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Patrick Blennerhassett - Monument -  Interview

Patrick Blennerhassett - Monument - Interview

LP: Monument’s characters are heavy drinking, drug abusing, amoral, racist, violent, misogynist young men yet somehow the reader remains interested rather than simply repelled by the characters. Was this a challenge when writing the book?
PB: Definitely, I wanted people to be torn about cheering for Seth in particular. I wanted him to be an [...]

Atwood, Doyle And Stephen Harper

Margaret Atwood has a powerful essay in the Globe and Mail on the arts in Canada and Prime Minister Stephen Harper’s attitude towards art and artists. The end is especially chilling. A must read, especially with an election looming.
And now check out out John Doyle as well.

Border Line Ignorance

The Seattle Post Intelligencer has a great (small but slowly, slowly growing) section online on Northwest writers that includes a range of writers from novelist Tom Robbins to cartoonist Ellen Forney. Each piece has a sample of writing as well as a video of the writer speaking on a variety of topics.
Looking through the section [...]

Top 10 Canadian Novels For Canada Day

Thirty years after the National Conference on the Canadian Novel in Calgary picked the 100 most important works of fiction in Canada, the Globe and Mail has five experts pick their top ten Canadian novels. The 1978 Calgary conference also picked their top ten. They were:
The Stone Angel (1964) Margaret Laurence.
Fifth Business (1970) Robertson Davies.
As [...]

As Good As Any Place To Begin

As Good As Any Place To Begin

A is for Atwood, which is as good as any place to begin.
That’s her photograph at the top of this page. The other portraits are Peter Oliva (at left) and Wayson Choy.
I make a living as a photographer but am fascinated by the world of writing. All writing and all aspects although I probably read [...]