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DTSTART;TZID=America/New_York:20240425T163000
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SUMMARY:2024 BLUE METROPOLI S INTERNATIONAL LITERARY FESTIVAL
DESCRIPTION:Each year the Festival is structured aroundone theme. In 2024\, our theme will be: ”Dreams & Utopias”. Shakespeare inspired us that theme with his famous line ”We are such stuff as dreams are made on”(The Tempest)\, adding\, as you know\, ”and our little life is rounded with a sleep”. Now that’s something to think about. If human life is fragile\, it is also rich in the imponderable\, in mystery\, in everything that escapes material things\, it is rich in dreams\, in short. So many questions arise from that theme\, including this one: Can we have confidence in human beings?\nOnce more\, public discussions\, roundtables\, debates\, readings\, master classes\, and podcasts will provide a rich display for both authors and the public to relish.\n—–\nThe Blue Metropolis Festival is one of the largest multilingual literary events in North America. Each year\, writers from Quebec\, Canada and around the world converge on Montreal for a couple of days. Festivalgoers are treated to live interviews\, roundtable discussions\, public readings\, debates\, master classes\, reading and writing workshops. Every year\, the Festival is structured around several strong themes that bear testimony to a keen social awareness and to a passion for literature in all its richness.
URL:https://qwf.org/event/2024-blue-metropoli-s-international-literary-festival/
LOCATION:Hotel 10\, 10 Sherbrooke Street West\, Montreal\, Quebec\, H2X 4C9\, Canada
CATEGORIES:Bilingual/Multilingual
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DTSTART;TZID=America/New_York:20240425T170000
DTEND;TZID=America/New_York:20240425T190000
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SUMMARY:Remember This: Book Launch
DESCRIPTION:Monique Polak launches her latest book for kids\, Remember This: The Fascinating World of Memory (Orca). The event is part of the TD-Blue Metropolis 2024 Children’s Festival. Monique’s share of book sales will go to the Canadian Consortium on Neurodegeneration in Aging. For more information\, contact Livres Babar (514) 694-0380.
URL:https://qwf.org/event/remember-this-book-launch/
LOCATION:Biblio Caf´e\, 5853 Sherbrooke St. W.\, NDG\, Montreal\, Quebec\, Canada
CATEGORIES:Book Launch
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DTSTART;TZID=America/New_York:20240425T173000
DTEND;TZID=America/New_York:20240425T190000
DTSTAMP:20260415T052437
CREATED:20240410T161353Z
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SUMMARY:MacLennan Lecture | Book challenges and their impact on Canadian communities\, a round table discussion (hybrid) 
DESCRIPTION:The Friends of the McGill Library\, in partnership with Blue Metropolis International Literary Festival\, are pleased to present the 2024 Hugh MacLennan Lecture\, a roundtable discussion on book challenges\, the Canadian context\, the power of community action\, and the path forward.  \nPanelists:\n– Michelle Arbuckle\, Executive Director of the Ontario Library Association and the chair of Canada’s Book and Periodical Council\n– Brendan de Caires\, Executive Director of PEN Canada\n– Robin Stevenson\, award-winning Canadian author \nThe discussion will be moderated by librarian Joseph Hafner\, Associate Dean\, Collections at the McGill Libraries. \nThis event is hybrid. Registrants can select in-person or online attendance. A YouTube link will be sent to those who register for virtual attendance. \nThe 2024 Hugh MacLennan Lecture is generously supported by Donald Walcot.
URL:https://qwf.org/event/maclennan-lecture-book-challenges-and-their-impact-on-canadian-communities-a-round-table-discussion-hybrid/
LOCATION:McGill University\, Leacock Building\, Room 26\, 855 rue Sherbrooke Ouest\, Montreal\, Quebec\, H3A 2T7\, Canada
CATEGORIES:Panel
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DTSTART;TZID=America/New_York:20240425T180000
DTEND;TZID=America/New_York:20240425T200000
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SUMMARY:Getting Weird: Crafting Surreal Short Stories
DESCRIPTION:Getting Weird is an 8-week short fiction workshop that focuses on writing strangeness into the everyday\, as a method for exploring and disrupting questions of race\, gender\, sexuality\, climate change\, capitalism\, and other big topics. Participants will read a wide range of writers who delve into the weird\, such as Paige Cooper\, Giada Scodellaro\, Renee Gladman\, Hiromi Goto\, Mariana Enriquez\, Carmen Maria Machado\, and Callum Angus. They will be given an array of writing prompts\, designed to investigate different aspects of surreal fiction\, and will also have the opportunity to give and receive feedback on short pieces of writing. \n\n\n\nWeird fiction contains elements of the eerie\, the uncanny\, and the surreal\, and encourages high levels of playfulness and perceptiveness\, two key elements of compelling storytelling. Weird fiction can also serve as a strong vehicle for writers from underrepresented groups to remake the world in ways that decenter white\, colonial\, hetero-cis-normative worldviews. Prompts will include the following topics: \n\n\n\n\nWeird micro-fiction\n\n\n\nEngaging the senses\n\n\n\nWeirdness at work (parsing the rituals of capitalism and labour)\n\n\n\nGender euphoria/queer weirdos\n\n\n\nReworking ancestral mythologies\n\n\n\nDream logics\n\n\n\n\nParticipants will receive prompts the week before each session (except before the first meeting)\, and will be given a rota (workshopping schedule) in advance. Each participant will have at least one opportunity to submit one piece of writing (up to 2000 words) to the group\, which will be discussed in-session by their peers\, with additional feedback provided by the instructor. These submissions should be based on one or more of the prompts given in the workshop. Participants should be prepared to do the following homework between sessions: responding to writing prompts\, reading one assigned piece of fiction\, providing feedback to their peers. \n\n\n\nThis workshop is open to new fiction writers\, as well as writers who already have a developed fiction practice. Participants should emerge from the workshop with one or two solid short story drafts\, and a confidence in their ability to unsettle the status quo on the page. \n\n\n\nH Felix Chau Bradley is the author of Personal Attention Roleplay (Metonymy Press)\, which was a finalist for the Danuta Gleed Literary Award and the Kobo Rakuten Emerging Writer Prize in 2022; and the chapbook Automatic Object Lessons (House House Press). Their writing has appeared in carte blanche\, ESPACE art actuel\, the Humber Literary Review\, Maisonneuve Magazine\, the Montreal Review of Books\, PRISM International\, Weird Era\, Xtra and elsewhere. They live in Tiohtià:ke (Montreal)\, and work as an editor for Metonymy Press\, This Magazine\, and Le Sigh. They were recently awarded QWF’s carte blanche Prize.
URL:https://qwf.org/event/getting-weird-crafting-surreal-short-stories/2024-04-25/
LOCATION:QWF Office\, 1200 Atwater Avenue\, Room 3\, Westmount\, QC\, H3Z 1X4\, Canada
CATEGORIES:QWF Workshops,Workshops
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DTSTART;TZID=America/New_York:20240425T200000
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SUMMARY:Speculative Fiction Master Class: Readying Your Work for Publication
DESCRIPTION:As in all of my workshops\, speculative fiction is defined broadly to include anything from science fiction to fantasy to slipstream to magic realism. Participants are free to submit a short story\, an excerpt from a larger work\, a script\, speculative poetry\, a comic\, or graphic novel excerpt. \n\n\n\nThe workshop will consist of ten sessions so as to give each participant the opportunity to workshop their piece twice: once for initial feedback and a second time once revisions have been made. We will begin by having each workshop member introduce themselves and their project\, including their intentions. Following these introductions\, I will give a brief presentation on different vectors of analysis in evaluating a piece\, including: \n\n\n\n\n         story\, plot arc\, and pacingworldbuildingcharacter\, POV\, voice\, and tonedescriptions and other issues of language and writing qualitytheme and meaning/intention\n\nbeginnings and endings\n\n\n\n\n\n\nIn week 1\, we will workshop a very short story that participants should read before we meet: Ursula K. Le Guin’s “The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas.” In discussing this story\, participants will have the opportunity to practice both the workshopping method and vectors of analysis that we will be employing during subsequent sessions. \n\n\n\nIn weeks 2 through 9\, we will workshop two to three submissions at each session. There will also be discussions and exchanges on a topic or topics related to one or more of the vectors of analysis mentioned in the first session. These topics will not be determined in advance\, but will flow organically from the submissions discussed that particular week. \n\n\n\nThe last session will be reserved for an in-depth presentation on maximizing your chances of publication\, including a list of resources\, and a guest presentation by a speculative fiction publisher. I will also answer any new questions that may have arisen in previous sessions. \n\n\n\n*This workshop will take place at the QWF Office (Room 3\, 1200 Atwater Avenue\, Westmount\, Quebec) with up to 2 virtual spots for participants who are unable to attend in-person. By default\, all workshop registrations are for in-person spots. If you would like to attend the workshop via Zoom\, first email Riley (riley@qwf.org) to see if online spots are still available for this workshop\, and then wait for confirmation. Virtual spots are limited and are reserved for people who either live outside Montreal or have a medical condition. \n\n\n\nSu J  Sokol is a writer of speculative and interstitial fiction as well as an editor. Xe is the author of three novels: Cycling to Asylum\, long-listed for the Sunburst Award for Excellence in Canadian Literature of the Fantastic and optioned for a film; Run J Run; and Zee\, a finalist for the Janet Savage Blachford Prize for Children’s and Young Adult Literature. Les lignes invisibles\, the French translation of Cycling to Asylum\, was published in 2022 by VLB Imaginaire. Sokol’s short fiction and essays have appeared in various magazines and anthologies.
URL:https://qwf.org/event/speculative-fiction-master-class-readying-your-work-for-publication/2024-04-25/
LOCATION:QWF Office\, 1200 Atwater Avenue\, Room 3\, Westmount\, QC\, H3Z 1X4\, Canada
CATEGORIES:QWF Workshops,Workshops
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