Category Archives: Rants, raves and faves

“Everything” worth writing about, poet says

By Liz Snell

Emily McGiffin’s bright-eyed, earnest face contained no pretension. She spoke her poems with confident resonance, but also vulnerability, as if they were letters written to a close friend, not intended for everyone else in the room. She seems like the kind of person you’d meet in a small town or on a farm; when she speaks, you feel she’s not just wasting words to impress you, but is sharing a homespun and heartfelt wisdom.

Her poetry is full of solitude’s topography: one person leading the blind speaker through a fog, someone living in a car and playing solitaire. Wild mountain landscapes butt against domestic acts like woodcutting and carding wool. Her writing, both on the page and spoken aloud, conveys a tension between closeness and distance.

Victoria poet Carla Funk, who conducted the evening’s Q & A at the Open Space event, asked McGiffin which three dead poets she’d invite to dinner. McGiffin bowed out of the question, saying she knows little of classic poetry, and instead cited her favourite “dead poet” poems: “Dover Beach” by Matthew Arnold, “Ode to Autumn” by John Keats, and “Fern Hill” by Dylan Thomas. These poems encapsulate both the joy in and loss of an Eden-like, harmonious world, a theme close to McGiffin’s own writing. One gets the sense that she’s attempting to write her way into the feeling of home, struggling to trust in a tenuous place: “And when, walking through the enormous and solitary land,/you grow hungry for company, you will find it underfoot…”

McGiffin began “fiddling with lines” of poetry in high school. She took writing courses at UVic as a side to her focus on geography and biology. Of studying writing she says, “It might have had an impact in that I never really did anything with my biology degree.”

Now pursuing a PhD in environmental studies at York University, McGiffin seems to still be searching for ways to explore the relationship between her scientific studies and her poetry. “I’d like to find a way that they can talk to each other a bit more.”

McGiffin initially struggled to see her creative writing as a worthwhile pursuit: “Poetry’s kind of a marginalized art form… It took a long time to feel it wasn’t something I was just doing on the side.”

To an audience member who asked, “How do you know what’s worth writing about?” McGiffin replied,  “Once I decided anything was worth writing about, it became less of a question of what was worth writing about – everything is.”

McGiffin recently moved to Toronto from Smithers, B.C., where her writing was often influenced by the Skeena River, which has been threatened by coal mining. She spoke of her concerns about conservation, and how we view the world in terms of “resource management.” In response to such environmental destruction, does McGiffin’s writing take a stance of hope, or despair? She’s not sure. “The question is, is there hope for humans? I don’t know.”

Liz Snell is a Victoria writer

Hank Angel Pays Homage to Rock and Roll

Hank Engel

Hank Angel (Extended Play 45)

Produced by David Jeffrey and Dave Lang

Reviewed by Chris Ho

Victoria musician Hank Engel’s self-titled EP is a nostalgic gem that brings you right back to the feel-good rockabilly vibe of the 50’s. Engel pays homage to the underground music scene in Edmonton in the 1980s, and more specifically to one of his favourite bands, The Draggnetts. Although this band had recorded much of their material and were admired for their musicianship, they ended up disappearing into obscurity. In an interview with Drive-in Magazine, Engel said, “We idolized those guys. Not only did they play great music, but they lived it, in an old house with rebel flags and velvet paintings and overflowing ashtrays. Empty bottles all over the place, a bust of Elvis on the mantle. Their girlfriends walked around looking like Betty Page and Marilyn Monroe. Their band was like a gang, like every band ought to be.”

The idea of living out the music that you write and express is essential to a lot of rock and roll — something that you don’t see as often these days. Many bands don’t have the luxury of being signed and consequently need to manage their own careers. Likely, it would only hinder productivity in that regard if they were to live out that kind of lifestyle – (talk about a buzz kill). But this isn’t the sort of genre that lends itself well to being focused on marketing, and making sure you tweet frequently enough. It’s a genre that’s about the music and the lifestyle. It reminds us that, when all is said and done, it’s the whole package that counts: sex, drugs, and rock n’ roll.

Hank Engel’s EP reminds us of this. The production isn’t flashy, and the vocals aren’t tuned to perfection. Many of the tracks sound as though they were recorded live off the floor, which gives it that old-­‐school rockabilly feel. And regardless of how polished the EP may be, one has to admire this decision to record the songs in this way. Hank Angel could very well have recorded these old tunes in a more mainstream, or polished way, but instead he stays true to the rockabilly roots.

Producer David Jeffrey clearly has a good understanding of Hank Angel’s genre, and has recorded and mixed it in a way that harks back to that early vintage rock-­‐ and-­‐roll sound. As a result, the EP gives you just the right amount of crisp guitar tones, non-­‐intrusive drum rhythms and raw vocals. Hank brings a new life to the songs of Art Adams and The Draggnetts, although it’s a shame that he doesn’t include more of his original material. His song “A Guitar and A Broken Heart” is a great opener for the EP since it has many of the elements that make a great song, including the catchy vocal melodies, tasteful guitar riffs, and simplistic drum rhythms. But instead of developing this, along with his own sound, he decides to resurrect a couple of great rockabilly tunes, obscuring his own path as a musician.

Nonetheless, his motives are pure, and the songs have come together very well. And who knows, maybe we’ll get to hear more original rockabilly releases from Hank /Engel/Angel in the future.

Chris Ho is a UVic  graduate, musician and closet cookie dough eater.

Open Word: Readings and Ideas: Emily McGiffin

First reading: Wednesday, October 9, 2013, at 12:30 p.m., University of Victoria, Fine Arts Building, Room 209
Second reading followed by interview with Carla Funk: Wednesday, October 9, at 7:30 p.m., Open Space
Admission by donation, books available for purchase, cash bar.

Toronto writer Emily McGiffin will read from her new book Between Dusk and Night as part of the literary series Open Word: Readings and Ideas. The event is hosted by the University of Victoria Department of Writing and Open Space. Her book of poems considers the human relationship with the earth during the current environmental crisis, and the intimate relationship between humans themselves. Local poet Carla Funk will interview McGiffin after the 7:30 p.m. reading at Open Space.

 

Poet deploys wordplay and humour

Sit You Waiting

By Kim Clark

Caitlin Press

112 pages, $16.95

Reviewed by Candace Fertile

Sit You Waiting is the first collection of Vancouver Island writer Kim Clark, whose poems reverberate between the mental processes we are all captured by and the world we inhabit. Topics include illness, love, desire, travel, and poetry, and Clark infuses several of the pages with bold wordplay and wry humour.

Clark uses square brackets, which can be a bit unnerving until it becomes evident that the recurring technique provides a sub-text. For example, in “A Woman Builds a Body, Post Tsunami,” the brackets help build the poem:

Sleep [stealthy] leaves

the makeshift bed, the woman

[a subduction].

Many poems use this technique, almost as a signature.

Clark handles a variety of length with ease. In “Lavender,” thirty-two words reveal the force of scent-driven memory. In “Three Days on a Train In and Out of Dreaming,” a longish poem of thirteen pages with fabulous use of white space, Clark delves into a train trip across Australia, a place of great space itself. Again the poet employs symbols, this time the number sign (#) and the equals sign (=) to organize the sections. The first is #= and the poem moves to #======= and then back to #= while maintaining more than half a page of space on each page as the traveller observes the landscape and contemplates the journey, both physical and mental. In the poem’s middle section, “A herd of stones gets up and walks away on wooly legs. / The treelines in motion are not stones or sheep but alphabetic arrangements. . . . “ These poems touch magic.

Even a short poem can tell a story, and “Wishing for a Colt” is a clever and funny look at people in a bar hoping for more than a drink. This poem is completely grounded in the concrete. The speaker tries to talk to a “failed cowboy, / dust-diving rodeo rider, / seven broken ribs with a mighty big / hat, and a real small / herd of hay burners / in the interior” while the bar waits for action. It comes.

I am drawn to poems about poetry, and Clark delivers. In “Primate Remuage,” the speaker advises readers to “Be the guerrilla / in the midst.” The corny pun works beautifully as the directions continue and focus on destabilizing the domestic environment until the final command: “Warm to this poem / deep in your pocket. / Leave crumbs / to find your way out.” Overall Clark’s poems appear to be about digging deep within the pockets of our minds,  then pulling the treasures out into the light.   How lovely.

Candace Fertile teaches English at Camosun College         

 

 

 

 

Books and coffee symbiosis thrives

Pictured: Authors Elizabeth Woods, left, and Linda Foubister at Moka Coffee House

By Barbara Julian

What is it about books and coffee? The literature-latte marriage originated back when many a writer lived in a garret and had to meet friends in public places. Literary conversation flowed while a drink could be eked out for hours.

“Back when”? What has changed? For at least some low-income scribes, a friendly local café is still social space, performance space and even, what with portable digital devices, office space. Under the influence of caffeine, wine, beer or whatever else stimulates the brain cells, writers and readers use cafes for book chat, gossip and increasingly, for selling. The rise of the independent author-publisher has created a need for novel marketing and distribution strategies, although printing by author and hawking books in the public marketplace are not new. The past is the future.

Where official arts bureaucracies have dropped the ball, many cafes in Victoria have responded to the demand (you’d think their counter staff include secret scribblers or something). As well as hanging paintings, Serious Coffee on Cook Street hosts the Pen In Hand reading series, Moka House on Hillside hosts Planet Earth Poetry, and Moka House on Fort is now home base for the Victoria Independent Authors and Publishers Association, giving local writers a few shelves on which to display their books–as does the Oak Bay Marina Coffee House. Let’s raise a mug to them all.

The idea is that customers peruse the books while sipping and contact author-publishers directly if they want to purchase. In this age of e-books the whole bookshop model stands on shaky ground, and the cafe/publisher symbiosis is just one emerging creative ad hoc book promotion arrangement.

Whether it’s Sartre and de Beauvoir debating at the Les Deux Magots, Hemingway scowling at La Rotonde, Susan Sontag being analytical at Café Loup or Dorothy Parker witticizing at the Algonquin, we all harbour images of the “literary café.” Many of the famous ones are now merely tourist spots, but Victoria’s cafes harbouring book nooks are for locals. The books are there discreetly and the readings just for fun, but any exposure for new and unknown (as well as better-known) authors is welcome.

Some people like tweeting, but others still prefer real-world contact with writers and readers. Our book-housing cafes are appreciated by those who cannot afford to buy every book they want but relish the chance to dip in or hear them being read from for the price of a coffee. Then there are the authors sipping in dark corners, clocking whoever is examining their books. (Note to patrons: keep your voice down–you never know when you might be providing dialogue.)

The café meanwhile is happy to draw in customers however it can. Nobody in either the café or the book trade is rich, both existing in over-crowded landscapes. A cross-species symbiotic relationship makes sense–and those who naturally keep their head in a book and a mug in their hand, are grateful.

 Barbara Julian has published Childhood Pastorale: Children, Nature and the Preservation of Landscape under her own Ninshu Press imprint.

Duo offers plant-collectors’ delight

Pursuing the Wild: The Sichuan Botanical Expedition
Guest Speakers Sue Milliken and Kelly Dodson
Sponsored by Finnerty Gardens Advisory Committee

Reviewed by Susan Hawkins

Gardeners in the Pacific Northwest often favour eclectic kinds of gardens. Our temperate, water-abundant environment supports a dizzying array of unusual plants, both indigenous and exotic. Recently, in the University of Victoria’s David Lam auditorium, rare plant collectors and breeders Sue Milliken and Kelly Dodson treated local plant and garden enthusiasts, a group in which I include myself, to a presentation that featured both rare and exotic. Milliken and Dodson are of that unusual breed of phytomaniacs, the plant collector. Plant collectors are intrepid explorers–men and women who traverse often-inhospitable terrain to be the first to find, document, collect and botanize previously unknown plant specimens.

Milliken and Dodson are the proprietors of Far Reaches Farm, a rare plant speciality nursery located in Port Townsend, Washington, where they grow and market a wide variety of plants that are particularly well suited to regional growing conditions. Their most recent plant-collecting excursion, joined by well-known plantsman and plant hunter Peter Cox, led them to the misty mountain ranges of China’s Sichuan region, seeking seeds and cuttings from a variety of new or uncommon species of rhododendrons, primulas and ferns. Their presentation paired over one hundred images with fascinating stories of botanical exploration and inspired a number of collective oohs and aahs from the enthusiastic audience. In addition, Milliken and Dodson work closely with the Friends of Finnerty Gardens, providing new plant stock for the ever-expanding rhododendron and plant collection.

Currently, the native habitat for rhododendrons is disappearing fast, and the status of many species in the wild is uncertain. As part of their occupation and nursery, this dedicated couple work to preserve rare plant species and their threatened habitats.  Milliken and Dodson’s passion for plants was both contagious and inspiring. Their presentation was immensely informative and conveyed an understanding of the value for preserving rare plant species and the habitats that sustain them.

The rhododendrons are currently in bloom in Finnerty Gardens; I highly recommend a visit to view some of the rare and exotic species first hand.

Sue Milliken and Kelly Dodson can be reached at: Far Reaches Farm, Port Townsend, Washington.

Susan Hawkins is a trained gardener completing her History in Art PhD. 

Leonard Cohen delivers unique holiness

By Julian Gunn

My plan was to see the exhibition of Leonard Cohen’s prints at a leisurely hour on Saturday morning, after some strong coffee and a wander up Oak Bay avenue. I knew that the Avenue Gallery resided there, theoretically stuffed with the evidence of Cohen’s vision, tucked between a Starbucks and Ivy’s Bookshop. I’d asked my friend J. to come along, but his schedule was less flexible than mine, so he called the gallery Friday night to see if he could run by after work (the sneak!)—and they told him the show was over. The newspaper and the website showed the wrong end date.

He texted me the news. I railed against fate in a few brief bursts of angry typing, and then J. updated me: the gallery owner had revealed that there were still a few stacks of prints standing up against the walls. We could see them if we wanted to, provided we arrived before five-thirty. It was almost five. We bolted to Oak Bay in J.’s car, Poncho.

It was true: the show was down and the gallery folk were in the midst of redecorating for the next exhibition. The whole room smelled of fresh paint and thwarted longing. The remaining works of Cohen stood on the floor in three close files of matching frames. The large and medium prints rested against the back wall, and the small ones were almost under our feet near the cash desk. J. knelt down and with reverence parted the frames. There it was, Leonard’s sigil and stamp, the Unified Heart: two interlocking hearts in a circle, a modified Star of David.

I’ll level with you, friends. I believe that Leonard Cohen is a saint. I don’t adhere to any faiths with saints in them, but I know a holy fool when I see one.  If  you were at his concert with me on Wednesday night, you saw him too, frail as a bird in a black suit, tipping his hat to us and the beautiful, terrible joke of mortal life. (That Voice. Inimitable. Sinking over six decades from a quavering tenor into an almost subsonic bass tremor rolling through the flesh of the earth itself. That Voice, now beginning to grow ghostly. It frightened me, but it made him laugh.) I say frail, yet he played three encores. We didn’t leave the Save-on-Foods arena (which Cohen described as “this difficult space”) until almost midnight.

Still, we are here to talk about Art. In parallel with Cohen’s gig, the Avenue Gallery exhibited a travelling display of his work. Or so I surmise—I never actually saw it on the walls. The question I was asked to contemplate was a reasonable one: was it Leonard Cohen’s great gift for visual art, or only his massive fame, that merited a display of his prints? We know he can write a song, but can he draw?

It is an article of faith with me (I have faith in any number of things, if not a central bureaucracy of divinity) that anything made with true attention, honesty, and compassion will produce beauty. I think you can tell. I think that it shows.

I think it shows in Cohen’s prints. There’s skill in the execution: a thick calligraphic line that twists to form a face, slightly abstracted Grecian forms for beloved women. There’s clumsiness too–the same lumpy pixellation that confused me in the art for his album Dear Heather.

The visual art’s precise analogy is his music. I think even we who love Leonard above rubies can agree that Mr. Cohen didn’t start out as a great musician or vocalist. He began instead as someone with a profound gift of attention—to the sudden flaring of the sacred in the ordinary world, to the nuances of desire and longing, to his own internal states. There’s a kind of narcissism in his work, but it is a wrenchingly humble self-contemplation that deserves a better name. Likewise, his visual work is full of self-portraits, but these are not self-aggrandizing images. Quick tracings of the deep canyons in an old man’s face, they bear wry inscriptions:

yes
always somewhat
off balance
but peaceful
in his work
peaceful
in his vertigo
an old man
with his pen
deeply familiar
with his
predicament.

That gift of attention, worked on by years of effort and humility, has produced something more than artfulness, though I think his songs are great art. The only word that comes close enough is holy, if there were some version of that word that insisted on only precisely the feeling of bliss and peace and mutual surrender. The songs have been transformed further by the musicians Cohen brought together to tour with him. The liquid violin of Alexandru Bublitchi, the incredible fingerwork of Javier Mas, the playful and sure percussion of Rafael Gayol, the golden vocals and songwriting gifts of Sharon Robinson—these would all be worth a ticket in themselves. We had all those, and we had him too.

“It kind of fits, though, doesn’t it?” J. pointed out as we rushed to the Gallery in pursuit of the remaining fragment of the art show. “Somehow it’s better this way, to come too late and to almost miss it. It’s like something from his songs.” And he was right.

 

Julian Gunn is a Victoria writer and music lover.

Victoria author bares more than her soul

By Will Johnson

Yasuko Thanh is not afraid to take off her clothes.

The Journey Prize-winning Victoria author, who published her debut collection of short stories Floating Like the Dead last year, is slated to appear as Miss July in a calendar of nude Canadian authors due in 2014. The project, titled “Bare it For Books,” will raise funds for PEN Canada.

But Thanh may be the only author in the calendar who already has experience working as a nude model.

“I’m trying not to tie those two worlds together as a deliberate decision,” she said. “In my wild-child days, or whatever you want to call it, I did modeling and it was certainly of a different texture. That was working as a part of the sex industry. And that’s not necessarily something I want to relive.”

“I think I have a nudist streak in me,” she said. “Anaïs Nin has this wonderful line, in one of her stories or journals, I’m not sure. ‘As sexless as a child who thinks nothing of his nakedness’. I think of it kind of like that. It doesn’t need to be provocative in that sexual way.”

“When we do the photo shoot that’s coming up on March 3, we have some interesting ideas that are going to stay away from that. It’s going to be fun. It’s going to be tongue-in-cheek,” she said.

The project, which is the brainchild of author Amanda Leduc and classical music producer Allegra Young, will feature 12 nude authors and will raise financial support for PEN Canada.

When Thanh was contacted by Young and Leduc, she eagerly accepted the invitation to participate. Victoria photographer Anastasia Andrews volunteered to take the photos.

“I said any way I can help, I’m there. I think most people have heard of PEN, and I certainly support the work they do.”

Thanh enthusiastically agreed with author Vincent Lam, who will appear alongside her in the calendar and was quoted in a recent story in The National Post as saying that it’s much more personal to publish a book than to expose your body to the world.

“Putting a book, putting your soul out there, that’s way more personal,” she said.

But she also emphasized it’s important to keep her experiences in perspective.

“Yes, it’s a little soul-baring to have a book, to put it out there and to have people saying things about it. Oh, poor me. But there are places where you’re not just putting your soul out there, you’re actually putting your life on the line or you could be looking at a prison sentence,” she said.

This is why Thanh felt so strongly about supporting PEN Canada.

“The fact that there’s an organization out there, fighting for people’s freedom of speech, well that’s great. And I want to support that any way I can.”

When asked why she thought of Thanh for the calendar, which also features a diverse selection of authors such as Miranda Hill, Angie Abdou and Daniel MacIvor, Leduc’s answer was simple: “because she’s hot stuff.”

“The point of BIFB, in addition to raising funds for PEN, is to introduce Canadians to writers they might not have encountered,” said Leduc. “Yasuko is a great writer, a young writer, and maybe not as well known as some of the others in the calendar.”

When asked how she feels about appearing alongside Yann Martel, bestselling author of Life of Pi, Thanh beamed happily.

“It feels friggin’ awesome,” she said.

 

Writer Will Johnson is back in Victoria after stints in Vancouver and Nova Scotia. 

 

Why I use a Kindle

Rant By Will Johnson

Photo by Darby Jack

My girlfriend bought me a Kindle for my birthday last year.

I was pretty ambivalent about it for the first while, and it sat unused in its box for nearly three weeks before I decided to tinker with it. Like so many other people, I was reluctant to give up the tactile experience of holding a book in my hands. My most cherished novels were dog-eared, maybe water-stained, with notes scribbled in the margins and unrecognizable brown stains in the corners. They were vehicles of instant nostalgia. How could that be replaced by this tiny gray machine?

But after learning how many Hemingway novels I could download for free, my love affair with this gadget began.

The first book I read was The Antagonist by Lynn Coady, and right away I liked the way it updated me on my progress (7% done, 12% done) as I read and the way I could slip it into my coat pocket while rushing out to the bus. By the time I started The Hunger Games trilogy, it had become an irremovable part of my daily life.

Then I discovered the Clippings function, which meant I could highlight choice passages and save them for later. My Clippings file is now a compilation of hundreds of quotes from authors like Christopher Hitchens, David Mitchell and Kurt Vonnegut all thrown together at random.

But perhaps my favorite feature? Every time I reach a word I don’t understand, all I have to do is click over to it and the dictionary will pop up with a definition. This is especially helpful when reading short stories by David Foster Wallace.

My new word for today, learned while lounging in a soapy bath: Contrail.

(If you don’t know already, a contrail is the mist-like vapor that streaks across the sky when planes pass overhead. I never knew what to call those before. Cool, right?)

Then there are the daily deals. At first, I was annoyed by the constant advertising, but for every shitty mystery novel or random shaving gel, there’s a chance to get a classic book for less than three bucks. The other day I downloaded Requiem for a Dream by Hubert Selby Junior for 99 cents!!!! (Sorry, I felt like one exclamation mark wasn’t quite enough there…)

Also, I find I can switch between books with ease. Buying Guns, Germs and Steel by Jared Diamond does not seem as daunting when it’s simply another bullet point in a list of titles. And though reading it sometimes feel likes a scholarly chore, on a Kindle I can dip into it for one grueling chapter, and then switch back to a Tom Clancy thriller to give my brain a rest.

I still read and buy normal books, but I’m finding my patience with them is starting to wear thin. I was working my way through the hefty hardcover of Dear Life by Alice Munro the other day, and I was frustrated that I couldn’t tap my finger on the page to find the definition for “bilious,” “commensurate” or “irascible.” What was I supposed to do? Go find a dictionary? And if I find a beautiful passage that I’d like to remember, which happens every page of two with Alice Munro, do I need to resort to a highlighter? Or maybe I could scribble it down on a notepad?

My Kindle has irrevocably changed the way I interact with literature. It has been a boon to my reading life, has probably saved me hundreds of dollars and it expands my vocabulary every day. Rather than having random piles of unread books lying around my bedroom and stacked on every windowsill, I have this little gray companion that fits comfortably into my bag.

I take it with me everywhere I go.

Will Johnson, a UVIC graduate, is completing his MFA in creative writing at UBC.

I confess: 000 Interest in 007

By Lynne Van Luven

I don’t get it. I never have got it. I never WILL get it.

Why all this brouhaha about Skyfall, the new James Bond movie? What’s the big deal?

Daniel Craig’s woodenly rugged face. Screeching motorcycle chases. Big Booms as things explode. Car tricks. More big Booms. Lots of gadgets, many of which cause booms. Also Kapows and Kabooms, just for variety. Sexy women. Big Bosoms too. That encapsulates the Screech-Boom plot of the new James Bond movie. Which echoes the plots of the previous 22 James Bond movies. And yet: everywhere, endless attention over so much empty action.

The fuss boggles my mind: I have perfectly sane colleagues who collect Bondabilia. And feminist friends who make special dates to see each new Bond film; they brag about having seen every one — and wait with bated breath for the next one. And I have a really smart co-worker who argues that Sean Connery was the BEST bond, even better than Roger Moore, who himself now 85, says Craig makes a “convincing killer” as the newest Bond.

Why, I ask? Why, why why? And don’t tell me that Kate and Will have made a date to see Skyfall. Means nothing: that pair will go anywhere.

Yes, okay, I guess: Escape. Entertainment. The frisson of being part of something described as “iconic,” a 50-year old “franchise.” Cinematic groupiedom.

But really: the current Bond cost $150 million to make – not including marketing and distribution. The cast went through 200,000 rounds of ammunition during weapons training for the movie. The storyline required 750 extras, 100 background vehicles and a 300-person film crew –just for the chase sequence through Whitehall in London.

Nope, not even a blond Javier Bardem and the redoubtable Dame Judy Dench will get me into the theatres for Skyfall.

I remain: neither shaken nor stirred.