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May 2012

Wednesday May 23, 2012
The eh List Author Series: Michel Tremblay and Sheila Fischman

Wednesday May 23, 2012
Talon Poetry Night - Weyman Chan, Colin Browne, and Daniel Zomparelli at Audreys Books

Wednesday May 23, 2012
Opera Factory's Double Bill - New Zealand

Thursday May 24, 2012
Talon Poetry Night - Weyman Chan, Colin Browne, and Daniel Zomparelli at Pages

Saturday May 26, 2012
Ghosts of Violence - Sharon Pollock - Bluma Appel Theatre

June 2012

Tuesday June 5, 2012
B.Someday Presents Suburban Motel in June - Walking Fish Theatre

Thursday June 14, 2012
Vigil - Morris Panych - Actors Theatre Playhouse

Wednesday June 20, 2012
Wanderlust - Morris Panych - Stratford Shakespeare Festival

Tuesday June 26, 2012
The Best Brothers - Daniel MacIvor - Stratford Shakespeare Festival

Thursday June 28, 2012
George Woodcock Lifetime Achievement Award - Presented to Daphne Marlatt

July 2012

Thursday July 5, 2012
Twisted Poets Literary Salon - bill bissett - Prophouse Cafe

Thursday July 19, 2012
Denman Island Readers & Writers Festival - 2012

Thursday July 26, 2012
Schoolhouse - Leanna Brodie - Stone Fence Theatre

August 2012

Monday August 20, 2012
KlezKanada Poetry Retreat: Three Millennia of Poetic Subversion - Adeena Karasick

September 2012

Tuesday September 18, 2012
Chickens - Lucia Frangione - Chemainus Theatre

October 2012

Thursday October 11, 2012
Where the Blood Mixes - Kevin Loring - Sagebrush Theatre

November 2012

Saturday November 3, 2012
Tom and the Coyote - Michel Marc Bouchard - Factory Theatre

January 2013

Tuesday January 15, 2013
Carmen Aguirre's Blue Box - Great Canadian Theatre Company

Friday January 25, 2013
Leave of Absence - Lucia Frangione - Pacific Theatre

February 2013

Tuesday February 26, 2013
The Glace Bay Miners' Museum - Wendy Lill - Neptune Theatre

March 2013

Thursday March 14, 2013
Dead Metaphor - George F. Walker - Factory Theatre

April 2013

Thursday April 4, 2013
My Turquoise Years - M.A.C. Farrant - Arts Club Theatre

Tuesday April 30, 2013
Le Chant de Sainte Carmen de la Main - Théatre du Nouveau Monde

Enter "The Real World?"

The Real World? is an early masterpiece from Michel Tremblay, one of Canada’s greatest living playwrights. Tarragon revives this Canadian classic nearly 25 years after it premiered it in English in 1988 with a powerhouse cast: Matthew Edison, Cara Gee, Sophie Goulet, Tony Nappo, Cliff Saunders, Jane Spidell & Meg Tilly.

The mother of a precocious young playwright takes issue with his latest play: not only does it put private family matters centre stage, it liberally blends fiction with truth. A play within a play, The Real World? remains a groundbreaking work about art, autobiography and authority.

The Real World? is at Toronto’s Tarragon Theatre, playing through June 3, 2012.

The Capilano Review is 40!

On May 16, there is a celebration for the 40th Anniversary Issue of the Capilano Review at Performance Works in Vancouver.

Doors open at 7:00 pm and the readings start at 7:30.

Daphne Marlatt Receives Lifetime Achievement Award

On June 28, the 2012 George Woodcock Lifetime Achievement Award will be presented to Daphne Marlatt at the Vancouver Public Library.

We are also pleased to announce that Daphne Marlatt’s Liquidities: Vancouver Poems Then and Now will be appearing from Talonbooks in 2013.

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BC Book Prize Finalists at the VPL!

This evening at the Vancouver Public Library at 7pm, four of the finalists for the 2012 Dorothy Livesay Poetry Prize will read from their nominated works.

The evening will be hosted by Evelyn Lau, Vancouver’s Poet Laureate.

Buzzzzzz!!!

Whether it is the fly-whisks or wingless locusts, North American readers and independent booksellers are abuzz about the new translation of Martine Desjardin’s novel Maleficium, which has already being reprinted, due to growing demand.

Brave readers will enter the realm of Vicar Jérôme Savoie’s Gothic-era confessional, where seven men, just returned from faraway lands, profess to have fallen victim to the strange and evil spells of a mysterious woman. Throughout the Middle East, these men sought the finest goods and rarest experiences the world had to offer, but as each came closer to the object of their desire, they were struck by debilitating maladies and crippling deformities. All seven had encountered a young woman with a scarred face and now they’ve come to warn the priest that she will soon bring her dark arts to bear against the Catholic church itself. It is not until the young woman enters the confessional that truth emerges and the crimes of the seven men come to light.

This evening at 7pm, please join Martine Desjardins and her award-winning translators, Fred A. Reed and David Homel, for the launch of this book in Montreal at the Drawn & Quarterly bookstore, where there will be a reading from this text.

May is Talon Poetry Month!

This month, Governor General’s Poetry Award finalists Weyman Chan and Colin Browne will join local poetry impresario Daniel Zomparelli for a book launch at the Anza Club in Vancouver on May 15, followed by a launch at Audreys Books in Edmonton on May 23, and then a launch at Pages on Kensington in Calgary on May 24.

Also, ALL THREE titles are now available from Talonbooks!

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bill bissett reading at Morris and Helen Belkin Art Gallery

bill bissett reading poetry on January 20, 2012 in conjunction with “LETTERS: Michael Morris and Concrete Poetry” at the Morris and Helen Belkin Art Gallery from January 13 through April 8, 2012.

Laurence Anyways

Xavier Dolan is set to adapt the Michel Marc Bouchard play Tom a la ferme and he’ll be writing the screenplay in collaboration with Bouchard.

Dolan’s Laurence Anyways will have its world premiere later this month in the Un Certain Regard section of the Cannes Film Festival and will open in Quebec May 18.

Tom a la ferme made its bow at the Theatre d’Aujourd’hui last year. It is a drama about a guy, Tom, who only gets to know the family of his lover after his death and it turns out that his lover’s mother had no idea of the existence of Tom. The lover’s brother Francis forces Tom to keep quiet about his gay relationship.

Découvrez Montréal à la Galluccio

Montréal à la Galluccio (Éditions de l’Homme), un guide qui présente les restaurants, terrasses, boutiques, bars et cafés de Montréal favoris de l’auteur et scénariste Steve Galluccio.

Margaret Reynolds Speaking About Support for B.C. Creative Sector

Margaret Reynolds, executive director of the Association of Book Publishers of B.C., speaks at a news conference on April 26, 2012, about the need to help the province’s creative sector become more competitive.

At present, registration is open for BCreative 2012, an inaugural conference and showcase to be held May 10 to 12, 2012 at Simon Fraser University’s downtown Vancouver venues. It is designed to bring together government, business, the creative sector, and researchers to stimulate thinking, policy and action directed at developing a strategy and levering resources to further build the creative economy and to help British Columbia BC become a leader in the creative sector in the twenty-first century.

For more information visit the SFU BCreative website.

A Conversation with Martine Desjardins

A Conversation with Martine Desjardins about her novel Maleficium:

Maleficium is a shift for me, because I have left that realm to venture a little more toward the unreal. Thus the main female character has physical attributes that make her appear foreign, almost monstrous and alien. She has a harelip, but is also described as having a long tail, vulvar stamens, perfumed earwax, thorns growing from her scalp; she is seen carrying a larva in her navel, shedding tortoiseshell tears, extracting iridescent oil from her skin.

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The Long Goodbye: A Review of Morris Panych's Vigil

Morris Panych’s Vigil is reviewed by James MacKillop:

Once playwright Panych has won us over with the audacity of his concept, Kemp’s outrageous lack of compassion, he has given himself the problem of making this increasingly interesting for nearly two hours. Ratcheting up the zingers works for a start: “I’m concerned about your health these past few days: It seems to be improving.” This escalates until Kemp introduces a do-it-yourself suicide machine, with a lethal brick and an electrocutionist’s helmet.

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Do You Pass the Empathy Test for Conceptual Writing?

Does Adeena Karasick consider herself a “conceptual” writer? Here is her response:

So, in asking “Do you consider yourself a Conceptual Poet”, one has to ask – where do the aesthetics begin and the friendships end? How do you continuously (contiguously) belong without belonging in an ever-widening circle of language, production, filiation, power and desire.

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“Living the Border” with Guillermo Verdecchia

Steve Fisher interviews Guillermo Verdecchia about returning to Fronteras Americanas:

It’s a deeply Canadian play, and while I think it makes sense in other places—you could take this play to Mexico, or Argentina, or anywhere, because these borders and bi-cultural negotiations take place all over the world—it’s of ongoing interest to Canadians. It’s another way of looking at our nation; there are plays that have been produced in Canada that hold up an image that I don’t believe ever existed, but we like to think did…

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