1966 in IS one, edited by Victor Coleman in Toronto, and signed “William Hawkins, ‘WM’ ”. #26 (ALMOST A POEM) was printed in Volume 63 (edited by Nelson Ball), number 5 (Summer 1966). This is approximately coincident with the publication of the book. Interestingly, in both these cases, the poems are not numbered but rather stand alone, resisting any allusion to the larger sequence. Volume 63 also printed 5 of the “Mysteriensonaten” poems in the Winter of 1965, numbered up to 8, suggesting that a larger sequence existed prior to the edited four poem set that appeared in Hawkins; this potentially solves the problems posed by the “Mysteriosonaten” poems in New Wave Canada discussed earlier.

#5 (how can I describe the anger) was printed as #7 in issue 19 (July 1966) of the magazine El Corno Emplumado, published out of Mexico City. It appeared in a group of thirteen Canadian poets in the issue (alongside George Bowering, Fred Wah, John Newlove, Nelson Ball, Daphne Buckle and Red Lane among others).

Alphabet, edited by James Reaney, apparently printed one, or some, of the poems according to the credit in the book itself, though I have not been able to find the excerpt(s) in question. However, I did find the wonderful ad below for “Poster Poems by the Fabulous WM. Hawkins” that appeared in Alphabet number 5 (December 1962) before a selection of four “King Kong” poems.

I do not have access to WEED magazine, stopping me from chasing down that reference as well. If you do have a set, or know which poems appeared, and when, sent me a note (cameron.anstee@gmail.com) and I will amend these notes. Equally, any information relating to other editions of these poems would be very much appreciated (for example, did any of the Ottawa Poems appear as Poster Poems?)

I think that these sorts of incongruities and inconsistencies make a strong case for the need to pursue bibliographic work on modern Canadian poetry. I think that they make clear the greater arc of a poem, or book’s, life. Certainly, the Weed/Flower Press edition of 1966 is the authoritative printing, but later editorial choices, as well as earlier little magazine publication help to illuminate the development of the poems over a span of forty years. I think that this is especially true in the case of book-length sequences, or longpoems, where small changes alter the whole. The Ottawa Poems did not end conclusively with their first collected appearance. Hopefully they’ll continue to be read and won’t end anytime soon.

---

Works Cited

David, Jack. “Weed Flower Press.” Essays on Canadian Writing 4 (Spring 1976): 34-41.

Hawkins, William. Dancing Alone: Selected Poems. Fredericton: Broken Jaw, 2004.

--. The Gift of Space: Selected Poems 1960-1970. Toronto: new press, 1971.

--. Hawkins. Ottawa: Nil Press, 1966.

--. Ottawa Poems. Kitchener: Weed/Flower Press, 1966.

Smith, A.J.M. Modern Canadian Verse. Toronto: Oxford UP, 1967.

Souster, Raymond. New Wave Canada: The New Explosion in Canadian Poetry. Toronto:

Contact Press, 1966.

Whiteman, Bruce. “Raymond Souster’s New Wave Canada: A Bibliographical Note.” Papers of

the Bibliographic Society of Canada XX (1981): 63-65.

(Mostly Poetry) Highlights of the Ottawa International Festival

Here’s what stood out for me as the most unique, bold and memorable:

Garry Thomas Morse, Death in Vancouver (Talonbooks, 2009), a selection of short prose bits with crazy compelling characters, tight, precise and breathtaking language and imagery and opera! The man can sing. call what he brought to the festival stories, call them poems. i don’t really care. they’re just damn good. i’ve started his book and am enthralled by its originality. His writing reminds me of local writer John Lavery’s work; they both are adept at linguistic acrobatics and are skilled in painting memorable and unusual characters.

Martha Baille, The Incident Report (Pedlar Press, 2009)-Baille presents a series of stories from the point of view of a librarian about the eccentric dramatic personae who frequent a library, including Rigoletto. the prose is tight and precise with lovely arcs and rhythms that sounded like poetry to me.

Jeremy Dodds, Crabwise to the Hounds (Coach House Books, 2009)-Dodds is someone who can play adeptly with language. In his first poetry collection he contorts everyday expressions much in the way Robert Priest does with his aphorisms in Time Release Poems (Ekstasis Editions, 1997.)

Matthew Tierney, the Hayflick Limit (Coach House Books, 2009)-inventive and precise.fun to see the relationship between science and the everyday in Tierney’s poems. the poetry masterclass that Dodds and Tierney participated in was interesting in that there were physicists in the audience and people who wanted definitions of terms like anti-matter. the whole thing was as wonderfully absurd as poetry events should be.

rob mclennan, Gifts (Talonbooks, 2009)-i’ve read these poems as drafts and also there’s one in there for me so i’m clearly biased, but i always enjoy hearing rob read. his poems have a delicious cadence and wonderful images.

Adeena Karasick-Amuse Bouche (Talonbooks, 2009)-a friend told me i would enjoy her language play and punnery and i did, so much so that i wanted to claim one of the poems as my own. i wish i’d written it. the subtitle of this book is “Tasty Treats for the Mouth” and i concur heartily. i enjoyed every bite. the book is a joy with colourful bits clipped from those air flight safety cards. i love all the linguistic twists and turns in this book and in Karasick’s reading.

Marcus McCann, Soft Where (Chaudiere Books, 2009)-once again, i am very biased here. not only is Marcus a dear friend but we are also in a poetry group together; however, i am not the only one who is gaga over the wit and language shenanigans McCann uses in his work.

The main thing all of the above writers had in common in their work is that they seem to be willing to take risks, to push a line beyond predictability. They aren’t sentimental; they don’t wax poetic over the heart or a white horse or a big mangy dog or say condescending things about the working class. Their rhythms are their own and not evocative of Edgar Allen Poe.

I found their presence and their work inspiring and appreciated the opportunity to hear them and to meet them. This is what I love about the Ottawa International Writers Festival…it exposes audiences to new and bold writing.

BC Scene Literary Events

www.bcscene.ca

Al Purdy Day, A-Frame Fundraiser

The Al Purdy A-Frame Fundraiser had an event as part of Pre-Writers Festival on Al Purdy Day April 21 in Ottawa.

Sean Wilson did the initial introductions of the 8 readers to share their favorite Al Purdy poems thru the decades and a sample of their own as part of Al Purdy Day.

Each person's brought out a different aspect, facet and tone of the poet from quiet wonder to story telling drama, the comic mystic of what the beavers know and aren't telling to self-deprecating humour. (I'll mostly only describe the Purdy ones but if anyone else wants to provide missing titles or details, please complete the picture.)

Books were on hand for sale as well as a donation box to contribute to the keeping and upkeep of the A-frame as a writer's retreat. A total of $285 was raised for the cause.


Luna Allison read from The Dead Poet and a used bookstore find, an anthology with one of his poems.

I was altered in the placenta
by the dead brother before me
who built a place in the womb
knowing I was coming:
he wrote words on the walls of flesh...

Stephen Brockwell read Purdy's poem of Helen and Menelaus and Agamemnon, a less often read one of Purdy's, unfortunately. An absorbing retelling of the story.


Michael Dennis read a poem of Purdy's early drafted soldier days, being entrusted even with a wooden gun being a foolhardy idea. Even the pigeons learned it was safe to not fly away from him on patrol. And he read from his own, one set in a mining camp at Christmas and the brawl that ensued.


Gwendolyn Guth described going to try to find the A-frame and finding Purdy's grave. (If you missed it, you should ask her for the story.) She read her tribute poems on him from The Ivory Thought: Essays on Al Purdy. In it 17 writers, scholars, critics, and educators appraise and reappraise Purdy’s contribution in essays in tributes, as part of a 2006 conference on him.


Kathryn Hunt, reading from the Last Picture in the World.

little point of land
like a small monk
in a green monastery
meditating

Jim Larwill read a Acorn tribute to Purdy and from the argument between Milton Acorn and Al Purdy while they lived in the A-frame. He is rallying for an Ottawa contingent to go to Marmora's people's poetry fest, Purdyfest, on Aug 1. The other picture is Jim Larwill performing The Raven, a bird associated with Purdy and Acorn.


Rob Winger read from Hockey Players and one about a pub brawl and beer like daisies called A Sensitive Man.

Sean Zio read a Purdy poem dedicated to Margaret Laurence and his elegy poem, Be Good.

Here's a 1978 Interview with Purdy and vid links to CBC Archives on Purdy.

Carleton University's Poetry Night at the MacOdrum Library

Left to right: President Rosanne Runte, David O’Meara and Rob Winger

Patti Harper, the Department Head of Archives and Research Collections sends in this report and photos about the event on April 1. Room 503, the Rare Book Room is open to the public and has a great collection, including old broadsides, zines and first editions of books such as Phyllis Webb's Naked Poems.

MacOdrum Library held its inaugural poetry reading night on April 1st to promote the Modern Poetry Collection within the Archives and Research Collections, bringing together the Carleton and Ottawa communities. Carleton’s own Rob Winger was Master of Ceremonies with President Rosanne Runte and local poet David O’Meara presenting selections of their work. The evening also included David presenting some of his favourites from the Collection as well as participating in a Questions and Answer session with the audience. The evening also showcased some of the gems from the collection including broadsides, magazines and books.

Stay tuned for another poetry night in the fall.

A Strong Week in April

Daily for poetry month there has been even more than usual lit events.

Last night Wayson Choy read as part of the year round writers festival. Meanwhile Jason Camlot read at Tree. (The next Tree is a Tulip Tree - All Open-Mic on April 28, followed by Stephanie Bolster May 12th but we're getting ahead of the month.)

AngelHouse Press, which now has an essay series going, is presenting a poem a day at National Poetry Month.

Tonight is chock-full of options in Ottawa Lit. To name just 2: The Oneness Poetry Showcase features Ian Keteku a.k.a. Emcee E with Erin Felepchuk on piano at the East African Restaurant. The Ottawa Arts Review hosted a panel discussion at Ottawa U. [Details at the bottom here]

Tomorrow is the penultimate of the Canal Mug Series. It will be Anne Le Dressay and Stephen Brockwell at the Sunnyside Library. April 23rd it'll be Nadine McInnis and Glenn Kletke.

There's a Plan 99 reading with Stephanie Bolster this Saturday and a Capital Slam.

On Sunday the 19th there's a Dusty Owl at the regular Swizzles bar but it's a double-header with it also being the partnership with Bywords to launch of the new Bywords Quarterly Journal.

Meanwhile over at Sushi 88 on Somerset, there's another Dusty Owl event, it's the first of 3 of the season's workshops. Pearl Pirie will do Firestarters, inspiration prompts. You can buy 2 workshops for the cost of 3. The next two will be Oni [link autoloads sound] teaching social action slam poetry, and in June, Ian Roy will expand horizons with drawing out short stories.

To look ahead to the 22nd, The A B Series features: Clifton Joseph, John Sobol and Robert Priest at The Mercury Lounge. On the following Sunday, April 26, Claudia Coutu Radmore will be at Sasquatch to launch her new chapbook: Ode to a Rubber Duck: An Explanation of the Whole World. People are invited to bring their rubber duckies and own odes.

Including the Writers Festival and BC Scene -- some highlights are in the previous post -- there are 3 to 7 lit events on daily for most of April. Check the full listings.

Carleton and the Writer's Festival

A brief amendment to Amanda's excellent and thorough post below on the Writer's Festival:

A reminder to all Carleton University students that all events in this edition are free with a valid student card (unless otherwise noted). In the Fall, 500 tickets were made available to Carleton students and that number has been boosted this time around. This is hopefully an indication of a developing and ongoing relationship between Carleton and the festival (with several faculty members hosting events again). If you're a Carleton student, attend and make us of this wonderful opportunity. This program will hopefully continue to be a part of the Writer's Festival in the future, but it clearly must be a success in order to encourage repetition.

I lament that I will no longer hold a valid card come the Fall edition...

Poetry Events at the Ottawa International Writers Festival

The festival begins on April 22 and goes until May 2 and marks its first official season at the new Saint Brigid’s Centre for the Arts and Humanities, 314 St. Patrick St near the Byward Market. There are lots of great events taking place this spring at the festival. The best deal is the festival pass, which you can buy at $85 until April 21. The programmes are scattered all over town and the full schedule complete with bio and youtube links is over at www.writersfestival.org.

Nicholas Hoare Books will be on hand to sell you copies of books to have signed by the authors.
There are 3 poetry cabarets, a masterclass writing workshop and two other poetry events taking place at the spring edition. Here’s what’s happening poetry wise.

Saturday, April 25, 2009
Dusty Owl Presents Urban First Nations Poetry with Mosha Folger, Rob Friday and friends; hosted by Steven Zytveld-6pm

Mosha Folger is an independent writer/photographer and spoken word artist.

Rob Friday is the 2008 recipient of the Bywords John Newlove Poetry Award for his poem “Manatee”.

Poetry Cabaret # 1: Jeanette Lynes, Marcus McCann and Molly Peacock, hosted by Stephen Brockwell-8pm

Jeanette Lynes is the author of five collections of poetry, most recently It's Hard Being Queen: The Dusty Springfield Poems (Freehand Books). She is also the author of a novel, forthcoming from Coteau Books. Jeanette has been a writer in residence at Saskatoon Public Library and Northern Lights College in Dawson Creek, B.C. She teaches at St. Francis Xavier University and co-edits The Antigonish Review.

Marcus McCann is a poet and journalist. He is the editor of Capital Xtra, Ottawa’s gay and lesbian newspaper. Soft Where (Chaudiere Books) is his first full-length collection.

Molly Peacock is the award-winning author of five volumes of poetry, including Cornucopia: New & Selected Poems. Her poems have appeared in such leading publications as The New Yorker, the Paris Review, and the Times Literary Supplement. Among her other works are How to Read a Poem and Start a Poetry Circle and a memoir, Paradise, Piece By Piece. Before she emigrated to Canada in 1992, she was 1 of the creators of Poetry in Motion on the Buses and Subways in New York City, and she served as an early advisor to Poetry on The Way. Recently she toured with her one-woman show in poems, The Shimmering Verge produced by the London, Ontario based company, Femme Fatale Productions. Peacock is currently the poetry editor of the Literary Review of Canada and the general series editor of The Best Canadian Poetry in English. She lives in Toronto with her husband, Michael Groden, an English Professor at the University of Western Ontario. Her website is: www.mollypeacock.org.


Tuesday, April 28, 2009

Poetry Cabaret #2: Spotlight on Talonbooks with Garry Thomas Morse, rob mclennan, Adeena Karasick and bill bissett-8:30pm

Garry Morse is a Vancouver poet and writer with two books of poetry published by LINEbooks, Transversals for Orpheus (2006) and Streams (2007). He has created more than thirty chapbooks of poetry and is the chief editor of an online read-only hyperclack of fresh writing called Lexican Radio. His work has been featured in a variety of publications, including Canadian Literature, The Capilano Review, filling Station, The Vancouver Review and West Coast Line, and his manuscript Go Medieval was selected as a runner-up for the Robert Kroetsch Award for Innovative Poetry. In 2008 Morse received the City of Vancouver Mayor’s Arts Award for Emerging Artist. When not pursuing literary endeavours, he is the lead developer for estudent.ca, and he sings in the chorus for OperaProCantanti.

rob mclennan currently lives in Ottawa (since 1989), even though he was born there once (1970). The author of a dozen poetry collections, most recently The Ottawa City Project and a compact of words, as well as a collection of essays, subverting the lyric: essays and Ottawa: The Unknown City. As an editor, he is putting the finishing touches on collections of essays on the works of Andrew Suknaski, John Newlove and George Bowering, as well as There Is No Mountain: new & selected poems by Andrew Suknaski. Editor/publisher of above/ground press and STANZAS magazine, rob regularly posts essays, reviews and other writing at www.robmclennan.blogspot.com.

Adeena Karasick is a poet, media-artist and the award-winning author of six books of poetry and poetic theory, The House That Hijack Built, The Arugula Fugues, Dyssemia Sleaze, Genrecide, Mêmewars, and The Empress Has No Closure. Marked with an urban, Jewish, feminist aesthetic that continually challenges normative modes of meaning production, and engaged with the art of combination and turbulence of thought, her work is a testament to the creative and regenerative power of language and its infinite possibilities for pushing meaning to the limits of its semantic boundaries. Karasick has lectured and performed worldwide and regularly publishes articles, reviews and dialogues on contemporary poetry, poetics and cultural/semiotic theory. She is Professor of Literature and Cultural Theory at BMCC, City University of New York. Forthcoming is Amuse Bouche: Tasty Treats for the Mouth.

bill bissett, winner of the Dorothy Livesay Poetry Prize and the Milton Acorn People’s Poetry Award first garnered international attention in the 1960s as a pre-eminent figure of the counter-culture movement in Canada and the UK. Author of over 70 books of published poetry, bill is a pioneer of sound, visual and performance poetry—eschewing the artificial hierarchies of meaning and the privileging of things (“proper” nouns) over actions imposed on language by capital letters; the metric limitations imposed on the possibilities of expression by punctuation; and the illusion of formal transparency imposed on the written word by standard (rather than phonetic) spelling. bill composes his poems as scripts for pure performance and has consistently worked to extend the boundaries of language and visual image, honing a synthesis of the two in the medium of concrete poetry. He writes and paints out of studios in Vancouver and Toronto.

Wednesday, April 29, 2009

Poetry Cabaret#3: Carolyn Marie Souaid, Zoe Whittall, David O’Meara; hosted by Rob Winger-6:30pm

Carolyn Marie Souaid is a poet, teacher, and book reviewer for The Montreal Gazette. The author of four books, she has appeared at many literary festivals across the country, and was part of a Canadian delegation of poets sent to Paris in December 2005 to participate in an international forum on the inhumane treatment of prisoners of conscience. She is the co-producer (with Endre Farkas) of two major Montreal events: Poésie en mouvement / Poetry in Motion (the poetry-on-the-buses project, 2004) and Cirque des mots / Circus of Words, a multilingual cabaret of performance poetry (2005, 2006). Three of her books have been shortlisted for the A.M. Klein Prize. A French translation of “Snow Formations” was published by Les Éditions Triptyque in 2006.

Zoe Whittall’s first novel, Bottle Rocket Hearts, was named one of the best books of 2007 by The Globe and Mail and Quill & Quire magazine. She won the 2008 Dayne Ogilvie award from the Writers’ Trust of Canada. Now Magazine awarded her the title of Best Emerging Author of 2007. She has published three books of poetry, Precordial Thump (Exile, 2008), The Best Ten Minutes of Your Life (McGilligan Books, 01) and The Emily Valentine Poems (Snare Books, 06). Her work has been anthologized widely, with poems appearing in Breathing Fire 2: Canada’s Best New Poets edited by Lorna Crozier and Patrick Lane and many others. The Globe and Mail called her "the cockiest, brashest, funniest, toughest, most life-affirming, elegant, scruffy, no-holds-barred writer to emerge from Montreal since Mordecai Richler…”. Her second novel, Holding Still For As Long as Possible, is forthcoming from House of Anansi press in fall of 2009. Born in the Eastern Townships of Quebec, she’s lived in Toronto since 1997.

David O'Meara was born and raised in Pembroke, Ontario. He lives in Ottawa, where he tends bar at The Manx Pub. His first book of poems, Storm still, was published in 1999 and was short-listed for the Gerald Lampert Award. His second collection, The Vicinity, was shortlisted for the Trillium Poetry Award.

Thursday, April 30, 2009

Poetry Masterclass-Why Poetry Antimatters: Metaphor, Entanglement and Particle Poetics with Jeremy Dodds and Matthew Tierney, hosted by David O’Meara-noon

Jeramy Dodds lives in Orono, Ontario. His poems have been translated into Finnish, French, Latvian, Swedish, German and Icelandic. In 2007 he held a residency at the Baltic Centre for Writers and Translators on the island of Götland, Sweden. He is the winner of the 2006 Bronwen Wallace Memorial Award and the 2007 CBC Literary Award in poetry. He works as a research archaeologist and co-edits for littlefishcartpress.

Matthew Tierney's poetry has been published in many literary journals in Canada and Ireland. He was born Kitchener, Ontario, and grew up in Toronto, where he now lives. Several years ago, he spent some time in Japan teaching English, and returned home by way of the Trans-Mongolian Express, an offshoot of the Trans-Siberian Express, one of the last transcontinental train routes. This journey and others around Asia and Europe form the experiences in Full speed through the morning dark. A second manuscript, The Rocket Scientist, is an epistemological tour of hard and soft sciences: cosmology, quantum physics, neurology, psychology and economics, among others. In particular, it grapples with the idea of intelligence—what it means to be an intelligent species, an intelligent person. The manuscript was awarded the 2006 K.M. Hunter Award for Literature.

BC Scene Poetry Night with Patrick Lane, Lorna Crozier, Evelyn Lau and Robert Bringhurst-hosted by Alma Lee-8:30pm

Patrick Lane is the author of 21 books of poetry, and has received many awards for his writing, including the Governor General’s Award for Poetry (1979), the Canadian Authors Association Award for Poetry (1988), and two National Magazine Awards. Lane lives near Victoria, British Columbia, with poet Lorna Crozier.

Lorna Crozier’ Crozier's work has won numerous awards, including the Governor General's Award, the Pat Lowther Poetry Award, the Canadian Authors Association Award, and the First Prize for Poetry in the CBC Literary Competition. She has published fourteen books of poetry, most recently, Whetstone. Crozier also edited Desire in Seven Voices and, with Patrick Lane, Addicted: Notes from the Belly of the Beast. Born in Swift Current, Saskatchewan, she now lives in British Columbia, where she teaches at the University of Victoria.

Evelyn Lau has written seven books, including the bestselling short story collection Choose Me. Her bestselling first book, Runaway: Diary of a Street Kid, was published when she was 18 and adapted into an award-winning film for television by the CBC. In 1992, Evelyn became the youngest poet ever to be nominated for the Governor General's Award, for her collection Oedipal Dreams. She lives and works in Vancouver.

Robert Bringhurst is a poet, typographer and linguist, well known for his award-winning translations of the Haida storytellers Skaay and Ghandl, and for his translations of the early Greek philosopher-poet Parmenides. His manual The Elements of Typographic Style has itself been translated into ten languages and is now one of the world’s most influential texts on typographic design. Among his most recent publications is a pair of essay collections, The Tree of Meaning (2006) and Everywhere Being is Dancing (2007). Bringhurst lives on Quadra Island, off the British Columbia coast.

Go buy your tickets NOW

Poetry, Poetry, Poetry

To celebrate National Poetry Month and get a daily dose of poetry, visit the following sites:

AngelHousePress’s National Poetry Month features 30 poets from around the world celebrating the nation of poetry.

the League of Canadian Poets' Poetry Planet Blog, a different poem each day by Canadian poets, representing each province.

Seen Reading’s 30 in 30. Poets read one of their own poems aloud and cover a favourite poem of another writer.

The Afterword, National Post Interviews Canadian Poets Daily

the New York Review of Books is posting daily poems that they’ve published over the years.

Daily Lit in conjunction with the magazine Poets and Writers will e-mail you the poetry of late great poets in a series called Masters of Verse

And if you'd like to celebrate in person as well as virtually, check out www.bywords.ca for all the poetry events happening this month.

Celebrate Poetry Month with a Night of Poetry

The MacOdrum Library Archives and Research Collections
Celebrating Poetry Month with the Carleton University Library Modern Poetry Collection

Join Master of Ceremonies Rob Winger for the inaugural Poetry Night featuring the Modern Poetry Collection, part of the Archives and Research Collections at the Carleton University Library. Listen to poetry readings by Ottawa's David O'Meara as well as view a selection of material from the collection while mingling with other poetry enthusiasts from the university and the greater Ottawa community.

The Modern Poetry Collection contains material from Canada's small press movement (1960s and 1970s) including rare broadsides; first and rare editions of modern and contemporary Canadian and North American poets; and print editions of Canada's "little magazines" like Arc, Poetry Magazine, Tish, Preview, Contact and First Statement--there is something for everyone!

Date: April 1st 2009
Place: Library Staff Lounge (Room 153), Carleton University Library, 1125 Colonel By Drive
Time: 7:00pm, Doors open at 6:30pm

Cash bar and refreshments provided.

For more information please contact Lloyd Keane, Archives and Research Assistant: lloyd_keane@carleton.ca or call 613-520-2600 x2739

[text copied from a poster in the Carleton English Dept.]

Haiku Events

The Haiku North America will be held at the National Library in Ottawa from August 5-9. Early bird registration for the conference ends May 31.

The Haiku Canada Conference, which had tentatively booked for Ottawa this year, will be in Vancouver May 15-17 to spread the wealth of access. The Haiku Canada speakers include:

Winona Baker
Janick Belleau
Marco Fraticelli
Joanne Morcom
Michael Dylan Welch

and Alice Frampton leading the kukai

Early registration closes March 30th.

Gary Barwin & Gregory Betts perform THE OBVIOUS FLAP in The A B Series

The A B Series presents

THE OBVIOUS FLAP

performed by electronic sound poetry duo

Gary Barwin & Gregory Betts

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Doors open 7:30pm, show 8pm
Friday, February 20th, 2009 The Mercury Lounge 56 ByWard Market Square Ottawa, Ont. Admission $7 at the door

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Gary Barwin (Hamilton) and Gregory Betts (St. Catharines) perform THE OBVIOUS FLAP, a performance text with dialogue, mixed-media and sound poetry. As part of the evening's program, Betts and Barwin launch Chora Sea, a chapbook published by Toronto's Emergency Response Unit. Publishers, Leigh Nash and Andrew Faulkner, will be in attendance.

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BIOS:

Poet, writer, composer, and performer, GARY BARWIN lives in Hamilton, Ontario. His work has been performed and published internationally. His books include frogments from the frag pool (poetry; with derek beaulieu), Doctor Weep and Other Strange Teeth (fiction), Raising Eyebrows (poetry) and Outside the Hat (poetry). A new book of poetry, is forthcoming from Coach House. His PhD thesis was a composition combining live computer processing, spoken text, and electronics. He can be found at garybarwin dot com and serifofnottingham dot blogspot dot com.

GREGORY BETTS is the author of If Language (2005), Haikube (2006), and The Others Raisd in Me (forthcoming, Fall 2009). He is the Co-Editor of PRECIPICe literary magazine and curates the Grey Borders Reading Series in St. Catharines. His poetry, essays, and manifestos have appeared in books, journals, and anthologies across Canada and in six countries besides. He currently lives in St. Catharines where he teaches Canadian and Avant-Garde Literature at Brock University.

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Raffle with book prizes from publishers BookThug, Brick, University of Ottawa Press and ECW + gift certificates from local restaurants to be awarded.

Chora Sea and other literature will be available from the book table.

The A B Series thanks The Mercury Lounge, The City of Ottawa, our volunteers and raffle sponsors for their support.

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For more information: Max Middle Artistic Director The A B Series (613) 237-4309

ABSERIES dot ORG

farewell to Steve Sauvé

On Saturday January 17, 2009, Steve Sauvé left this world, and underlined his indelible mark on the spoken word poetry family.

Steve was a poet and organizer integral to Ottawa's local spoken word scene, and to Ottawa's presence in the Canadian spoken word community. Most of us were struck first by his sense of humour, and next by his ethic of being truly himself, disarmed and disarming.

We knew Steve as a survivor. In recent years, he faced medical setbacks that would have crushed most of us. Instead of despairing, he treated them with humour -- though not lightly.

It was as if his response to peril was to lay bare his core self, rather than to be guarded. He confronted terrifying situations with an emotional presence that most of us don't have the guts to open up in our safest places, let alone in performance.

The most touching instance of this in my own memory was when he read his poem "Heart," about his own brushes with death, at the 2005 Canadian Festival of Spoken Word in Vancouver. He was part of the Ottawa slam team at that festival; we all spent some lovely time together exploring and bonding. When he took the stage, no-one in the hall that night could have been prepared -- even those of us familiar with the piece's content -- for the intensity of that particular performance. He wrought, from his own grave and painful experiences, something of beauty, and delivered it in a way that touched us all unforgettably.

Though relentlessly modest off-stage, Steve was never one to undervalue his loving relationships, and never afraid to expose them to the trial of the limelight. He let us all see how much he was loved and loved in return, and he wanted us to remember our part in that, and to treat it with due respect and joy.

I'm not trying to make him out to be a saint. I knew Steve only as well as my few years on the Ottawa spoken word scene allowed, but he always -- always -- shone positivity and courage on those of us around him. He remains with us in the nuanced and unexpected ways he continues to influence our work, our points of view, and our sense of how much we mean to each other. This part of Steve cannot be taken from us, and we are grateful.

Through Ottawa, and across Canada, the impact of his passing is still unfolding. Most of us just find it pretty hard to believe. Please watch, in due time, for various tribute projects that are currently in discussion; as we celebrate the facets of Steve's life that have made us who we are -- as artists, and as friends. If you have a part to play in that, please feel free to contact me at ktm7@mac.com.

Long live bwana geek.

Steve Sauvé (Oct 12, 1975 - Jan 17, 2009)

very sad news this week. Steve Sauvé, spoken word poet, passed away today.

Steve was a loving and beautiful person, not to mention very talented. He was a member of Capital Slam, 2006 Ottawa CBC Poetry Face-Off Finalist; Member of the 2005 Capital Slam TeamMember of Ottawa 2004 Wordlympics Team; to name just a few of his accomplishments.

He will be missed greatly.

Here's his myspace page

MESSAGIO GALORE in The A B Series

jwcurry performing MESSAGIO GALORE take V on April 13, 2008

photo courtesy of Ben Walker

The A B Series presents jwcurry’s

MESSAGIO GALORE

7pm

Saturday, 24 January 2009

City Hall Art Gallery

Main Floor

Ottawa City Hall

110 Laurier Avenue West

Ottawa, Ont.

Admission: $15 at the door (or more or less according to your ability)

Program for MESSAGIO GALORE take VI provided at the door with admission.

General seating

Door prizes / raffle tickets

Cash bar / Appetizers

On January 24th, 2009, The A B Series is delighted to present jwcurry's MESSAGIO GALORE. It promises to be another astonishing act combining curry's acute editorial acumen with the crew's extreme technical skill. Incomparably well informed on Canadian and international sound poetry, Ottawa editor, publisher and producer jwcurry has awed audiences with the previous five productions of MESSAGIO GALORE. This performance will indubitably mark another historic development in the trajectory that curry has charted for MESSAGIO GALORE. With this production, The A B Series brings the best in sound poetry to Ottawa. We're expecting a full house so come early, have a drink, a snack and enjoy the ninety-minute performance.

MESSAGIO GALORE is a celebratory investigation into what constitutes sound poetry, surveying its com- & ex-position through the writing & reading (& listening & rewriting & reading) of Canadian and international works. MESSAGIO GALORE take VI will be read through the lingual acrobatics of jwcurry, John Lavery, Roland Prevost, Carmel Purkis, Sandra Ridley and Grant Wilkins. It takes as its outer formal structure a 4-voice arrangement of John Cage's Lecture On Nothing and incorporates material by Hugo Ball, Four Horsemen, Claude Gauvreau, d.a.levy, Sam Loyd, Mike Patton and Frank Zappa.

Following the performance, a raffle will be held to celebrate the launch of The A B Series web site with the following prizes: a combination book/gift certificate prize from Nicholas Hoare, a prize pack from Coach House Books, a gift certificate from The Great Canadian Theatre Company, double passes to The Bytowne Cinema, The Dig Your Roots CD collection from National Campus Radio Association, a double pass to any production in The National Arts Centre's Fourth Stage 2009 season, gift certificates for local restaurants and more to be announced.

The A B Series thanks The City of Ottawa, our volunteers and raffle sponsors for their support. Many thanks to Ben Walker who has generously provided photos of Messagio Galore take V, one of which appears above and others can be found on The A B Series web site.

More info on MESSAGIO GALORE take VI:

ABSERIES dot ORG

or from:

Max Middle

Artistic Director

The A B Series

director at abseries dot org

tel: 613 859 8423

A B SERIES WEB SITE LAUNCH

Dear friends,

It is with great pleasure that The A B Series announces the launch of its official web site at ABSERIES.ORG. Visit the site to see what's happening in Ottawa's reading series for performance, sound and experimental poetry.

Launched in November 2007, The A B Series has quickly become one of the most dynamic reading series in Ottawa. Performers from Ottawa-Gatineau, across Canada as well as The Netherlands and The USA have graced The A B Series stage.

The A B Series was initiated in late 2007 by current Artistic Director, Max Middle. The first event in The A B Series' inaugural season took place on November 1st, 2007 in Ottawa's City Hall Art Gallery with readings by three book touring Calgarians: William Neil Scott, Natalie Zina Walschots and ryan fitzpatrick. The A B Series saw the completion of a very successful inaugural season (Autumn 2007 – Spring 2008) on June 12th, 2008 with a reading by Christopher Dewdney. The second season (Autumn 2008 – Spring 2009) was launched in October and proceeds apace with major productions to be staged early in 2009.

In its brief history, The A B Series has drawn consistently large and enthusiastic audiences to its events. Legendary Dutch sound poet Jaap Blonk performed in The A B Series on June 6th, 2008. Attendance at this event was one hundred and thirty: the best attended sound poetry production in Ottawa's history.

On January 24th, 2009, we are very keenly anticipating hosting jwcurry's next execution of Messagio Galore. It promises to be yet another astonishing act combining curry's acute editorial acumen with his and assistants' extreme technical skill. This performance will indubitably mark another historic development in the trajectory that curry has charted for Messagio Galore. See abseries.org for details on the program and who curry's assistants will be. At fifteen dollars suggested donation, we humbly contend that it will be one of the best values in the history of the performing arts. We're expecting a full house so come early, have a drink, a snack and stay after the ninety-minute performance for door prizes and a celebration of the launch of The A B Series web site.

On February 6th, 2009, The A B Series in association with Kevin Matthews presents four acclaimed Australian poets/spoken word artists on The National Arts Centre's Fourth Stage. They are Alicia Sometimes, Emilie Zoey Baker, Justin Ashworth and Sean M Whelan, each of whom hails from UNESCO's recently announced City of Literature, Melbourne. On 4 February 2009, they land in Vancouver to start their debut North American tour. The A B Series hosts their second North American performance. After which, they leave for Montréal's 2009 Festival Voix d'Ameriques and several engagements there; later in February, they perform in New York's Bowery Club and at The Green Mill Bar in Chicago.

On February 20th at The Mercury Lounge, The A B Series presents a collaborative performance by Gary Barwin and Gregory Betts. They will be reading from The Obvious Flap, a performance text in progress that includes dialogue, mixed-media and sound poetry.

A very special thank-you goes to Brian Pirie for designing and realizing The A B Series web site. While you're on The A B Series web site, make sure you view the photos Ben Walker has generously provided of Messagio Galore take V, which took place in April 2008. Many thanks to the following for providing photographs: Ben Walker, Pearl Pirie, Charles Earl and Natalie Zina Walschots.

The A B Series is currently preparing for these and several other momentous productions to take place in 2009. We're very much looking forward to seeing you in the New Year; in the meantime, come visit us online.

Best wishes,

Max Middle

Artistic Director
The A B Series

rob’s poetry recommendations;

Since I never got a chance to answer Amanda Earl’s question about poetry recommendations, I thought I should do it here. Two of the best poetry books over the past year that I would more than recommend would be Vancouver writer and filmmaker Colin Browne’s The Shovel (Vancouver BC: Talonbooks, 2008) [see my review of it here], as well as Toronto writer Margaret Christakos’ What stirs (Toronto ON: Coach House Books, 2008) [a review is forthcoming on The Danforth Review]. Why were neither of these on the GG poetry shortlist? Speaking more generally, I would recommend anything by American poet Sarah Manguso; how did she get so damned good?

Poetry Recommendations for Christmas

If you're thinking about giving the gift of poetry to your family or friends over the holidays, you might be interested to hear a few recommendations by some of Ottawa's local poets. Like any other gift, poetry is a matter of personal taste, tis true, but if they're your friends, i wouldn't be surprised if they are interested in poetry, so here are a few possibilities; all these books can be purchased through your local independent bookstores, such as Books on Beechwood, Collected Works, Mother Tongue, Perfect Books, and Nicholas Hoare or directly through the publishers.

Mike Blouin

Some Days I Think I Know Things: The Cassandra Poems, Rhonda Douglas, Signature 2008
The Luskville Reductions, Monty Reid, Brick, 2008

Amanda Earl

Decalogue: ten Ottawa poets (Chaudiere Books, 2007)
includes poetry by Stephen Brockwell, Michelle Desbarats, Anita Dolman, Anne Le Dressay, Karen Massey, Una McDonnell, rob mclennan, Max Middle, Monty Reid and Shane Rhodes; this is a great overview to what's going on in contemporary poetry in the National Capital.

Marcus McCann

Best Canadian Poetry in English 2008 ed. by Stephanie Bolster (series ed Molly Peacock), (Tightrope Books, 2008)

This is the first book in a new series collecting the best poetry that appeared in Canadian journals in the previous twelve months. It's controversial & compelling - the intro is worth the price of the volume ($18.95) on its own. Bonus: the anthology includes work by current or former Ottawans like Shane Rhodes, Craig Poile and John Barton.

Susan McMaster

Ronnie R. Brown's "Night Echoes" (Black Moss, 2006) is a rich romp through a wise woman's dark, moving, and hilarious dreams, Nadine McInnis's "Two Hemispheres" (Brick Books, 2007) mixes science and madness in a personal and at the same time historical narrative that grips from the first page, and Colin Morton's "the Local Cluster"(Pecan Grove Press, 2008) -- full of sounds and images drawn from the streets of our town over several decaudes -- will rouse responses from any longtime Ottawan.

Christine McNair

Karen Houle. During. Gaspereau Press: 2008. (not local but good)

Roland Prevost

Guess I'd feel ok recommending Robert Kroetsch's "Completed Field Notes" (University of Alberta Press, 2001).
Certainly experimental enough, but also accessible enough, fun enough & wide ranging. I know I'd have been very happy to get it as a gift too. (Um, in fact I did get it as a gift, & I was glad to get it.) I know it's not exactly what people would expect, but it's an excellent read & also Canadian too.

Rob Winger

Troy Jollimore's Tom Thompson in Purgatory (Margie / IntuiT House, 2006) is a nice recent one. Failing that, tell everyone to buy the new edition of George Bowering’s Kerrisdale elegies, (Talon Books, 2008) [also pooka press in Vancouver published a beautiful limited edition run, but perhaps that's out of print?]

City of Ottawa Arts Cuts

Many local poets, reading series, and publications will be seriously messed up by these cuts as will the city itself, which will lose its artists and its soul.
Imagine a city without poetry, fiction, music, art, theatre, dance. Imagine a ghost town.

Here's what you can do:

Attend the City of Ottawa Arts Funding Cut Press Conference on November 18:
10:00am - 11:00am; Ottawa City Hall Andrew Haydon Hall (Council Chambers), 110 Laurier st.

Attend the meeting on November 19th, 7:00 pm, Club SAW (67 Nicholas Street)
CARFAC will host a meeting that is open to Ottawa artists of all disciplines and those who support them. We will discuss the impact those cuts will have for individual artists and what can be done to stop them.

Contact your Councillor

Attend the Draft Budget Public Consultations

Book your time to speak to the Committee

Come to the Council Chambers on December 1st at 10 am as the first delegations present to City Council List of cuts

More information and how you can help: http://arts-ottawa.on.ca/.

Grant Writing Workshop

The first of the Dusty Owl monthly workshops will be Saturday November 8th. Tickets are available for the last day at Octopus Books, 116 Third Ave in the Glebe. This one will be on Grant Writing and Publishing. Some tickets might be still available at door of Heartwood House, 153 Chapel Street. Reps from the Canada Council for the Arts, Ontario Arts Council and St John Publicity and Marketing will speak and do a Q&A.

Summary Notes from it here.

Poetry Cabaret, Writers Fest

Zachariah Wells did a festival overview at his blog. I mentioned some things from the Writers Fest's writers voice at Humanyms.

In addition to that there are a few other tidbits to mention from the poetry cabaret with Monty Reid, Dannabang Kuwabong, Meredith Quartermain, moderated by Rhonda Douglas...

On the question of writing as catharsis and healing, Monty Reid said, yes and no. It can be, in the process of writing, but ironically enough to publish and perform the poems means reliving. He also said of the writing process that poetry projects fail with more regularity than individual poems and he thinks that has to do with intentionality. For a project you have an intention pushing poems rather than letting the unconscious drive. The rest of the panel nodded agreement.

Dannabang Kuwabong said the why of a poem is a dangerous question for any poet. It's an attempt to answer. He is interested in the how not why of poetry. So far as writing cathartically it is not an act of erasing, forgetting but acknowledging and overcoming, to laugh off the bad things and add joy to pain, an attitude also espoused by Junot Díaz in his talk.

For Kuwabong poetry descends from oral. The oral informs the page and poetry is alive when spoken. God is a poet. He spoke a word and created life. Some of his poetry comes out of the dirge traditions of his culture. He found it interesting that as he did genealogical research, he found himself in Jamaica and recognized things from Ghana.

On the subject of inspiration Reid said that poetry is promiscuous. It comes from almost anywhere. It comes from the interplay of what's outward and inwards. There is no temple of muses that sends inspiration to a narrow selection of the chosen. It's everywhere available to any mind that will have it.

Meredith Quartmain (see Alterran Poetry Assemblage interview) meditates on Matter. She described the process of writing as a genesis. Expository writing is recording what's past and dead. A new experience has to happen on the page in the writing and in the reading to spark.

Her reading had lots of provoking turns of phrase: the gurge of word regurgitates...it laughs typhoons and names are the instruments of thought...not vehicles of but wings for flight. The idea of biology and categories mixed with the thesaurus and how the biologist who created Roget's Thesaurus was grouping ideas into families of thought.


[Cross-posted.]

the 2008 Bywords John Newlove Poetry Award

for poems published on bywords.ca between September, 2007 and August, 2008.
Judge for the 2008 Award was George Bowering who said this about the winning poem:

"It is witty and thoughtful, mysterious and competent. It does not sacrifice
prosody and notation to affect. It shows confidence and practised skill
on the part of its author."

Winner: Rob Friday, Manatee, August 2008
Honourable Mention: Joe Hickey, A Billion Billion, February, 2008
Honourable Mention: Ben Ladouceur, new house, November, 2007

Lupercalia, the chapbook of last year's winner, Sean Moreland, is available right now by contacting editor@bywords.ca and soon through the Bywords.ca online store.

Arc's Lampman Scott-Award for Poetry

from the Arc site: "Established in 1986, the Archibald Lampman Award for Poetry was inspired by Archibald Lampman, Canada’s finest 19th century poet." and ...

"Duncan Campbell Scott was born in Ottawa in 1862 and died here in 1947. He had a 53-year career in the civil service and was a tireless contributor to the cultural life of the national capital. With Ottawa’s Archibald Lampman and Fredericton’s Charles G.D. Roberts and Bliss Carman, Scott was a leader of the influential group of “Confederation Poets” who comprised the first full flowering of Canadian literature, especially poetry, in the late nineteenth century."

the award was given at the Ottawa International Writers Festival opening night last night along with the City of Ottawa Book Awards.

and the winner is...

Shane Rhodes for The Bindery (NeWest Press, 2007).

Citing Duncan Campell Scott's role as the Minister of Indian and Northern Affairs in charge of some of the worst policies regarding Aboriginals, Shane said that he is donating half of the money to the Wabano Centre for Aboriginal Health. The prize is $1,500. As I said last night, Shane has beauty, brains and heart.

the long list of folks whose poetry was considered for the award:

Michael Blouin for I’m not going to lie to you
Stephen Brockwell for The Real Made Up
Anne Le Dressay for Old Winter
Nicholas Lea for Everything is Movies
Luis Lama for Alien Land
Nadine McInnis for Two Hemispheres
rob mclennan for The Ottawa City Project
Colin Morton for The Cabbage of Paradise
Shane Rhodes for The Bindery
Ian Roy for Red Bird
Asoka Weerasinghe for Mayan Love Songs

The Short List

Michael Blouin for I’m not going to lie to you
Nadine McInnis for Two Hemispheres
Shane Rhodes for The Bindery


more info on the award is here.

Ottawa poetry's local, Mother Tongue, escapes fire

Readers of OPN probably know that Mother Tongue Books, just south of the Rideau Canal on Bank Street, is one of poetry's homes in Ottawa, one of its living rooms, where local writers and readers frequently meet to talk books and, more than occasionally, to listen to poetry readings.

When my book of poems The Local Cluster was published this fall -- poems mostly about my yard, my neighborhood, and my community, Old Ottawa South -- I felt strongly that the book's Ottawa launch should be at my local. Mother Tongue's proprietors, Laura and Evelyn, were as welcoming as ever, and we sent out notices about a Sunday afternoon launch on October 5.

So I was alarmed, a week before launch Sunday, to see that fire had gutted the Mud Oven, the store next to Mother Tongue, and that firefighters had smashed windows in both stores in putting out the blaze. Thanks to their efforts, the flames didn't spread to Mother Tongue's books, but smoke poured out of the ventilation system, causing a lot of damage to the stock of books and gifts. Once the carpet and ceiling tiles are replaced, and the whole store given a cleaning in an ozone tent, the store will be back with its new stock for seasonal sales.

Of course, with the ventilation shut off, there was no possibility of going ahead with the launch of my book. But I still wanted my book to make its official appearance at Mother Tongue. So we postponed the date, but still intend to celebrate The Local Cluster along with the reopening of the renovated store, sometime in November. Watch for the announcement.

what's new in Canadian poetry?

Recent and Forthcoming Poetry Publications by Canadian Publishers

Sunday’s Ottawa Citizen featured its usual fall preview of upcoming books. the article featured fiction, non fiction, biography and memoir, but as usual, not a word was mentioned about upcoming poetry publications. i guess what burns me the most about the Citizen’s lack of coverage of poetry is that many of our citizens write poetry and a few have upcoming books. how is the Citizen accurately reflecting what goes on in Ottawa, if it neglects the publishing efforts of its residents? it makes no sense to me.

furthermore, you’d think a newspaper with an interest in encouraging literacy would be highly supportive of covering Canadian publishers, who are working hard to ensure Canadians have access to a variety of writing, including poetry. the Citizen’s unbalanced coverage of literature in its arts and books pages makes it look like Ottawa residents are interested only in current events and mystery novels. here’s a list of cross-Canada publishers and the poetry that has been recently or is about to be launched this fall.

to the Citizen’s credit, they recently started a books section (again very little poetry coverage, maybe the occasional review) and James Macgowan has a book blog; although it seems to focus on American popular fiction if the last few weeks are any indication (yes i did see a mention of the Tree Reading Series with George Murray as the feature).

those of us with an interest in finding out about current poetry in Canada need to send letters to the editor of our papers complaining about the lack of coverage. we need to blog about poetry, promote poetry and keep agitating. i’m so bored of reading about mystery novels in the Citizen, aren’t you? tell them.

there are likely more poetry collections being published in Canada in the 2008/2009 literary season. perhaps you can send me a comment if you know of additional books...

take a look at the list below and make sure to buy poetry this fall. and go to the bywords.ca calendar of literary events to find out about local launches such as Rhonda Douglas’s upcoming launch on September 17 at the Cube Gallery.


Maritimes

Broken Jaw Press, Fredericton, New Brunswick

Aquella luz, la que estremece / The Light that Makes Us Tremble, poetry by Nela Rio; Hugh Hazelton, translator.

Gaspereau Press, Kentville, Nova Scotia

The Muskwa Assemblage by Don McKay

Refrain for Rental Boat #4 by Tim Bowling

Goose Lane Editions, Frederiction, New Brunswick

I & I by George Elliott Clarke

Imperfect Penance by Mitchell Parry

Québec

Véhicule Press, Signal Poetry Editions

The Stream Exposed With All Its Stones, Collected Poems by D.G. JONES

Penny Dreadful by SHANNON STEWART

The Empire’s Missing Links by WALID BITAR

36 Cornelian Avenue by CHRISTOPHER WISEMAN

Snare Books

Variations on Hölderlin by Geoffery Hlibchuk

JACK by Mike Spry

Ontario

Anansi Press, Toronto, Ontario

Jeremiah, Ohio by Adam Sol

Bookthug, Toronto, Ontario

Body of Text by Michael V. Smith and David Ellingsen

Every Way Oakly by Steve McCaffery

In Stereo by Paul Hegedus

Mal Arme: Letter Drop 3 by Victor Coleman and Paul Collins

Quixote Variations by Ramon Fernandez (Alfred Noyes, trans)

Tender Buttons by Gertrude Stein

The SubWay by Philip Quinn

This & That Lenin by Steven Zultanski

Welcome to Earth: Poem for Alien(s) by Amanda Earl

Brick Books, London, Ontario

Cypress by Barbara Klar

Noble Gas, Penny Black by David O'Meara

Breaker by Sue Sinclair

Coach House Books, Toronto, Ontario

Crabwise to the Hounds By Jeramy Dodds

Laundromat Essay By Kyle Buckley

What Stirs By Margaret Christakos

ECW Press, Toronto, Ontario

Reading the Bible Backwards by Robert Priest

wasps in a golden dream hum a strange music by Asher Ghaffar

Pedlar Press, Toronto, Ontario

Watermarks by Joanne Page

Wolsak and Wynn Publishers, Hamilton, Ontario

The Baltic Quintet: Poems from Estonia, Finland, Latvia, Lithuania and Sweden
by Edita Page

feria: a poempark by Oana Avasilichioaei

Sister Prometheus: Discovering Marie Curie by Douglas Burnet Smith

I can still draw by Heather Spears

Your Scrivener Press, Sudbury, Ontario

The Hole in the Wall, poems by Peter McEwen

Prairies

Freehand Books, Calgary, Alberta

It’s Hard Being Queen: The Dusty Springfield Poems by Jeanette Lynes

NeWest Press, Edmonton, Alberta

Nightmarker by Meredith Quartermain

Signature Editions, Winnipeg, Manitoba

Some Days I Think I Know Things: The Cassandra Poems by Rhonda Douglas

Turnstone Press, Winnipeg, Manitoba

she walks for days inside a thousand eyes by Sharron Proulx-Turner

Fear Not by Maurice Mierau

British Columbia

Caitlin Press, Halfmoon Bay, BC

lan(d)guage a sequence of poetics By Ken Belford

A Well-Mannered Storm The Glenn Gould Poems By Kate Braid

Nightwood Editions, Gibsons Landing, BC

The Book Collector by Tim Bowling

Letters I Didn't Write by John MacKenzie

Little Hunger by Philip Kevin Paul

Talonbooks, Burnaby, BC

Kerrisdale Elegies by George Bowering

sublingual by bill bissett

NEW: the Naughty Thoughts Book Club

Capital Xtra and After Stonewall present
DANIEL ALLEN COX
launching his second novel, Shuck (Arsenal Pulp Press)

at
The Naughty Thoughts Book Club
where sex and ideas meet

Sun, Sep 28, 3pm.
The Buzz, 374 Bank St.

Daniel Allen Cox is a former Inches cover model, video porn star, and interviewer for the New York Waste. He is the author of the novel Shuck (Arsenal Pulp Press), and lives in Montreal.

***

PRAISE FOR SHUCK:

"Daniel Allen Cox writes truthfully and elegantly about a New York that I knew very well and that I miss very much. Set in the late 1990s, his novel Shuck describes with great clarity and verve the last gasp of a gritty Manhattan just before the war with the Eskimos, a bygone era that existed before wealth and privilege strangled the sweet life out of street life."
-Bruce LaBruce, director of Otto; or, Up with Dead People

"In his novel Shuck, Daniel Allen Cox gives us Jaeven Marshall, the bastard love-child of Dennis Cooper and Jim Carroll. He's a hustler, self-abuser, wannabe diarist, and aspirant to the dubious title of 'Boy New York'. You'll regret getting to know him, but you'll wish he were in your bed."
-Hal Niedzviecki, author of The Program and Hello, I'm Special

New Poetry Slam Series Starting in Ottawa - Bill Brown's 1-2-3 Slam

Can you throw down with Bill Brown?

Cytopoetics presents the newest poetry series to grace the local spoken word scene – Bill Brown’s 1-2-3 Slam. The inaugural show takes place at Umi Café on Thursday, September 18, hosted by Ritallin and Hyfidelik. Sign-up at 7:30 p.m.; show starts at 8 p.m. Cover is $5.

At Bill Brown’s 1-2-3 Slam, each spoken word artist in the competition (to a maximum of 12) will perform a 1-minute poem in the first round, with the usual grace period and time penalties of a classic slam format. The top 8 performers earn the right to move on to a second round with 2-minute poems. The four best scorers in the second round qualify for a Showdown Round with standard slam-length 3-minute poems. The highest scoring poet in the final round wins Bill Brown – a $100 bank note complete with a picture of the 8th Prime Minister of Canada, Robert Borden. Each round wipes the slate clean on the scores, so you just never know who’s going to come out on top!

Poets – get writing your 1- and 2-minute poems and then come down to Umi to be part of Ottawa’s newest poetic experience!

Bill Brown’s 1-2-3 Slam takes place at the Umi Café (610 Somerset St. W. at Percy) on the third Thursday of each month. Check http://www.umicafe.org/ for updates and information.

Can you throw down with Bill Brown?

Call for Submissions to (Cult)ure magazine for Local Poets and Event Organizers

(Cult)ure magazine seeks submissions from local poets to be published in the magazine’s new poetry section. The magazine is also soliciting submissions from local artists and arts organizations seeking coverage for upcoming events for its new current events column, entitled Shine. The new poetry section and the first Shine column are slated for their inaugural publication in the September 2008 edition.

The new Poetry Editor is Greg “Ritallin” Frankson, a local spoken word artist, creative services consultant and co-founder of the Capital Slam poetry series. (Cult)ure co-founder Brendan Blom is excited about the magazine’s new section. “Creating a poetry section in the magazine adds tremendously to (Cult)ure’s mission,” says Blom. “It is a collection of critical voices that speaks to a cult within our society that is fierce, vibrant, activist and irreverent – many of the qualities this magazine seeks to emulate.”

The Shine column, to be written by Frankson, will focus on upcoming artistic events that normally do not receive a lot of mainstream media coverage. “This is a column I used to write for the (now-defunct) City Journal and it was a success there,” explains Frankson. “It’s clear that there’s a need for this kind of coverage – turning the spotlight on artists and events that deserve a little ‘shine’ but can’t grab the attention of big media.”

All poetry submissions for the September 2008 issue (with the theme of Survival) must be received by August 10, 2008. All styles of poetry are acceptable – print and audio poems are welcome. Artists and organizations hosting events in September 2008 wishing to be the subject for the first instalment of Shine in (Cult)ure magazine must submit their press release and/or press kit by August 1, 2008. Please note that only events taking place during the calendar month of September will be considered for coverage.

(Cult)ure magazine is an online arts and politics magazine that speaks to the different intellectual cults within our society. These cults are small communities of individuals who have an in-depth understanding of their given interests; they are overtly passionate, and driven by their enthusiasm to apply or transmit their message to the city and to the world. Hence, “(Cult)” is placed in brackets. Empowering the multiplicity of identities within our community by giving these co-existing voices an opportunity to represent their unique culture is what makes (Cult)ure magazine so rich in content. It can be found at www.culturemagazine.ca.

For more information, contact:
Greg Frankson
Poetry Editor
(Cult)ure Magazine
(613) 252-1777
greg [at] ritallin [dot] com

anarchy issue of the Peter F. Yacht Club-deadline aug 30

Graffiti, graphic comics, film script excerpts, song lyrics, erotica, visual art, apocalyptic poetry, prose wanted for the anarchy issue of the Peter F. Yacht Club

black and white images only, texts in word, word perfect, pdf, html, deadline aug 30, 2008. to amanda underscore earl at storm dot ca

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