Literary Photographer

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A message from Alan Twigg, Publisher of BC BookWorld: *The provincial government has suddenly rescinded ALL funding to /BC BookWorld/, *the most-read publication about books in Canada. Notice of this pre-Olympics decision to break a 22-year-old relationship with the newspaper came from Andrea Henning, executive director of Arts & Culture, during a brisk phone call, [...]

Due to travel/work I missed the 3rd annual Pacific Festival of the Book that ran May 4-15. Well, I did manage to run  in to (for maybe 10 minutes) one panel discussion and here, finally, are a couple of photos from the event. I didn’t want the Festival to pass  without a mention even if [...]

The Independent has a quirky feature by David Nicholls, a list of  The Top Ten Literary Tear Jerkers. This is actually quite amusing, not quite what you’d expect from a list of this sort. Here’s a sample: ONE FLEW OVER THE CUCKOO’S NEST BY KEN KESEY I’ve not read this for twenty-five years now, so [...]

In the New York Times, Paul Greenberg has a plan to bail out writers! The NYT also picks their top ten books for 2008. From the Seattle Times, art critic Sheila Carr writes about writing on the arts. From London: In the Independent, a collection of letters and manuscripts from Oscar Wilde are resdiscovered and [...]

LP: John, you’re a visual chronicler of Ottawa, do you see Ottawa as a documentary project? JWM: I guess I see myself as photographer who happens to live in Ottawa. I don’t necessarily think of myself documenting Ottawa as a project. That would imply that I have a vision and a plan which I don’t. [...]

Greg Gatenby’s ‘Toronto, A Literary Guide’ published in 1999 is a thick book that provides a tour of residences and places in Toronto that have a literary connection.  This March, Stephen Cain, writing in Open Book Toronto,  told about a walking tour of the Annex area that he and another person designed using Gatenby’s book [...]

Fall is the season for the big Canadian Writers’ Festivals so here’s a list of what’s coming up. Today’s the last day for the Winnipeg Festival so you’ll have to start making plans for next year but there’s a lot more upcoming in October. Vancouver hosts the Writers & Readers event October 21-26 at the [...]

Photographing writers is not new. Many other photographers have specialized in images of authors. Two photographers who introduced me to the idea of photographing writers were John Reeves and Sam Tata. Reeves, a Toronto photographer who works with a large format camera, is known for his images of people connected with the arts, including writers. [...]

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 [...]