Writing In Ottawa

Karen Connolly signing copies of her novel at Tree Sept 14, 2010. Done with Burma and, for now, novels. Her previous books were about being away and this one is about being with both feet firmly in Canada, trying to parse politics and history, personal and public, power and gender relations. It’s about family and people living on the street with addictions but tells stories with a grace. She was reading from a collection of poetry underway. The poems built together so far are from between 6-10 months old and 6-10 years old. They made me look forward to their completion.
Ben Ladouceur read at the open mic a short poem about being on another continent from a friend, imagining them being in a hundred million years, carbon meeting carbon, as brothers. Gillian Wallace read a couple poems which you can read on her site. A little sound bonus of in person was how her poem about an outhouse ended with “walk back whistling” (pause, next poem) “Listening”. A lovely little tie to bridge poems. Murray Citron’s poem was dedicated to a CBC Radio 1 newsreader who speaks so clearly that, “like a verse by Donne, every syllable gets its oxygen”. T.A. Carter was in Paris with “her girls”, the left and right ones each having a name and habit of their own. I do hope you’ll get to come across that poem yourself one day. Perhaps it’ll go up on the Tree site. I read a couple new poems which I might mix in with the Blink Vernissage on Thursday.
What else? Have you heard that an umbrella organization for poetry reading series is getting going? (Announced at Tree last night.) It has representatives from half a dozen reading series around town. The group is still unnamed but will advocate for poetry in arts and cultural funding, help promotion of events and get this long-awaited Ottawa Poetry Festival underway.
You saw the sneak peak to what Apt. 9 has coming next?
Did you see on FB that months after Sean Moreland gets back to town, he, Aaron Kozak and Collin Campbell have started a new reading series?
And you know that the art-lit issue of Arc launches this Saturday at 5 at Plan 99?
Oct. 1 is the launch of the AB Series season with legends Nobuo Kubota and Penn Kemp. Oct 16th is Jay MillAr and Shane Rhodes.
In other writing news, Joanne Proulx is offering an installment of her fiction writing Snapping the Sheet: Creative Writing Course 1. (The spots snap up fast because she’s a great instructor. I took a novel-writing course with her last fall.) “Learn to write clean, creative prose and bring engaging stories to life. The course covers both writing technique and the art of story-telling. Together we will focus on where story ideas are found, effective openings, the shaping of the story, kinds of conflict, and satisfying endings.” (5 weeks starting September 21.)