SpeakUp: Collaborative Performance Poetry
2023-04-26 19:00 - 21:00 (America/New_York) | Phoenix Books, 5928 Sherbrooke St W, Montreal, Quebec, H4A 1X7, Canada
​FREE EVENT
SpeakUp​ : Collaborative Performance Poetry
L’Échange Interactif de Poésie de Montréal
Poets : ​​Carolyn Souaid & Endre Farkas; Jade Palmer featuring Hillary Muller & Willow Little
​Join us at Phoenix Books in NDG (5928 Sherbrooke St W, Montreal, Quebec H4A 1X7)
on WEDNESDAY, April 26th @ 7 PM
​for a poetry reading with a difference, avec SpeakUp le public est engagé.
Each audience member receives a copy of the poems.
Each poet reads their poem, followed by a 15 to 20-minute discussion.
The poet reads their poem a final time.
​For more info or details contact us by
email MTLSpeakUp@gmail.com or on Facebook @MtlSpeakUp

The Ghost at the Heart of a Short Story
2023-04-26 20:00 - 22:00, 2023-05-03 20:00 - 22:00 | QWF Office, 1200 Atwater Avenue, Room 3, Westmount, QC, H3Z 1X4, Canada
A man down on his luck has moved everything he owns out onto his lawn, and for no reason anybody can articulate, he pawns some of it to two young passersby; in northern Ontario, a woman whose cancer is in remission lets a teenaged boy, half her age, kiss her on a floating bridge—she doesn’t know why; in a hotel room in Wenatchee, a man has a strange, galvanizing sexual encounter with a bare-knuckle boxer, and it leaves him more sure of himself, or more sure of his past, or more sure of who he might yet become. But if you asked him what had changed, he wouldn’t be able to tell you.

There is something ineffable in every good short story, something that cannot bepinned down, a question—perhaps insignificant—whose answer is not merely unknown, but unknowable, and whose presence haunts us long after we’ve put a story down.

This workshop is a guided discussion about the plot, characters, point of view, structure, and language (the mechanics or “craft”) of participants’ short stories, as well as an investigation of each story’s aboutness, patterns, emotional plot, and central question(s)—that is, all those hard-to-define elements that make fiction what it is.

Additionally, the workshop aims to foster community among the attendees, to bring together

writers of similar skill and drive, and to encourage the kind of creative energy that crackles

between new practitioners.

Some Learning Objectives

Critical reading, and the ability to identify the roots of a story’s problems, particularly with regard to dramatic structure and conflict. Conversely: the ability to identify the roots of a story’s successes, especially when it seems intangible or difficult to pin down.

Close reading, even of your own work, for strongest possible sentences. (They are, after all, the building blocks of fiction.)

Immersing yourself in, and engaging with, literature among a cohort of people who are similarly immersed and engaged in literature; enjoying it.

In our first meeting, we will establish a schedule, review workshop etiquette, spend some time meeting each other, and do a few writing exercises. From then on, each session will consist of detailed discussion and feedback of participants’ stories. The goal, always, is to offer the writer of each story constructive suggestions to help them improve the story and their craft. We are, I always say, in this together.

In preparation: Please bring a short story you’ve written of no more than 2500 words to the first session.

D. W. Wilson is the author of Once You Break a Knuckle, a collection of short stories, and Ballistics, a novel. His work has appeared in lit mags across the globe, and in 2011 he won the BBC National Short Story Award for “The Dead Roads.” Since then he has been shortlisted for numerous fiction prizes, and has won the CBC Short Story Prize and the Manchester Fiction Prize. He taught creative writing at the University of Victoria and Brandon University, as well at literary festivals such as the London Short Story Festival and Wordfest.

How to Pitch the Media
2023-04-27 14:00 - 15:30, 2023-05-02 13:00 - 15:00 | Online – Please RSVP to receive a Zoom link
Virtual Session: April 27, 2-3:30pm (No registration limit)In-Person Session: May 2, 1-3pm (Registration currently full)Free for all QWF members

QWF is pleased to offer this free workshop with CBC Montreal’s Debbie Hynes, Manager of Communications, Marketing & Brand.

“How to Pitch Your Work to CBC” will give you practical, hands-on advice on how to get your work out to the media, with a particular focus on CBC. You’ll learn what producers expect (and want) in a pitch, how to market your work to media outlets, and how to craft a pitch that sets you and your story apart.

This workshop is offered two times: once online and once in person. The in-person workshop will be held at the CBC Montreal offices and is limited to 12 participants. The virtual workshop will be held over Zoom and does not have an attendance limit. The content of both sessions is essentially the same, but the in-person workshop will be a bit more hands-on, given the nature of the format.

To Register for a Virtual Spot on April 27:

(1) Send an email to Riley at riley@qwf.org with the subject line “How to Pitch the Media – Virtual Registration.” Make sure that your email includes both your name and email address.

(2) A Zoom link will be sent out a few days prior to the session.

To Register for an In-Person Spot on May 2:

In-person registration is now closed. If you are interested in this workshop, please register for a virtual spot.

Important: This workshop is free for all QWF members. QWF membership status will be checked for both virtual and in-person participants. Not yet a member? Learn about being a member here!

Writing the TV Pilot
2023-04-27 18:00 - 20:00, 2023-05-04 18:00 - 20:00 | QWF Office, 1200 Atwater Avenue, Room 3, Westmount, QC, H3Z 1X4, Canada
In this eight-week workshop, Montreal-based screenwriter Allen Markuze will give you the tools to be able to write a TV pilot. He’s going to do so by asking and helping answer the following…

What is your TV series about?

Is your idea sustainable?

What happens episode to episode?

What’s the theme of your show?

What are some similar shows?

Who are your characters?

Is your pilot going to be a premise episode or an episodic episode?

What is a three-act structure and five-act structure?

These intimate sessions will involve a mixture of group discussion, critical analysis of TV pilots and shows, and workshopping participants’ own ideas with the goal of completing their own TV pilot. Ideas will be workshopped in groups as well as one-on-one with the workshop leader and fellow participants.

Allen Markuze is an award-winning screenwriter who has taken part in writers rooms and has written for a variety of live-action and animation TV shows that have aired on the likes of Netflix, Disney, Nickelodeon, Hulu, and CBC. Before embarking on a screenwriting career, Markuze spent several years working in LA at Dan Halsted’s company, Manage-ment, where he helped manage a roster of writers from shows such as Mad Men and Breaking Bad, and on feature films like Friday Night Lights and Wall Street. Prior to that, he worked as an assistant to screenwriter Janus Cercone (Leap of Faith with Steve Martin). Markuze’s foray into the entertainment industry began as a development intern in LA at Underground Films (FX’s Snowfall) where he read countless scripts, books, and plays, and eavesdropped on A LOT of conversations.

Biography, Autobiography, and Ghostwriting
2023-04-27 20:00 - 22:00, 2023-05-04 20:00 - 22:00 | QWF Office, 1200 Atwater Avenue, Room 3, Westmount, QC, H3Z 1X4, Canada
The basic tools of biography and autobiography are the same, and this workshop will show how you can write any life in a meaningful and engaging way.

The first challenge is learning how to put lives in a larger context. This means researching the times and places the subject lived in, then weaving their individual narratives with all of their complex personal relationships, into the larger world. We will learn how to do this with the use of the illuminating details that bring people and places to life.

We will also look at the sub-category of ghostwriting, where you are writing a first-person biography and, in a sense, become the person you are writing for, internalizing their thoughts and feelings as you use all of the tools at your disposal to tell their story as if was your own.

Ghostwriting also happens to be a field where a writer can make a decent living in Canada, and at the end of the course, we will look at the business side and what goes into a ghostwriting contract.

One thing you soon discover in writing biographies of any kind, including ghosting an autobiography, is the truth of the cliché that everyone has a book in them. At least in the sense that all of our stories—following our lives along the trajectories of time and space and meeting and beating challenges—are worth telling. As a writer you discover that it is a privilege to write someone else’s life.

Ideally, you will be working on biographical or autobiographical material of your own in the class, but this is not necessary. If you are working on a text now or if you are simply planning one for the future, I look forward to meeting you in the spring of 2023 and exploring the writing of lives together.

Peter McFarlane has written 4 nonfiction books of his own and five ghostwritten books, as well as more than 100 newspaper and magazine features. He has specialized in Indigenous history and politics and has worked on several CBC radio programs as a researcher and on-air contributor. He is currently completing another ghostwritten book and a new work of his own nonfiction.

Shut Up & Write! with QWF
2023-04-29 10:00 - 12:30 | Online – Please RSVP to receive a Zoom link
Looking for some dedicated, quiet writing space?

Register below to do all that writing you’ve been meaning to do. Using the Pomodoro technique, participants write in 25 minute bursts, with 5 minutes break in between.

This event is for QWF members only. Not a member? Learn about becoming a member. Please note that you have to be logged in for the registration link to show up. A Zoom link will be sent out a few days before the session.

Please note as well that these sessions are designed for silent writing, rather than discussing or getting feedback on work.

1000 – 1025: Writing 11025 – 1030: Break1030 – 1055: Writing 21055 – 1100: Break1100 – 1125: Writing 31125 – 1130: Break1130 – 1155: Writing 41155 – 1200: Break1200 – 1225: Writing 5

Book Celebration, Audiobook Launch, and Premiere of Wekweètì and Ekwǫ̀
2023-04-29 14:00 | McCord Stewart Museum Theatre, 690 Sherbrooke St. W., Montreal, QC, H3A 1E9, Canada
Saturday, April 29, 2PMMcCord Stewart Museum Theatre, Montreal

Nadine Neema will be in conversation with Tammy Steinwand, Tłı̨chǫ Government Culture and Lands Protection Director, to celebrate Neema’s historical fiction youth novel and audiobook Journal of a Travelling Girl, and to watch the premiere of her short film Wekweètì and Ekwǫ̀ (“Wekweètì and Caribou”) at the McCord Stewart Museum Theatre on Saturday April 29th at 2pm.

There will be readings, songs inspired by Neema’s time in Wekweètì accompanied by Adam Goulet, and the Montreal premiere of Wekweètì and Ekwǫ̀, a short film from footage Neema took between 2000 and 2002 in Wekweètì and on the land, which features the late Elders Alexis Arrowmaker and Mary Adele Eyakfwo telling old time stories of how they grew up on the land and why they settled in Wekweètì. There will also be book signings, bannock and giveaways.

Please come early as seats are limited and this is free admission.

The Words & Music Show: Spring 2023
2023-04-30 17:00 - 20:00 | les sans-taverne, 1900 rue Le Ber, suite 101, Montreal, Quebec, H3K 2A4, Canada
Sunday, April 30, 5:00–8:00 pm

This spring edition of the Words and Music Show will feature spoken word performances by Roen Higgins, Erin Moure, and Lucia De Luca, the three winners of the inaugural (2022) Spoken Word Prize awarded by the Quebec Writers Federation. Other featured artists on the programme include poets Misha Solomon and Hannah Karpinski, and singer-songwriter, member of the band Bluebird, Dan Beasy.

Hosted by poet, trumpeter, and community worker Jason “Blackbird” Selman

Admission: Free or Pay What You Can (to support future Words & Music shows)

Co-produced by the Quebec Writers’ Federation, Words & Music, and SpokenWeb. We acknowledge the support of the Canada Council for the Arts for this project.

Performers’ Bios

Dan Beasy (Beaulieu) is a singer-songwriter, and central member of Bluebird, a band and musical collective based in Montreal. Dan is originally from Prince George, British Columbia, and grew up surrounded by significantly more diesel pickups than artists and musicians. After years of trying to fit into a conservative city geared towards capitalism Dan hit the road and began a journey of inspiration and creativity. Travelling through Canada Dan landed in Dawson City, Yukon and began writing poetry and stories to pass the time. Finding other poets and songwriters along the way encouraged Dan to keep writing and eventually to sing as well. After several years in Yukon Dan set off for Montreal and began pursuing a career as a songwriter. 2 EPs and a full album later Dan is just getting started. The music continues to be guided first and foremost by poetry and the human experience.

Roen “Blu’Rva” Higgins is an award-winning spoken word poet, educator, speaker, and creative evangelist. As the founder of The Elevated Creative, her mission is to elevate others through creative literacy and help them find their flow and tap into their genius zone.

Hannah Karpinski is a queer writer and editor living in Tiohtià:ke/Montreal. Her work has appeared or is forthcoming in Lemon Hound, Commo Magazine, My Loves: Digital Anthology of Queer Love Poems (Ghost City Press), and Lesbians are Miracles, among others. She is currently finishing her MA at Concordia University and working as the Publishing Assistant for Montreal-based independent press, Metatron.

Lucia De Luca is an English teacher and spoken word artist, who plays with stories in the classroom and at the mic. Her poetry cradles past versions of herself, her family, and her Italian heritage. Lucia is a recipient of the 2022 QWF Spoken Word Prize and was a finalist at the 2021 Canadian Individual Poetry Slam. As an organizer, she brought McGill University its first-ever slam (2020) and oversaw the Grove Campus Poetry Show (2022). Her work is published to the TEDx, Brickyard Spoken Word, Toronto Poetry Slam, and Bankstown Poetry Slam YouTube channels, as well as in online and print publications.

Erín Moure is a Montreal poet and translator from Galician, Portuguese, French and Spanish to English and from Galician and English to French. Her next book, a hybrid book of texts and poems, Theophylline: an a-poretic migration via the modernisms of Rukeyser, Bishop, Grimké (de Castro, Vallejo)will appear in August 2023 from House of Anansi Press. You can find her reading new stories once in awhile on YouTube too.

Misha Solomon (he/him) is a homosexual poet in and of Tiohti:áke/Montréal. He is the author of two chapbooks, FLORALS (above/ground press, 2020) and Full Sentences (Turret House Press, 2022), and his work has also appeared in journals including The /tƐmz/ Review, Yolk, andLeste Magazine, and is forthcoming in Vallum and Plenitude. He is currently pursuing his MA at Concordia University.

The Host

Jason “Blackbird” Selman is a Montreal born poet, trumpet player and community worker. He is the author The Freedom I Stole (2007, Cumulus Press), Africa As A Dream That Travels Through My Heart (2016, Howl) and co-editor of the poetry anthology Talking Book (2006, Cumulus Press) which chronicles the writings of Kalm Unity Vibe Collective (of which he is a founding member). He works as a teaching artist, conducting poetry workshops in schools across the Montréal area and beyond. His work is grounded in the themes of ethno-musicology, surrealist expression, love and the intersection of masculinity and emotional vulnerability.

The Joys and Pitfalls of Memoir
2023-05-03 18:00 - 20:00 | QWF Office, 1200 Atwater Avenue, Room 3, Westmount, QC, H3Z 1X4, Canada
This workshop will explore the hazards and rewards of writing a personal memoir. Throughout the eight weeks, we will look at ways to produce a compelling narrative out of the chaos of the past. We’ll discuss the tremendous value of research, but we’ll also consider whether research can sometimes handicap a project. We will explore the creation of a narrative voice. And we will ask if and how a writer knows that a memoir has achieved its ideal focus and shape.

Each participant will be expected to produce one or two finished (or near-finished) pieces of writing. They could be either stand-alone essays or excerpts from a longer work. I will provide a detailed response to these pieces, and other participants in the workshop will be asked to give their feedback too. A good portion of time each week will be spent on a discussion of the work submitted by participants. Throughout the workshops, I plan to emphasize the crucial importance not just of remembering but of rethinking and rewriting.

In the remainder of each session, we will examine and debate issues that memoir-writing brings to the fore. We will delve into some thorny issues that memoirs often raise: the unreliability of memory, an author’s urge to justify, and the sense of hurt and betrayal that a memoir may provoke in other people. I will ask the participants to read selected materials (none of them too lengthy) as a basis for discussion.

“Memoir,” for the purposes of this workshop, can include small-scale personal essays as well as longer, more ambitious texts. The participants may choose to focus on a particular relationship, place, or time. But the pieces they submit for discussion should all be personal in nature, and unless there are unusual reasons to the contrary, they should make use of the first-person pronoun. Memoir can be a demanding form; it allows the author no place to hide. Yet it can be immensely rewarding to write.

The overall aim is to equip participants with more awareness, more skills, and more confidence in their own work.

Indigenous Dramaturgies Exchange 2023
2023-05-08 00:00 - 2023-05-26 23:59 | Banff Centre for Arts and Creativity, 107 Tunnel Mountain Drive, Banff, Alberta, T1L 1H5, Canada
Indigenous Dramaturgies Exchange offers emerging Indigenous artists professional development and space for artistic exchange on a current or upcoming dramaturgy project, with a focus on on-the-land engagement as a way of locating stories.
This program provides reciprocal mentorship and community building, and you are encouraged to apply with a partner, mentor, or collaborator.
Indigenous dramaturgies; as artistic ceremony, as political resistances, and as community-building, are under studied and under supported. In this program we will discuss and explore your roles in deeper detail, with the support of faculty and with cultural facilitators for on-the-land engagement sessions. This program includes daily check-ins as a group to share in creative processes and showcase your work in order to look to yourselves, your cultural realities, relationships, and teachings as ways that navigate your artistic practice.
*Financial Aid of up to 100% of tuition fee, meal and accommodation fee is available for this program. All accepted participants will receive the financial aid package.
Program Dates: May 8 – 26, 2023
Application Deadline: February 15, 2023
Learn more and apply online: http://bit.ly/3tPly6S

The Art of Literary Translation
2023-05-08 18:00 - 20:00, 2023-05-15 18:00 - 21:00 | QWF Office, 1200 Atwater Avenue, Room 3, Westmount, QC, H3Z 1X4, Canada
In this workshop, we will explore literary translation from French to English: fiction, nonfiction, poetry, and songs.

We will look at contemporary literature from Quebec and France, as well as some older (nineteenth- and twentieth-century) texts. Sources may include Gabrielle Roy, Anne Hébert, Annie Ernaux, and Samuel Archibald. We will start by looking at an excerpt of a literary text in French and reading a published English translation of it. What difficulties (such as euphony, voice, word play, and verb tense) did the translator face, and how successful were they? At each meeting, there will be time to produce your own translations, often in groups. We will read our work aloud and comment on difficulties and strokes of inspiration.

Participants will have the opportunity to translate a further passage from the same work (or from another) as a homework assignment for the next meeting. The corrected assignments provide individual feedback and lead to discussion of the issues encountered.

During the course of the workshop, you’ll be asked to present a passage you have translated from a work you have chosen, commenting on the issues it presents, and describing ways of solving these issues. This is an ideal opportunity to begin or pursue a project you intend to submit to a publisher. Jonathan Kaplanskywon a French Voices Award to translate Nobel Prize-winning author Annie Ernaux’s La vie extérieure (Things Seen)for the University of Nebraska Press. Recent translations include Jonathan Bécotte’s Like a Hurricane (Orca, 2023) and Hélène Rioux’s The End of the World is Elsewhere (Guernica, 2022). He has sat on the juries for the translation category of the Governor General’s Literary Awards and the John Glassco Translation Prize and recently translated the libretto of an opera by Hélène Dorion and Marie-Claire Blais entitled Yourcenar: An Island of Passions.

Helen Molesworth in Conversation with Jarrett Earnest
2023-05-11 18:00 | Cinema du Musée, 1379-A Sherbrooke Street West, Montreal, Quebec, Canada
Thursday, May 11, 2023 at 6 PMCinéma du Musée1379-A Sherbrooke Street WestPresented by ART SPEAKS

Art Speaks is proud to present a conversation between Helen Molesworth and Jarrett Earnest, which will focus on Molesworth’s impressive career and trajectory in the art world as a thinker, writer and curator.

Helen Molesworth is a writer and a curator based in Los Angeles. She recently hosted Death of an Artist a 6-part podcast about the intertwined fates of Carl Andre and Ana Mendieta. She was the originating host of the podcast “Recording Artists” with The Getty. She is also the host of PROGRAM, streamed interviews with artists and writers hosted by the David Zwirner Gallery. Her major museum exhibitions include: One Day at a Time: Manny Farber and Termite Art; Leap Before You Look: Black Mountain College 1933–1957; Dance/Draw; This Will Have Been: Art, Love & Politics in the 1980s; Part Object Part Sculpture, and Work Ethic. She has organized monographic exhibitions of Ruth Asawa, Moyra Davey, Noah Davis, Louise Lawler, Steve Locke, Anna Maria Maiolino, Josiah McElheny, Kerry James Marshall, Catherine Opie, Amy Sillman, and Luc Tuymans. She is the author of numerous catalogue essays and her writing has appeared in Artforum, Art Journal, Documents, and October. The recipient of the 2011 Bard Center for Curatorial Studies Award for Curatorial Excellence, in 2021 she received a Guggenheim Fellowship and in 2022 she was awarded The Clark Art Writing Prize.

Jarrett Earnest is a writer and curator living in New York City. He is the author of What it Means to Write About Art: Interviews with Art Critics (2018) and editor of The Young and Evil: Queer Modernism in New York, 1930-1955 (2020), Painting is a Supreme Fiction: Writings by Jesse Murry, 1980-1993 (2021) and Devotion: today’s future becomes tomorrow archive (2022). His criticism has been published in magazines and exhibition catalogs around the world, and appears regularly in the New York Review of Books. His new collection of photographs and writing,Valid Until Sunset, will be out this fall.

T. Liem launches SLOWS:TWICE
2023-05-11 19:00 | La Petite Librairie Drawn & Quarterly, 176 Bernard West, Montréal, Québec, H2T2K2, Canada
Thursday, May 11 at 7:00 pmLa Petite Librairie Drawn & Quarterly

Join T. Liem at La Petite Librairie Drawn & Quarterly at 176 rue Bernard O at 7 pm on Thursday, May 11th for the launch of their new poetry collection SLOWS:TWICE! The evening will feature readings by Trynne Delaney, Alexe Perry-Cox and Lauren Turner, a conversation, Q&A and signing.

The event is free and open to all. Books will be available for purchase at the event and the author will sign copies of their book.

Please note that we are asking all guests to wear masks at this event. Masks will be available free of charge upon entry.

About the Book

Backward and forward: a double book of mirrored poems about identity in all its forms.

This is a book of slow hours, days, and years—how they can collapse into one another, how it can feel like we are living one day repeating itself. From within this collapse, the speaker seeks connection everywhere. They visit their father’s birthplace, Jogjakarta; they listen to a stranger’s phone call at the Motel 6 in Alberta; they linger in the so-called ethnic aisle of the grocery store. From all of these places the speaker is discouraged but tries to imagine a future joyously incomprehensible to the present.

Slows: Twice is a collection of revisions and repetitions. Every poem in one half of the book has an alternate version, or a mirror poem, in the other half. Lines, words, images, and forms are reused and reflected in a kind of palindrome, so the book can be read from front cover to back cover, or vice versa. In this way, Liem considers how language shapes identity over time and how the speaker’s position in relation to language might be revised. The poems are tied to themes of work and labor, consumption and waste, family and home, as other shapers of identity and relationships. The act of revising and repeating – slowly – is meant to be a resistance to efficiency, a resistance to being an always-productive body under capitalism.

About the Author

T. Liem was born and raised in Vegreville, Alberta, and now lives in Montreal, Quebec. They are the author of OBITS. (2018), which was shortlisted for a Lambda Literary Award, and won the Gerald Lampert Memorial Award as well as the A. M. Klein Prize. Their writing has been published in Catapult, Apogee, Plenitude, the Boston Review, Grain, Maison- neuve, Best Canadian Poetry 2018 and 2019, and elsewhere.

Accessibility

Organizers encourage the wearing of masks at events.

Event space uses StopGap.ca ramps in an effort to encourage accessibility. Both the step at the entrance, followed by a half step and a door have StopGap ramps. The door opens inward and is not automated. Once inside, there are no additional steps.

It is not a sober space, our events sometimes offer alcohol.

Please email events@drawnandquarterly.com if you have any questions!

Susan Lloy Launches: Nothing Comes Back
2023-05-11 19:30 - 20:30 | Argo Bookshop, 1841A Ste-Catherine St. West, Montreal, Quebec, Canada
Join us at 7:30 PM on Thursday, May 11th, for the launch of Susan Lloy’s new short story collection, Nothing Comes Back!The event will take place in-store, and is free. Please note that we still ask people to wear masks in the Argo. As seating is limited, RSVPs are encouraged; click here!

About the Book

Age is the great divider. One side fused of fire and lust, the other undetected like fallout. The characters in this collection have been plucked and blown through time like pollen on the wind, often rooting themselves in foreign landscapes both beautiful and adverse, sometimes altered, yet always unyielding, ripe for transformation. Nothing Comes Back is a deeply captivating collection by a major literary talent working at the top of her craft.

About the Author

Author of the two short story collections But When We Look Closer (2017) and Vita (2019), as well as the children’s book Coo and the Loo (2021), Susan E. Lloy has dozens of international publication credits to date. Currently working on a fourth collection, Susan continues to write about characters existing on the edges of ordinary life. She lives in Montreal.

Film Screening: The Seeds of Vandana Shiva
2023-05-12 18:00 | The Caribbean Food Factory, 5311 Boul. de Maisonneuve Ouest, Montreal, Quebec, H4A 1Z5, Canada
Friday, May 12, 6:00 pm

The Choosing Joy Collective pleased to invite you to join us, and share with your platform, a one-time documentary screening of the award-winning documentary Seeds of Vandana Shiva, which tells the remarkable story of an ecofeminist activist and her plight for global food justice. The screening will take place May 12th at 7:00pm at the Caribbean Food Factory.

About the Film

How did the willful daughter of a Himalayan forest conservator become Monsanto’s worst nightmare? The Seeds of Vandana Shiva tells the remarkable life story of Gandhian eco-activist Dr. Vandana Shiva, how she stood up to the corporate Goliaths of industrial agriculture, rose to prominence in the seed saving and organic food movements, and is inspiring an international crusade for change.

The Seeds of Vandana Shiva documentary shows how the battle against multinational agribusiness has become an international struggle between two visions for feeding the world: The first, a multinational corporate model of chemically dependent monoculture that rewards a capitalist imperative of profit and growth. And the other: ‘Earth Democracy, that honors ecology, biodiversity, sustainability and community—what Dr. Shiva demonstrates is the only way forward for the future of food. (Vandanashivamovie.com, 2021)

Doors open at 6pm, the screening begins at 7 pm.

Light food & snacks will be available for purchase.

Tickets are available at the door in limited quality. To guarantee a seat, buy your ticket on Eventbrite.

Shut Up & Write! with QWF
2023-05-13 10:00 - 12:30 | Online – Please RSVP to receive a Zoom link
Saturday, May 13, 10:00 am-12:30 pmOnline via Zoom—RSVP below to receive the Zoom link

Looking for some dedicated, quiet writing space?

Register below to do all that writing you’ve been meaning to do. Using the Pomodoro technique, participants write in 25 minute bursts, with 5 minutes break in between.

This event is for QWF members only. Not a member? Learn about becoming a member. Please note that you have to be logged in for the registration link to show up. A Zoom link will be sent out a few days before the session.

Please note as well that these sessions are designed for silent writing, rather than discussing or getting feedback on work.

1000 – 1025: Writing 11025 – 1030: Break1030 – 1055: Writing 21055 – 1100: Break1100 – 1125: Writing 31125 – 1130: Break1130 – 1155: Writing 41155 – 1200: Break1200 – 1225: Writing 5

The Many Definitions of Family: Reflecting and Journalling with Christopher DiRaddo
2023-05-13 12:00 - 13:30 | Online via Zoom
Saturday, May 13, 12:00-1:30 pmFree, online via Zoom

Family is such an important part of our culture; it plays a large role in the stories we tell. But which family stories are not being told? And what does it mean to be a part of a family? How do we create honest depictions of those we share our lives with? In this workshop, we will reflect on what makes a family and explore what more can be done to expand that representation.

Montrealer Christopher DiRaddo is the author of the novels The Geography of Pluto and The Family Way. He is also the founder and host of The Violet Hour Reading Series & Book Club.

Offered by Accenti Magazine as part of the Workshops to Express Creativity: Engaging Canadian Seniors series.

Lunch & Learn with QWF
2023-05-16 12:00 - 13:00 | Online – Please RSVP to receive a Zoom link
Thursday, May 16, 12:00–1:00 pmOnline via ZoomTo register: RSVP below

Looking to connect with a community of like-minded writers? Whether you’re a new member of the Quebec Writers’ Federation or just curious about what we offer, join us for an engaging virtual lunchtime session with QWF!

Our knowledgeable staff members are passionate about supporting writers at all stages of their careers, from emerging wordsmiths to seasoned scribes. During this session, we’ll give you a deep dive into all of our programs and services, so you can get a better understanding of how QWF can support you on your writing journey.

Whether you’re interested in taking part in our writing workshops and mentorship programs, applying for our literary awards, or attending our events to connect with fellow writers and industry professionals, QWF has the resources and support you need to take your writing to the next level. We’re excited to meet you and look forward to welcoming you to our vibrant literary community!

Riley Palanca (Membership Services Coordinator) will be discussing QWF’s many programs and services geared toward emerging and aspiring writers, including our mentorship program, Shut Up & Write writing sessions, and writing workshops.

Lori Schubert (Executive Director) will be explaining QWF programs and services for more established writers, including the Writers in the Community program, the Hire a Writer Directory, and the QWF Awards.

John Wickham (Communications Officer) will provide a brief walkthrough of the website, highlighting sections and resources that are particularly useful to QWF members.

There will be time for questions at the end of the session.

To register, RSVP below. The Zoom link will be emailed to you a few days before the event.

Note: As this is a virtual event, you can join us from the comfort of your own home via Zoom. You’ll be able to interact with QWF staff and other attendees in real-time, and have the opportunity to ask questions and learn more about what QWF has to offer.

Daniel Allen Cox launches I Felt the End Before It Came in conversation with Heather O'Neill
2023-05-16 19:00 | La Petite Librairie Drawn & Quarterly, 176 Bernard West, Montréal, Québec, H2T2K2, Canada
Tuesday, May 16, 7:00 pmIn person and livestreamed

Join Daniel Allen Cox in conversation with Heather O’Neill for the launch of I Felt the End Before It Came: Memoirs of a Queer Ex-Jehovah’s Witness, which has been referred to by the latter author as “hugely entertaining, open-hearted, and insightful… a joy to read from start to finish.” The event will take place at La Petite Librairie Drawn & Quarterly at 176 rue Bernard O at 7 pm on Tuesday, May 16th, and will feature a reading, a conversation, Q&A and signing.

This event will be ASL interpreted. It is free and open to all. Books will be available for purchase at the event and the author will sign copies of their book.

Please note that we are asking all guests to wear masks at this event. Masks will be available free of charge upon entry.

The event will also be livestreamed on Drawn & Quarterly’s YouTube account—link to come.

About the Book

Daniel Allen Cox grew up with firm lines around what his religion considered unacceptable: celebrating birthdays and holidays; voting in elections, pursuing higher education, and other forays into independent thought. Their opposition to blood transfusions would have consequences for his mother, just as their stance on homosexuality would for him.

But even years after whispers of his sexual orientation reached his congregation’s presiding elder, catalyzing his disassociation, the distinction between “in” and “out” isn’t always clear. Still in the midst of a lifelong disentanglement, Cox grapples with the group’s cultish tactics—from gaslighting to shunning—and their resulting harms—from simmering anger to substance abuse—all while redefining its concepts through a queer lens. Can Paradise be a bathhouse, a concert hall, or a room full of books?

With great candour and disarming self-awareness, Cox takes readers on a journey from his early days as a solicitous door-to-door preacher in Montreal to a stint in New York City, where he’s swept up in a scene of photographers and hustlers blurring the line between art and pornography. The culmination of years spent both processing and avoiding a complicated past, I Felt the End Before It Came reckons with memory and language just as it provides a blueprint to surviving a litany of Armageddons.

About the Participants

Daniel Allen Cox is the author of I Felt the End Before It Came: Memoirs of a Queer Ex-Jehovah’s Witness. His essays have appeared in Electric Literature, Literary Hub, Catapult, TriQuarterly, The Malahat Review, The Rumpus, Maisonneuve, and elsewhere. His essay “The Glow of Electrum” was named Notable in Best American Essays 2021 and was a finalist for a 2021 National Magazine Award. Daniel is the author of four novels, nominated for the Lambda Literary Award, the Ferro-Grumley Award, and the ReLit Award. He is past president of the Quebec Writers’ Federation and lives in Montreal.

Heather O’Neill is a novelist, short-story writer and essayist. Her most recent bestselling novel, The Lonely Hearts Hotel, won the Paragraphe Hugh MacLennan Prize for Fiction and was longlisted for the Women’s Prize for Fiction and CBC’s Canada Reads. Her previous work, which includes Lullabies for Little Criminals, The Girl Who Was Saturday Night and Daydreams of Angels, has been shortlisted for the Governor General’s Literary Award for Fiction, the Orange Prize for Fiction and the Scotiabank Giller Prize two years in a row. She has won CBC’s Canada Reads and the Danuta Gleed Award. Born and raised in Montreal, O’Neill lives there with her daughter.

A Gathering of Waters: A Writing Workshop with Mary Soderstrom & Font
2023-05-17 10:00 - 13:00
“There is nothing in the world more soft and weak than water, yet for attacking things that arehard and strong there is nothing that surpasses it, nothing that can take its place.” Lao Tzu

Wednesday, May 17, 10 am-1 pmFree, Online

Writer Mary Soderstrom (author of Against the Seas: Saving Civilisation from Rising Waters and the novels River Music and After Surfing Ocean Beach) will be leading an online writing workshop to explore our relation with the power and wonder of water, in particular the great gathering of waters that is the St. Lawrence River and its estuary. Writings from the workshop will be published in Font magazine in June 2023.

To reserve a place, please email Rachel McCrum at font@fontmag.ca. Priority will be given to residents of Lower St Lawrence and the surrounding area

Giller Power Panel: The End is Nigh—Apocalyptic Canadian Fiction
2023-05-17 19:00 | Online via Zoom
Wednesday, May 17, 7:00 pmOnline via Zoom

Listen in as these writers share their literary visions for the end of the world.

Moderated by Omar El Akkad, the panelists include authors Larissa Lai, Thea Lim, Saleema Nawaz and Waubgeshig Rice

Eliza Robertson launches I Got A Name in conversation with Kasia Van Schaik
2023-05-18 19:00 | La Petite Librairie Drawn & Quarterly, 176 Bernard West, Montréal, Québec, H2T2K2, Canada
Thursday, May 18 at 7 pmLa Petite Librairie Drawn & Quarterly

Join Eliza Robertson at La Petite Librairie Drawn & Quarterly at 176 rue Bernard O at 7 pm on Thursday, May 18th for the launch of her new book I Got A Name! The evening will feature a reading, a conversation with Kasia Van Schaik, Q&A and signing.

The event is free and open to all. Books will be available for purchase at the event and the author will sign copies of their book.

Please note that we are asking all guests to wear masks at this event. Masks will be available free of charge upon entry.

About the Book

A vivid and meticulous true-crime story that exposes the deep fractures in a system that repeatedly fails to protect women, while tracking the once-cold trail of a murderer still at large.

Krystal Senyk was the kind of friend everybody wants: a reliable confidant, a handywoman of all trades, and an infectious creative with an adventurous spirit. Most importantly, she was tough as nails. So when her best friend needed support to leave her abusive husband, Ronald Bax, Krystal leapt into action.

But soon Krystal became the new outlet for Bax’s rage. He terrorized and intimidated her for months on end, and finally issued a chilling warning to her and his ex-wife: the hunt is on. Krystal was scared but she was smart: she reached out to the RCMP for a police escort home. The officer brushed her off.

Bax’s threat had been all too real. At 29 years old, the woman who seemed invincible—who was a beloved sister, daughter, and friend—was shot and killed at her home in the Yukon. Ronald Bax disappeared without a trace.

Three decades later, Eliza Robertson has re-opened the case. In compelling, vibrant prose, she works tirelessly to piece together Krystal’s story, retracing the dire failings of Canadian law enforcement and Bax’s last steps. I Got a Name uses one woman’s tragic story to boldly interrogate themes of gender-based violence and the pervasive issues that plague our society. In this riveting true-crime story about victimhood, power, and control, Robertson examines the broken system in place, and asks: if it isn’t looking out for the vulnerable, the threatened, the hunted—who among us is it protecting?

About the Author

Eliza Robertson attended the University of Victoria and the University of East Anglia, where she received the 2011 Man Booker Scholarship. In 2013, she won the Commonwealth Short Story Prize and was a finalist for the CBC Short Story Prize and Journey Prize. Her novel Demi-Gods won the Paragraphe Hugh MacLennan Prize for Fiction. Her first story collection, Wallflowers, was shortlisted for the East Anglia Book Award and selected as a New York Times Editor’s Choice. In 2015, she was named one of five emerging writers for the Writers’ Trust Five x Five program. She lives in Montreal.

Accessibility:

Wearing a mask is encouraged at all D&Q events

Event space uses StopGap.ca ramps in an effort to encourage accessibility. Both the step at the entrance, followed by a half step and a door have StopGap ramps. The door opens inward and is not automated. Once inside, there are no additional steps.

It is not a sober space; our events sometimes offer alcohol

Everything for Everyone
2023-05-19 19:00 - 21:00 | Argo Bookshop, 1841A Ste-Catherine St. West, Montreal, Quebec, Canada
Friday, May 19, 7:00-9:00 pmArgo Bookshop

Join us on Friday, May 19th as we welcome authors M.E. O’Brien and Eman Abdelhadi along with Helen Hudson to discuss their novel of revolutionary science fiction, Everything for Everyone: An Oral History of the New York Commune, 2052-2072!The event begins at 7 pm and is free and open to all. It will take place in-store; please note that masks are required at the Argo. As space is limited, RSVPs are recommended via Eventbrite by clicking here.

About the Book

By the middle of the twenty-first century, war, famine, economic collapse, and climate catastrophe had toppled the world’s governments. In the 2050s, the insurrections reached the nerve center of global capitalism—New York City. This book, a collection of interviews with the people who made the revolution, was published to mark the twentieth anniversary of the New York Commune, a radically new social order forged in the ashes of capitalist collapse.

Here is the insurrection in the words of the people who made it, a cast as diverse as the city itself. Nurses, sex workers, antifascist militants, and survivors of all stripes recall the collapse of life as they knew it and the emergence of a collective alternative. Their stories, delivered in deeply human fashion, together outline how ordinary people’s efforts to survive in the face of crisis contain the seeds of a new world.

About the Authors

M. E. O’Brien writes and speaks on gender freedom and capitalism. Everything for Everyone was her first book, coauthored with Eman Abdelhadi. Her second book, Family Abolition: Capitalism and the Communizing of Care, will be out from Pluto in June 2023. She co-edits two magazines, Pinko, on gay communism, and Parapraxis, on psychoanalytic theory and politics. She works as a therapist, and is pursuing training as a psychoanalyst.

Eman Abdelhadi is an academic, artist and activist based in Chicago who writes and thinks at the intersection of gender, sexuality, politics, and identity. She is co-author of “Everything for Everyone: An Oral History of the New York Commune, 2052-2072,” a revolutionary sci-fi novel published in 2022 with Common Notions Press. Her academic work has been published in numerous peer-reviewed journals and covered by press outlets such as the Washington Post, Associated Press, and NPR. Abdelhadi received her PhD in Sociology in 2019 and is currently an assistant professor at the University of Chicago.

The authors will be joined by discussant Helen Hudson. Helen Hudson has been involved in movements for social liberation for over 30 years, mostly while living in Tiohtiá:ke/Montreal. Her work has included antiracist, feminist, and queer organizing; eco-justice work; student activism; anarchist movement building; prisoner solidarity and migrant justice.

Montréal Book Launch: House Within a House and Baby Book
2023-05-20 18:00 | Librairie Le Port de tête, 262 avenue du Mont-Royal Est, Montreal, Quebec, H2T 1P6, Canada
Saturday, May 20, 6 pmLibrairie Le Port de tête

Join D.M. Bradford, Amy Ching-Yan Lam, and Nicholas Dawson for a double book launch in Montréal! Hosted by Michael Nardone.

**We kindly ask that people mask for this event**

About the Authors

Amy Ching-Yan Lam is an artist and writer. She is the author of Looty Goes to Heaven (2022) and her poems have been published by Book Works, Montez Press, and yolkless press. Baby Book is her first collection of poetry. Lam’s exhibitions, performances, and public artworks, both solo and as part of the collective Life of a Craphead, have been presented at Seoul MediaCity Biennale, Eastside Projects, and Art Gallery of Ontario, amongst others, and she has participated in residencies at Macdowell and Delfina Foundation. She lives in Toronto, which is Mississauga Anishinaabeg treaty territory, as well as the land of the Haudenosaunee and the Wendat. Lam was born in Hong Kong.

D.M. Bradford is a poet, translator, and editor based in Tio’tia:ke (Verdun). His first book, Dream of No One but Myself, won the 2022 A.M. Klein Prize for Poetry and was a finalist for the Gerard Lampert Memorial Award and the Griffin Poetry Prize. His forthcoming collection, Bottom Rail on Top, will be published in 2023. House Within a House is his first book-length translation.

Born in Chile and based in Montréal, Nicholas Dawson is a writer, scholar, and the Literary Director of Éditions Triptyque. He is the author of La déposition des chemins (La Peuplade, 2010), Animitas (La Mèche, 2017), and Désormais, ma demeure (Triptyque, 2020), for which he received the Grand Prix du livre de Montréal and the Blue Metropolis Diversity Prize. He is also the co-author of Nous sommes un continent, Correspondance mestiza (Triptyque, 2021, with Karine Rosso), and the editor of many anthologies.

Michael Nardone is a poet and editor based in Montréal. His works include OEI #98-99: Aural Poetics, The Ritualites, Sonic Materialities, Transaction Record, and, with live artist Dana Michel, Yellow Towel: A Score.

About the Books

Baby Boy by Amy Ching-Yan Lam

House within a House by Nicholas Dawson, trans. D.M. Bradford

Désormais, ma demeure by Nicholas Dawson

Montreal International Anarchist Theatre Festival presents: Marusya Nikiforova: Ukraine's Legendary Anarchist Warrior
2023-05-23 19:00 | La Sala Rossa, 4848 St. Laurent Boulevard, Montreal, Quebec, H2T 2R5, Canada
Tuesday, May 23, 2023, 7:00 pmLa Sala Rossa, Montreal

Norman Nawrocki’s one-act play Marusya Nikiforova: Ukraine’s Legendary Anarchist Warrior debuts May 23 as part of the Montreal International Anarchist Theatre Festival.

Tickets are $20 and include entry to all the day’s performances:

Kiltras, by the Compania Danza JAM (Chile)

Marusya Nikiforova: Ukraine’s legendary anarchist warrior, by Norman Nawrocki/Babushka Theatre (Montreal)

CÍCLICAS: Resistiendo en la (de) (re) construcción, by Colectiva Tribu (Montreal)

A three-day pass to the entire festival is available for $50.

For more information, click here to visit the festival website.
