Finally I can start gossiping about the Booker again!

Oh man, sorry for the sporadic posting folks. It’s been a long month. I promise a real post is in the works!

For now, in case you haven’t heard, The Booker Long List:

• The Children’s Book by A.S. Byatt
• Summertime by J.M. Coetzee
• The Quickening Maze by Adam Foulds
• How to Paint a Dead Man by Sarah Hall
• The Wilderness by Samantha Harvey
• Me Cheeta by James Lever
• Wolf Hall by Hilary Mantel
• The Glass Room by Simon Mawer
• Not Untrue & Not Unkind by Ed O’Loughlin
• Heliopolis by James Scudamore
• Brooklyn by Colm Toibin
• Love and Summer by William Trevor
• The Little Stranger by Sarah Waters

Who’s up for a rousing game of “find the Canadian?” No, it’s not Margaret Atwood. The book doesn’t even have the word “wilderness” in the title! Trickier than you thought, eh?

Reading The Little Stranger was like the highlight of my year, so that’s who I’m rooting for.

Which book’s got your vote?

 

Canada Has at Least Ten Poets: Read in Case of Future Jeopardy! Question

Last month CBC took some time out to remind us that there are Canadian poets and make us feel guilty for not reading any of them. Oh CBC, I kid. It’s actually a good article and with the wealth of poets out there in Canadiana territory picking a top 10 must have been thankless task.

Readers will (perhaps) be relieved that they are no longer required to read George Bowering wax poetic about the eroticism of baseball or Al Purdy make metaphors about wood. Thankfully the list goes outside of the “Introduction to Canadian Poetry” canon and includes several women and non-white poets. Somehow I keep forgetting Dionne Brand is Canadian. I must remember to brag about this more when I leave the country.

Something else that caught my eye was despite claims to have “dropped several past masters in favor of some younger authors making their mark in this millennium”  I wouldn’t call these top 10 poets youngsters. Let’s just say none of them are twittering. Where are the Zoe Whittals? The Stuart Rosses? All those other hip poets that hang out in Toronto I keep trying to “accidentally” run into?

I think as a literary culture we tend to associate “Canadian Literature” with past generations, and it works to our deteriment by making it seem like there have only been 20 or so poets to have ever grown in Canada. And let me tell you, WE ARE LEGION. Seriously, I bet 10% of the people you know under 30 are poets. It’s like being left-handed, except that Stephen Harper takes your money away.

So… Read poetry! Go! Now!

Here’s the list to get you started:

Don McKay
Ken Babstock
Mary Dalton
Dionne Brand
Don Domanski
David McGimpsey
Skydancer Louise Bernice Halfe
Jeramy Dodds
Erin Mouré
Sheri-D Wilson

 

Giller Gossip Part 2

There were tears, laughter, and lots of distracted rubbernecking from the audience. Awkward shuffling around the stage and hugging from the presenters. And oh god, the montages. Why? Who produced this? Scenic shots of Cochrane with elevator music in the background?! Longshots of Boyden pretending to fish? Endicott fishing for Elizabeth Hay comparisons in her local bookstore? And are we supposed to believe Mary Swan writes her novels out by hand, like Virginia Woolf? Just no, never again Giller planning committee.

I liked hearing the judges saying things that weren’t just copied off the back of the book. And hey, this Samantha Nutt person seems pretty cool and she totally looks like Buffy, right? Right?

Ok, I’m procrastinating, I actually haven’t read Through Black Spruce, though I keep meaning to. So the only thing I can say, really, is:

Joseph, call me. You need to share your hair care secrets.

 

Giller Gossip Part 1

Ooh, hours to go before the Giller Gala gets underway! Who knows what wacky hijinks and surprises await! Surely fellow Canadians all over the country are browsing the CTV website in anticipation of the usually somewhat relaible CTV online broadcast- I checked in to read over comments on the latest Giller article:

What scintillating commentary! I hadn’t thought about the dangers of political correctness taking over a jury made of three middle-aged white intellectuals. What’s next, a black person on the jury? Crazy Liberals. There isn’t even a book about lawyers on this shortlist- anarchy I tell you!

And by the way, Good to a Fault is going to sneak up and catch unawares an entire nation who hasn’t read it yet but keeps meaning to. You heard it here first.