An issue on Canadian Literature has been on the cards for a long time. Here it is, and…… here is to bemused looks, neutral shrugs, crinkled foreheads, and other intense Canadian-isms. Oh! Don’t get me wrong! We love grovelling […]
I first came into contact with Theodore Harris when I was given the opportunity to moderate “Art as a Weapon: Critical Thinking and the Media,” the keynote event of Culture Shock 2011 co-organized by QPIRG McGill and the SSMU […]
— No language is neutral Derek Walcott To my students at the local university I announced that we would be reading the essay “My Canada,” and, who is the author (I’d told them previously)? “That girl from India,” blared out […]
Between the ages of twenty-eight and forty-four, I lived for Montreal. Nothing could have budged me from this town. Pure blind love, I was utterly faithful and happy to offer up my youth. I had my heart broken a few […]
I am walking along 21st Street toward 11th Avenue to see one exhibition which takes place in three different art galleries. Extractions, the name of one part of the exhibition, shows bronze sculptures made from images of cancer tumors by […]
The 2011 literary awards season is drawing to an end, with new stars such as Esi Edugyan and Patrick deWitt in the Canadian literary firmament. It has been an inspiring year, an inspiring few years in fact, and we can […]
I was first introduced to ghazals by my father. Well, not really. I first heard ghazals at my father’s house. He would plunk in tapes of Pankaj Udhas, a famous ghazal singer, and my sister and I would groan, […]
Burning hot it keeps becoming, and Professor Ivor and I have been traipsing around the island. Tall, angular, and English to the core, the Professor says he wants to learn about creole ways, and grins. “Really, Ivor?” “I do.” […]
Il était une fois un petit monstre très laid et très méchant, qui portait en lui des pensées si tristes et si funestes qu’il n’avait aucune envie de grandir pour devenir un grand monstre avec des pensées […]
Rana Bose (RB): Canadian Literature has been evolving in all directions. Literature out of a newer multicultural context is also making its presence felt. The Globe and Mail reviewer in reviewing your best seller The Love Queen […]
Rope, A Tale Told in Prose and Verse by Louise Carson. Broken Rules Press, 2011, 53 pages I first heard of Louise Carson’s new work, Rope, when she read the opening scene at Twigs and Leaves, the monthly open […]
I don’t want to talk about what to read—that anyone can choose for themselves. What I want to talk about is how to read and why to read. Those alone are the pertinent questions to ask. If we know how […]
Of late, I have been deluged with messages regarding the shifting of elephants from Toronto Zoo to the PAWS(Performing Animal Welfare Society) sanctuary in California in USA. and have been constantly reminded of the Canadian poet Margaret Atwood’s statement, “Nature […]
(Inspired by Robert Frost) If only I had enough pens, enough to write ghazals in my sleep. then I would know I have miles to go, miles to go before I sleep. In my city, […]
[Please note that this piece was originally published in Poetry Quebec. – ed] 3625 Aylmer Street, Montreal It is Thursday evening at The Yellow Door and you are hearing poets and prose writers reading from their work. […]
C’est en descendant de la montagne que je l’aperçus pour la première fois. Mon premier réflexe eût été de m’en éloigner en ignorant sa présence. Mais plutôt que de le fuir, je m’approchai sans crainte et m’assis calmement […]
Canadian literature is as rich as its native children such as Joseph Boyden, who, Through Black Spruce, has allowed city folk to breathe in the heady scent of aboriginal life in the north, Hugh MacLennan, who bridged […]
IN THE WRITERS’ WORDS Conversations with Eight Canadian Poets, Laurence Hutchman, Guernica Press, Toronto-Buffalo-Lancaster (UK), 2011 The1950s in Canada were energized by a group of young poets who were on a mission to create a national literature. Their hard […]
A deluge of water filled up the Sunday morning I went to see Varnam at the 35th edition of Montreal’s World Film Festival. On the way to the theatre, I biked and waded through meandering streams coursing through the […]
Los Angeles, February 1972 Dear children: When I myself was a child, in Italy, and toured the country with my parents, we would visit churches, basilicas, and cathedrals. Either for religious fervor or as a cultural duty I […]
