Fatale: A dangerous Night of Femme Performance

I am passing this announcement on:

As part of the programming for Exposure:  Edmonton's Queer Arts & Culture Festival, The Canadian Literature Centre/Centre de litt ture canadienne is co-sponsoring an evening of literary performances this Sunday, November 25th, at Latitude 53, 10248-106 St. (7.30 sharp:  doors open at 7.00 p.m.).  The evening is called "Fatale:  A Dangerous Night of Femme Performance," and it features performances in French and English by David Bateman, Anna Camillerii, T.L. Cowan, and Val Desjardins.  Please join EXPOSURE, and the CLC, for this innovative and exciting evening of Canadian literary celebration.  Admission is FREE.

Alberta Writers’ Guild publishing evening

The Alberta Writers' Guild has a seminar evening next Wednesday that might interest you (and is pretty cheap!):

Get Published in Magazines (the Edmonton version)!
Wednesday, November 28, 7:00 PM
2nd Floor Program Room, Strathcona Public Library

8331 104 Street

WGA members free; non-members $5

 

Edmonton Story Slam

Adam suggested I pass this on:

The Bunker Projects presents:
another Edmonton Story Slam (celebrating our 20th event!)
Wednesday, November 21, at the Blue Chair Cafe, 9624 - 76 Avenue
(& the third Wednesday of every month) 
Sign up at 7 p.m., stage opens at 8 p.m.
For details e-mail thebunkerprojects@hotmail.com or call Susan at 1 (780) 682-2559.
Special event: Exposure Festival's Queer Slam, Nov. 28, at the Blue Chair Cafe

 
 

Dear Slammers;

Why would anyone sign up to read their works at a Story Slam? It's not safe. Not comfortable. You sweat. Your breathing gets a little funny. Your insides are a wreck. What if you fail? What if you stand there paralyzed like in that recurring nightmare? You open your mouth; no sounds come out. What if you end up looking like some jerk?

Or worse. What if they don't get your bizarre sense of humour? 

You could stay home with the curtains drawn this Wednesday while others gather to celebrate literature as it comes alive at the Blue Chair Cafe. Or you can bravely sign up at 7 p.m. and share five minutes of your best prose with a welcoming community. Or simply join our audience to witness some of the finest performed prose in Edmonton. Stage opens at 8 p.m. Please arrive early to enjoy dinner and drinks and to ensure you get a seat.

If you haven't been to a Story Slam yet, please join us Wednesday for our 20th monthly Story Slam and celebrate our success as a growing community of talented and dedicated writers/performers. 

Thank you for your participation, support and talent. This is an inspired community worth building.

Please see Story Slam rules and information below.

 
 

Sincerely,

 
 

Susan Hagan, on behalf of The Crew: Alison Hagan and Lisa Gregoire.

 
 

Thank you to the Blue Chair Cafe, Vue Weekly and Tracy Kolenchuk (photos) for your generous support.

 
 

Story Slam Rules: We keep it simple and only use rules that are absolutely vital so writers can express their creativity fully. We reserve the right to tweak the rules, if it becomes logical and necessary, and will enhance the evolution of the event. Our goal, as the caretakers of the Edmonton Story Slam, is to keep the format simple and Story Slam fair and fun.

1. Writers must present their own original stories (no rerun stories).

2. Stop watch starts ticking as soon as contestant begins talking.

3. 5 audience judges are selected by the organizers. Highest and lowest scores are dropped, middle three added together.

4. Times of 5:05 minutes or less, no penalty (5 second grace period). Over 5 minutes and you receive a .5 point penalty for every 10 seconds (or portion) over (ie. 5:11-5:20 = 1 point. 5:51-6 min = 3 points).

5. Gong at seven minutes.

6. Writers names are drawn randomly from a hat for the order of appearance.

7. Highest score after penalty deductions receives ALL audience donations from pass the hat. (Tied high scores share the prize) and is eligible for a spot in Slam Off.

8. Sign up begins at 7 p.m. Cut off when the Slam stage opens/or 10 writers.

9. No props.

10. Past winners are welcome to compete again, but receive only one space in Slam Off.

Also, we encourage writers to present their unpublished stories that contain events which transpire over time. However, this is a strong suggestion only because enforcement becomes really tricky.

Story on climate change

I thought some of you might be interested in the following story. Apart from the intrinsic interest in the story itself, it is a good example of how to approach research, from all angles, from those Richard Black is writing about, to his own research. I think it is also interesting as an example of how a writer can take a particular subject and make it into a story, here a scientific one that has much more general application:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/7092614.stm

Germaine Greer and Pink

A fun and typically perceptive article (Why has the world gone pink mad?) by Germaine Greer that's just come out, and that I thought might interest some of you:

http://blogs.guardian.co.uk/art/2007/11/why_has_the_world_gone_pink_ma.html

I haven't seen that much pink here in Edmonton (too male oil sands nacho for pink?). Any comments?

Creative Works readings

Tuesday, November 6, 3:30 pm, HC 4-29

Creative Works Reading by Gary Geddes

Gary Geddes has written and edited more than thirty-five books of poetry, fiction, drama, non-fiction, criticism, translation and anthologies. Sailing Home: A Journey Through Time, Place and Memory became a national bestseller in Canada.  Other recent works are
Skaldance and a best selling nonfiction work about an ancient Asian voyage to the Americas, The Kingdom of Ten Thousand Things: An Impossible Journey from Kabul to Chiapas.   His national and international awards include the E.J. Pratt Medal, the National Poetry Prize, the Americas Best Book Award, the Writers' Choice Award, National Magazine Gold Award, Poetry Book Society Recommendation (U.K.), the Archibald Lampman Prize (twice), and the Gabriela Mistral Prize.  Gary has been very active in promoting other writers. He was founding editor of a series of critical monographs called Studies in Canadian Literature, he has reviewed poetry regularly for the Globe & Mail, and started several publishing companies, including Quadrant Editions and Cormorant Books.  He has had numerous appointments as writer in residence, including University of Alberta, Malaspina University College, University of Ottawa, and Green College, UBC.  His best known anthologies, 20th Century Poetry & Poetics and 15 Canadian Poets (both from Oxford), have gone into numerous editions and have had an enormous impact on the teaching and writing of poetry in Canada. 

Wednesday, November 14, 3:30 pm, HC 4-29

Creative Works Reading by Michael Trussler

Michael Trussler's collection of stories,
Encounters (NeWest Press), won the City of Regina and Book of the Year awards at the Saskatchewan Book Awards in 2006. 
Encounters
is made up of stories that centre on characters who encounter something larger than themselves — a situation or another character — around which they must navigate. 
His second book, a poetry collection, entitled
Accidental Animals
has just appeared.  He has also published book reviews, literary criticism, poetry, and short fiction, and is the Chief Editor of Wascana Review. Trussler received a PhD from the University of Toronto and has taught courses on American literature, literary theory, and the short story at the University of Regina. He has travelled widely in the United States and Europe, is an amateur photographer, and has a fascination with visual art. 

Tuesday, November 20, 3:30 pm, HC 4-29

Creative Works Reading by Candace Savage

Candace Savage is the author of more than two dozen books, including thirteen on natural history and natural science, and an equal number of magazine features.  She is currently the wildlife columnist for
Canadian Geographic. 
Her work ranges through the sciences and humanities, with books on the aurora borealis, grassland ecology, European witchcraft, and cowgirl mythology, among other subjects. She has been honored by the American and Canadian Library Associations and the Canadian Science Writers' Association, among others. In 1994 she was inducted to the Honor Roll of the Rachel Carson Institute. As a resident of Saskatoon, Saskatchewan, she has lived on the prairies for most of her life.   Her latest book,
Crows: Conversations with the Wise Guys (Greystone, 2005), has been described as part science, part poetry, and a celebration of crow consciousness.  This reading is funded by a grant from the Canada Council for the Arts.

Piece on the oil sands

There's a well-written and extremely well researched essay by Aida Edemariam on the oil sands on the UK Guardian website – I think it's essential reading, especially as it presents a view from the outside, and almost everything we hear about the oil sands is Alberta or Canada generated – and it's a model of how to combine extensive and detailed research and fact and figures with writing that keeps the reader interested:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2007/oct/30/energy.oilandpetrol

Global Visions Film Festival

I have received information about the Global Visions Film Festival at the U, which I am passing on to all of you. Looks interesting!

"This year's Global Visions Film Festival is less than a month away! We are four University of Alberta student-volunteers with the festival (through the community service learning program), and we are sending you this email as an invitation for you and your students to attend.

"Now in its 26th year, The Global Visions Film Festival is Canada's oldest documentary film festival. This year's programming of inspirational non-fiction addresses the changing realities of the global community with over 30 local and international films from a total of 25 countries. Topics range from human rights, good governance, and democracy, to the development of the private sector and the provision of basic human needs, to the environment and gender equality. Screenings also serve as a forum for discussion and an international marketplace.

"We would be pleased if you and your students could attend any of this year's films. The festival runs from November 1st until November 4th at various venues around Edmonton. Tickets are available at the door ($8 for students), or packets of several tickets ($50 for 6 tickets) are available at select distributors. More information about the festival, the films, and tickets is available at the festival's website:

www.globalvisionsfestival.com

"Furthermore, we are available for short, five minute class presentations from October 19th until October 31st. We have clip reels at our disposal, which we would love to present, and we would be happy to answer any questions about the festival.

"We look forward to hearing from you.

"Sincerely,

Kevin Kuchinski (ksk2@ualberta.ca)
Emily Ophus (eophus@ualberta.ca)
Mark Hoge (hoge@ualberta.ca)
Julia Daniluck (daniluck@ualberta.ca)"

Creative Non-Fiction Literary Festival

Here's the link for the Creative Non-Fiction Festival. Student prices for the whole festival (apart from the Gala Opening) are $30 for a pass to all the events – good value (individual events $5 - $10 for students). I do encourage you to go at least to one of the events – not only might you hear interesting readings, but this is the Literary Festival for the writers in Canada who are professionally doing the kind of writing we are talking about in the class.

http://www.litfestalberta.org/index.html

The new blogger play

If you haven't already, try the new blogger.com Play:

http://play.blogger.com/

It's fascinating, in a sort of horrific existentialist way, as it simply relays photographs which are being uploaded to blogs, to your viewer in real time. So it's a kind of continuous snapshot from right across the world, and raises all sorts of metaphysical and social questions.

Do add comments when you have looked at it!

kd lang on the prairies and music in the prairies

The three-part series 'Music from the Middle of Nowhere', in which k d lang plays music by her favourite Canadian songwriters and explores the current Prairie music scene, starts in our 'Close Up' slot on Friday 28 September.

You will be able to hear the first programme on demand via a link on page

http://www.bbc.co.uk/worldservice/programmes/close_up.shtml%20

from 0832 GMT on Friday 28 September (2.32 a.m. in Alberta). The audio will remain available on demand for seven days, being replaced by Part 2 on Friday 5 October.

If it is interesting – or from our Albertan point of view, controversial, I might discuss it in class, so take a listen.

Course timetable

A link to the course timetable has been added on the left. I will be updating this timetable as necessary.

Mark’s attempt at buying a new car…

I blame Top Gear. The segment of the Famous Celebrity trying to drive the Very Ordinary Entry-Level Car hell-for-leather around the race track had just ended. The camera had cut to a long, dark, latent aircraft runway. The lens swung slowly along the empty asphalt, lightly salted with a smattering of rain. Every single person watching knew it was about to reveal the latest supercar, those rain drops suggestively sliding down an impossibly sloping windscreen, and Jeremy Clarkson about to climb in and start burning rubber. And what appeared was a Ford Focus.

As soon as I saw it, I knew I wanted one. It was small. It was cute. It was a bright yellowy-orange. It also had just a hint of menace. Sitting on the tarmac it stated "I am not just any Ford Focus", and it wasn't. It had a five-cylinder turbo-charged Volvo engine, and I love five-cylinder turbo-charged engines, having had one in a succession of Audis. And this one took the car from 0 to 60 mph in 6.8 seconds, to match the 6.8 litres per 100 kms highway driving. Then Top Gear tested it. They burnt rubber down the straight, they shot it round corners, they wondered if they should take it up to 150 mph (it goes that fast), and they loved it. They loved a Ford, even after Jeremy Clarkson's unfortunate experiences in trying to live down buying a GT40. The demure little car quietly reminded everyone that its great-aunt wins World Rally Championships. It was good on gas, and it didn't even cost that much. I was now totally hooked.

It was also something of a synchronicity. I had started thinking about a replacement for my ageing Audi Quattro only a couple of weeks earlier. I love Audis in general (I've owned six of them) and I love my current car in particular. It's solid, it's fast, and it gets through whatever the weather. But if it isn't quite a gas-guzzler, it does like a good drink, and it's been the equivalent of ten times around the globe. When Audi Canada, one of those firms who are quite certain customers are there to serve them instead of the other way around, sent me incorrect door trims in boxes stamped with the correct part number five times, and then asked me to send them a photograph of the ailing trim in situ on the door, I thought it was time to think about a change.

Besides, I wanted something smaller, something that uses less gas. I know I am not alone in this. All over North America those SUVs are starting to be turned in, if not here in Western Canada, where satiated Albertans are still hurtling themselves like Norwegian lemmings over the gas-guzzling cliff, or rolling over in them on the Queen Elizabeth Highway on the first day of snow. Elsewhere, thousands of us are turning to smaller cars, cars a little kinder to the environment and to our wallets.

Therein lies the rub, at least for those of my generation whose children, if they have any, are leaving home, and the sheer size of that big vehicle really isn't needed any more. For almost all small cars here in North America are aimed at the entry-level buyer or the twenty-to-thirty-something-year olds. But I don't want to revert to a small Toyota, let alone to a boy-racer Hyundai pretending to be a performance car by adding a chrome end to the exhaust. That's what my students drive. I don't want Zoom Zoom, but I do want zoom. I want a bit of panache, a bit of razzmatazz – heck, my 81-year old father drives a Honda R2000 performance sports-car. I would like a hatchback, as I often carry a lot of photographic equipment about. But at the same time I want a car that is a little individual, a little different, but doesn't show off, doesn't draw attention to itself. I can leave that to the boy racers, to those who can afford Jaguar sports cars, or to those poor unfortunates who find it necessary to pretend to be a gangster by driving a black Chrysler 300.

Actually, I have seen just the car, regularly, in Europe. It is a little Audi A3. It has the Quattro all-wheel drive (great for Alberta winters). It is a three-door hatchback - plenty of room. It has a 1.8 turbo-charged engine – plenty of zoom. It has the luxury to which I am accustomed. And it is very kind on gas. My demographic and age-group loves them, and buys them in droves. But I already knew this was an impossibility. When Audi Canada eventually got round to bringing in the A3, the only version with all-wheel drive had five doors and a huge 3-litre engine, and a price-tag beyond my range. Well, that was about what I have come to expect from Audi Canada.

But now there was the Focus ST. I called my local Ford dealer. Not only did he not have one, he had actually never heard of one (even though they have the rally world-championship version on the front page of the Ford Canada website). So I contacted Ford Canada. The first person I got hold of there hadn't heard of it, either. The second told me Ford Canada had no plans to introduce it to Canada, perhaps I would like another car the Ford range, a Ford 500, maybe? No thanks, said I. Well, came the voice on the line, you could always import one from Europe…

Next stop, the Big Daddy of them all, the inventor of the mass-produced automobile, the most recognized name in automotive history, Ford USA, or more accurately, their Customer Relations Department. I explained my predicament. I explained I have owned Audis for 18 years and now I was actually thinking of switching to Ford. I explained I wanted a Ford Focus ST with the five-cylinder turbo-charged engine. I asked where I could get it.

The reply involved a prolonged silence as the Customer Relations person went off to Consult. Then came the bitter blow. "Ford North America has no plans to import that particular model."

"Why not?"

"It does not suit our customer research predictions," came the reply.

"But there can't be any problems selling it here – the Volvo engine is sold in Volvos here, so it meets the standards, and the rest, well the rest is…a Focus."

"It does not suit our customer research predictions."

"But this is an iconic little car," I pleaded. "I teach University, and virtually none of my students drive a Ford. They drive Toyotas and Hondas and Hyundais. Don't you want to catch this new generation?"

"It does not suit our customer research predictions."

No wonder Ford North America continues to lose a fortune.

But no little yellowy orange buzz-bomb from Dearborn, Michigan, pretending to be a three-door hatchback for me…

To be continued…

Interesting events and readings

Wednesday, October 3, 3:30 pm, HC L-3

A Joint Reading by rob mclennan, Writer-in-Residence, University of Alberta and Jalal Barzangi, Writer-in-Exile, City of Edmonton

Born in Ottawa,
rob mclennan
is the author of over 13 trade poetry collections in Canada and England, most recently
The Ottawa City Project.  He has published poetry, fiction, interviews, reviews and columns in over two hundred publications in fourteen countries and in four languages, and done reading tours in five countries on two continents. The editor/publisher of above/ground press and the long poem magazine, the online critical journal Poetics.ca and the Ottawa poetry annual ottawater (ottawater.com), he edits the ongoing Cauldron Books series through Broken Jaw Press, edited the anthologies
evergreen: six new poets,
side/lines: a new canadian poetics,
GROUNDSWELL: the best of above/ground press, 1993-2003,
Decalogue: ten Ottawa poets and
Decalogue 2: ten Ottawa fiction writers, and runs the semi-annual ottawa small press book fair. His online home is www.track0.com/rob_mclennan, and he often posts reviews, essays, rants and other 'nonsense' at www.robmclennan.blogspot.com.

An ethnic Kurd from Iraq,
Jalal Barzangi is a recognized poet and journalist who had a long literary career before he was forced to leave the country in 1998. He was imprisoned from 1986 to 1989 because of his writings. In Iraq, Barzangi edited several magazines and worked at many cultural organizations. He has published hundreds of articles and poems about human, cultural and women's rights. Barzangi served on the board of the Iraqi Kurdish Writers' Union and was executive director of the Culture Department of the Culture Ministry in the autonomous Kurdish region of northern Iraq. Since coming to Canada, Barzangi has continued to write and has published several volumes of poetry in Kurdish.

This event is made possible by grants from The Canada Council for the Arts (both WIR and WIE) and the Alberta Foundation for the Arts and also by numerous WIE host/partners:  Writers Guild of Alberta, PEN Canada, Faculty of Arts, Edmonton Community Foundation, Edmonton Arts Council, Athabasca University, Grant MacEwan College, Edmonton Public Library, Edmonton Journal and Edmonton LitFest.

Derek Walcott

Friday, 28 September, 4:30 p.m., Convocation Hall – Arts Building

Derek Walcott is an award-winning poet, playwright and visual artist. Born in St Lucia, he studied languages and literature at the University of the West Indies in Jamaica, and theatre in the United States. He has published over 20 collections of poetry and verse, including In a Green Night: Poems 1948–1960 (1962); The Castaway (1965), Sea Grapes (1976), Collected Poems, 1948–1984 (1986); Omeros (1990), and Selected Poems (2007). Founder of St. Lucia's Arts Guild and Theatre Workshops in Trinidad and Boston, Walcott also has published over 30 plays, among them, Dream on Monkey Mountain (1967), Ti-Jean and His Brothers (1958); Pantomime (1978); and The Odyssey: A Stage Version (1993), which is currently playing at Statford's Festival Studio Theatre. His enchanting watercolours of Caribbean life are exhibited at June Kelly Gallery in SoHo.  His collaboration with Paul Simon led to a 1998 Tony Award nomination for Best Original Musical Score for "The Capeman." He has been awarded the Obie Award for Distinguished foreign play, the prestigious MacArthur Genius Award, the Queen's Medal for Poetry, the Royal Society of Literature Award, and the Nobel Prize for Literature. Derek Walcott currently spends his time in Boston, New York and Trinidad & Tobago.
This event is hosted by the Caribbean and African Diasporic Initiatives Program (CADI) and the Canadian Literature Centre/Centre de littérature canadienne (CLC), and sponsored by the Office of the Provost, the Faculties of Arts and Education, the Department of Political Science,. the Department of English and Film Studies, the Office of Human Rights, the
Edmonton Journal, and Hole's Greenhouse and Gardens. 
A steel drum performance starts at 4:00 p.m.; book signing and reception will follow. 

 

You might also be interested in the following:

Poets, poetry, performance, premiere play, gala, and more…
The Edmonton Arts Council is sponsoring passes for interested students to attend the Word! Symposium, an innovative two day symposium that brings together presenters and performers  locally, nationally and internationally on September 21-22 at Muttart Hall, Macewan—Alberta College Campus. Full symposium passes are free to interested students and include all sessions and special events, plus lunches. Passes are available upon registration by phoning Chrystal Seutter at 780-497-2336.  For information about the Word! Symposium, go to:
http://edmontonculturalcapital.com/word.asp.  This event is produced by The Edmonton Cultural Capital Program.

Posting blogs using Word 2007

For those of you who have the new Office suite (2007), or Word 2007, you can write your posts in Word, and then publish them directly from Word. This is very useful!

To do this:

• start a new document by clicking on the top left symbol in Word, and choosing 'new'.
  
• From the window that opens, chose 'new blog post' (double click on it).
  
• The first time you do this, you will get a little box asking you to register. Choose 'blogger' from the drop down box of providers (assuming you are using blogger.com), and simply enter your user name and password. You don't even have to remember the url!
  
• Then write your piece/post, and when you have finished, click the 'publish' icon, top left of the screen, and off it goes. As simple as that!
  

Clicking the 'home page' button (top left) opens your blog in your browser. Like most things in Word 2007, it is very well designed, and very easy to use. It also means you have the usual things in Word to use – such as the spell-checker, bullets (as in this post) and so on.

Blog created

This is the main blog for WRITE 498 at the University of Alberta