Readings/Events

SOME 8, a journal launch

As a past contributor, I’ll be reading with Daphne Marlatt and Selina Boan at the launch of SOME’s 8th issue.

Daphne Marlatt is a long-time Vancouver poet associated with the TISH movement and a founder of the magazines, periodics and Tessera. Intertidal, a collection of her early poems was published by Talonbooks in 2017. Recent publications from Talonbooks include Then Now (2021) and a Noh-theatre inspired libretto for four composers entitled Shadow Catch (2023).

Selina Boan is a moniyâw/nehiyaw poet whose work has been published widely, including in The Best Canadian Poetry 2018 and 2020. Her book, Undoing Hours (Nightwood Editions) won the 2022 Pat Lowther Memorial Award She is currently a poetry editor for Rahila’s Ghost Press and is a member of the Growing Room Collective.

The Some magazine website can be found at https://robertmanery.ca/some-magazine/

Subscriptions can now be purchased through the website. You can also link to recordings of some of our past readings.

Cross-Pollinations

The Wednesday, November 29 Cross-Pollinations event features poets Elee Kraljii Gardiner and Isabella Wang on the theme of their poetic expressions of medical events. In this conversation between long-time friends of different generations, Elee and Isabella discuss what happens when we shift the paradigm from the idea of “dying for one’s art” to ideas of agency and care, creating art that takes care of its maker. Elee will read from her award-winning collection Trauma Head about vertebral artery dissection and stroke and Isabella will share excerpts from her manuscript in-progress, Subscript: Annotating Long-Illness, a creative auto-theoretical work that speaks to her cancer diagnosis, sifting through her medical documents and the writings of Roland Barthes to express her experiences of navigating the health system as a whole.

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Supported by the Canadian Association for Health Humanities and the Health Arts Research Centre, this Cross-Pollinations virtual rounds feature artists and Health Humanities professionals for multi-faceted conversations about healthcare, art, healing, and humanities.

In this ground-breaking series, health humanities and poetry come together under the same scope, combining artistic expression with health practice and research. The presentations of Cross-Pollinations will illuminate new and emerging insights and perspectives on healthcare opportunities and challenges, healthcare approaches and advances, as well as build bridges of connection between health professionals, humanities and the arts.

This series is ideal for people in arts communities, poets and writers, as well as those working in healthcare.

Cross-Pollinations occurs monthly on the last Wednesday of each month at 6pm EST/3pm PST. Events run for one hour, and include a discussion period for audience engagement.

Poetry in the Park

Delighted to read with Harry Alluri!

Hosted by Alan Hill. Bring a pen or writing implement in case I ask you to scribble ideas!

MUSE at Medical Museion

I’ll be presenting excerpts from two projects, Until the Book Faints and Residence, a chapbook of ideas from last year’s residency here, to the staff and friends of the Medical Museum.

VMI and Friends: An AWP 2023 Offsite Reading

Featuring Ashanti Anderson, David Bradford, Danielle Geller, Jen Currin
Elee Kraljii Gardiner, Charles Mudede, Susan Olding, Susan Steudel, Erika Thorkelson

Free and open to the public. Masks, please!

SPANNER, an AWP offsite

A multimedia literary performance with Elee Kraljii Gardiner, Sasha La Pointe, Jasmine Elizabeth Smith, Troy Osaki. Free and open to the public. Masks required.

Poetry in Parks

Come to the field house at Oppenheimer Park in Vancouver’s Downtown Eastside and write!

Keys, Openers, Openings

In this 2hr playful creative writing session, we will read short bits of published writing and do our own writing on the theme of keys, openers, and openings. Participants will have a chance to share their work aloud and are welcome to work in any genre: memoir, poetry, fiction, etc.

The History of Hogan’s Alley with Wayde Compton and John Atkin

The Vancouver Police Museum & Archives is pleased to be hosting author Wayde Compton and local historian John Atkin as they unravel some of the myths and histories of this neighbourhood and its importance to Black identity 50 years later.

The Downtown Eastside was one of the first places in Vancouver settled by European, African, and Asian people. This historic neighbourhood, which includes Gastown, Strathcona, and Chinatown, was once the thriving business and cultural centre of Vancouver. Over the decades, gentrification, a lack of affordable housing, and the forced displacement of people had a devastating effect on many communities. Join us for the first event of our “Hidden Histories” 2023 Speaker Series: The History of Hogan’s Alley.

Hogan’s Alley was the unofficial name for an alley that ran through the Strathcona neighbourhood in Vancouver. It was home to Vancouver’s Black community, alongside a wider immigrant community. The alley was known for its famous musical guests, great food, gambling, and bootlegging joints, but it was also home to many hard-working families. The construction of the Georgia and Dunsmuir viaducts ploughed through the community, displacing the families that called it home and obliterating any evidence that it ever existed.

Community tickets are available. Partial proceeds to Hogan’s Alley Society.

Storied: Books and Writing as Tools for Change with Harsha Walia and Ian Williams, hosted by Elee Kraljii Gardiner

On Tuesday, December 13th, Harsha Walia, author of Border & Rule: Global Migration, Capitalism, and the Rise of Racist Nationalism, and Ian Williams, author of Disorientation: Being Black in the World will discuss books and writing as tools for change with Elee Kraljii Gardiner, author of Trauma Head. Border & Rule is the winner of the 2022 Jim Deva Prize for Writing that Provokes, and Disorientation was a finalist for the 2022 Hubert Evans Non-Fiction Prize.

The event begins at 7 pm (PT).
This is a free event, but registration is required.

Tree Reading Series

Join us for the next event of Tree Reading Series for 2022-2023 season.

20:30 EST On Tuesday,November 29th, Tree is excited to welcome featured readers  Elee Kraljii Gardiner and Dilruba Ahmed.

Best Canadian Poetry: Celebrating the 2023 Edition

Join Massy Arts Society, Massy Books and Biblioasis to celebrate the 2023 edition of Best Canadian Poetry. Selected by guest editor John Barton, this collection showcases the best poetry writing published in 2021.

The event will be hosted at the Massy Arts Gallery, at 23 East Pender Street in Chinatown, Vancouver. Register here.

Registration is free, open to all and required for entrance. Masks are mandatory. The gallery is wheelchair accessible and a gender-neutral washroom is on-site.

Covid Protocols: Attendees must wear a mask (N95 masks are encouraged and recommended as they offer the best protection). We ask if you are showing symptoms, that you stay home. Thank you kindly

POETS, WRITERS, MENTORS & MENTEES, IT’S COMPLICATED!

It’s never been easy to be a poet or a writer and in these quickly changing times, writers need to create a hub of support with their peers. Today’s conversation questions: how to make connections, how to support Downtown Eastside writers more, how to get known outside of the DTES? In these times, how do you take care of yourself? How do you keep moving forward? How do you find support? Where are we now and where are we going? As the scene changes, established writers spend more time with emerging writers, and that needs a formal structure – and then how does that affect the environment again? It’s complicated!

Guests: Fiona Tinwei Lam, author, poet, mentor, collaborator and Vancouver’s Poet Laureate – “the people’s poet” – for 2022-2024; Henry Doyle, DTES warrior-poet-janitor and winner of the 2022 Dorothy Livesay Poetry Prize (BC Book Prizes) for his poetry collection No Shelter; and Elee Kraljii Gardiner, author, poet, editor and founding director of Thursdays Writing Collective.

Moderated by Betsy Warland, a leading writer, teacher, and manuscript mentor/editor. Throughout her career, Warland has been dedicated to emerging writers; from initiating the Toronto Women’s Writing Collective in 1975 to the design and direction of SFU’s The Writer’s Studio in 2001, leading to Thursdays Writing Collective in the Downtown Eastside.