the city on the edge of forever, : Victoria, part three,

Okay, so I clearly had too many adventures in Victoria, British Columbia [see part one here; see part two here]. I thought I could contain it all in one post, so there you go.

Saturday, April 25: My final morning in Victoria, with a noon check-out, so I had to get my bags figured out. My high school pal Jennifer (who originally collected me from the airport on day one of this trip) arrived for the sake of my many bags, and we headed out to get coffee and sandwiches. There were rowboats in the water. The sky was an incredible blue. We drove out for sandwiches to a place she likes, realizing we were parking right by that art gallery that was closed on Thursday, when I wandered that same way, able to go into the "multi-media debut solo exhibition by Mila Rio," You Do Not Have to Be Good (again, a line from this Mary Oliver poem). Rio is layering animal imagery in a really interesting way, from paintings to works of felt across frames, stitching ideas together that intrigue and slightly trouble the imagination. I hadn't realized until after that we had actually met the artist, sitting in the space, so that was pretty cool. I think Rio is doing some interesting work. If you are in Victoria, you have until May 28th to see this small show, and I would recommend it.

Sandwiches by the water, the low American hills in Washington State across the bay. Sandwiches, as we talked about who we still knew from high school (Glengarry District High School, class of 1989), and where they might be. Who we still spoke to. Where has everyone gone? A handful still around home, while others (that we know of) scattered across Ottawa, Germany, Lethbridge, Texas, etcetera. The long arm of Glengarry wanderings.

Mile Zero, where I think I might even have visited with Joe Blades, back in the spring of 1998 (we attended that year's League of Canadian Poets AGM, and launched a five-poet anthology we were in, that he edited/published). A photo, most likely. I wonder where that might be? Mile Zero: the end of a poem by Robert Kroetsch, naturally. Or is this the beginning?

Afterwards, Jen offered to keep my bags in her car until the evening event, and she dropped me at Miniature World, a museum near enough to the reading venue that I knew I could catch this, sit somewhere, and then head off to the event fairly easily. This place is magnificent and everyone who goes to Victoria must go there immediately. When I looked on a map, it seemed close enough and intriguing enough, and I thought, why not?

Some of the battlesites were pretty cool, as were the occasional trains, but the best part had to be a wrap-around single train-line heading from Canada's west coast through to the east, catching most of the main stops along the way across the period of some of the original founding of our country's national rail. Victoria, Calgary, Regina, Toronto. Although it jumped immediately from there to Quebec City and a generic "The Maritimes," which I thought a bit nonsense (I wanted to complain, but the end of the tour leads one to the street, and not back to the front desk). It was a remarkable display, either way. But I wanted to see my house!

And then the lights went low! And the train lights went on, and the train whistled through! And then it was daylight again, the sunlight lifting up across the whole stretch of country.

There were historic European and American battlesites, fairy tale settings, circus city-scenes and a whole room of dollhouses. A stretch of buildings and totem poles reminiscent of the Great Hall in Gatineau's Museum of History (formerly the Museum of Civilization, which is a better name, despite what former Prime Minister Stephen Harper thinks).

No gift shop, which was admittedly a surprise (and disappointing; I would have picked up something, at least). From there, I wandered slightly, collecting postcards (and a block further, stamps to accompany), before landing at the Sticky Wicket, "Vancouver Island's biggest pub" (it's not always about size, fella), attached to the city's Strathcona Hotel (very different than, say, the Edmonton namesake, which had been a perpetual favourite of myself and pals such as Andy Weaver, Paul Pearson, etc circa 2000). I sat with pint, wrote postcards and read further from The Paris Review for a couple of hours, catching my breath. Why didn't I take any pictures? The pub was fine (and there was a woman across from me reading, also, so it felt the right place), although there was an artwork, a drawing, along one wall I found confusing, and didn't know the reference, something about "preparing the troops for Sevastopol," a sketch of the army that I realized, upon looking it up, was a reference to the Crimean War (1854-56). Why would a pub in Victoria, British Columbia be holding a sketch referring to the Crimean War?

I eventually met up with Jennifer, who had my mound of books, and went into the on-stage recording of The Poet Laureate Podcast, in which I interviewed Kyeren about her experience around being Victoria's (seventh!) poet laureate for the first half, with the second half focusing a bit more on me and my work, my thoughts around writing, etcetera. She kept saying throughout that we would have cake in-between, so the audience listening would have to imagine us eating cake. The third poem she read, leading into our break, was one that referenced Marie Antoinette. So, as I said, let us eat cake.

The crowd was grand! Rhona McAdam [my generous host], John Barton again [who later said I reminded him of the late Victoria poet Robin Skelton, which I would like him to explain, as I don't have enough direct knowledge of the man to speculate], and Terese Svoboda [I knew Donald Sutherland, she said, and you have his eyebrows!]. Allegra Kaplan. I was able to return Sara Cassidy her charger cord, which saved my computer while west. During the half-time, a familiar face came up to me (the woman on the couch) and reminded me that she was a waitress at The Royal Oak I frequented in the second half of the 1990s [ex-partner of my late pal Greg Kerr, also] and had been a therapist in Victoria for years, interested in the fact that I was doing an event, and came out, which was very cool. Kyeren had suggested I read three poems, so I read only my three poems from the new Coach House Books anthology On Occasion: Poems for the People, ed. Sina Queyras [see the write-up I did on the collection here]. Given I'd read healthily from my two University of Calgary Press collections, it seemed a good idea to read from the new collection, since it was brand new.

It was an engaging conversation, kind of all over the place, but one I quite enjoyed (worried slightly it was my usual rambling nonsense). I shall let you know when the audio lands online. After, Jen and Allegra [it was good to hang with her and get a sense of her, as I'd only caught her in passing at that first reading] and I caught a quick drink at a hotel (fancy) bar. I mentioned the artwork at the Sticky Wicket, and Allegra suggested it could just as easily be an interest in British-isms by whomever designed the space, and not any deeper or more specific connection between anything here and anything there. That makes the most sense, I think.

And then Jen drove me to the airport for my 11:30pm overnight flight, which left late, bumping my landing in Toronto enough to put me on a further flight back home. But home by noon, exhausted, pleased. Hopefully it won't be another two decades-plus before I land in Victoria again! (and hopefully next time Wayde Compton is actually in town, as well).

The Capilano Review : 50th Anniversary Issue(s) : 3:46-3:48

 

Last year, in anticipation of our 50^th anniversary, we invited over a hundred of the magazine’s contributors to submit a term of their choosing to our special anniversary issues, the first of which you now hold in your hands. These terms would be collecting, we said, alongside notable selections from our archive into an experimental glossary—a form we hoped would index the creative practices that make up our literary and arts community while elucidating, as our invitation explained, “some of the questions, shifts, antagonisms, and continuities that have marked five decades of publishing.” Returning to our prompt now, I can’t help but also consider the term “experimental,” itself a point of ongoing discussion at the magazine and one that has generated lively debate: What are our criteria for “experimental” writing? What does it look like on the page, and how does it sound? Who does it include? What kinds of risks does it take, and how does it take them? (Matea Kulić, “Editor’s Note,” 3.46, Spring 2022)

Anniversaries, much like birthdays, are a good time to assess, reassess, examine and celebrate, and Vancouver’s The Capilano Review did just that last year, offering all three 2022 issues as a single, ongoing 50^th anniversary celebratory project. Across a period that also included the shift from Matea Kulić to Deanna Fong as the journal’s main editor [see then-editor Jenny Penberthy's 2010 "12 or 20 (small press) questions" interview on the journal here], the three issues were released as “A – H” (Spring 2022; 3.46), “I – R” (Summer 2022; 3.47) and “S – Z” (Fall 2022; 3.48), producing a self-described triptych “featuring newly commissioned work alongside notable selections from our archive by over a hundred of the magazine’s past contributors.” The range and the ambition of this year-long project is stunning, providing an overview of contributions in a loosely-thematic alphabetical order that offers a vibrancy across each page. If you haven’t yet, or haven’t much, interacted with the journal, this might be the place to begin: the three volumes offer a combined four hundred and fifty-some pages’ worth of essays, poems, stories, visual art, statements, interviews and other works in a wild incredible wealth of material (and contributors too many to list across this particular space) that ripple from the journal’s core of Vancouver out across Canada and well into the international.

Introducing a special double issue (Nos. 8 & 9, Fall 1975/Spring 1976) to memorialize the loss of Bob Johnson, “the man responsible for the original graphic design of The Capilano Review,” then-editor and founder Pierre Coupey wrote: “When we first proposed a magazine at Capilano, I wanted one that would not only print good work, but also one whose design would treat that work with respect.” I would say that such a consideration has remained, thanks to the solid foundations that Coupey and Johnson (among others) originally set up, way back in 1973 over at Vancouver’s Capilano College (the journal and since-university have since parted ways).

The problem with defining yourself by the centre is that you are working backwards. That which is earlier is supposed to be better. Because it was before the erasure, its reinscription is sacrosanct. This is a handy cudgel for authoritarians. Look to the Duvaliers in Haiti for Afrocentrism as policy, where it served to quiet social criticism, where it was at first used to smash the Left, and later to smash democracy altogether. Let them eat Egyptology.
            Fanon excorcised all this in “On National Culture,” espousing an anti-colonialism that is a pragmatic synthesis of old and new in the form of a “fighting phase” of the culture. Returning to previous tradiations is no panacea. The modernity of Fanon’s position leaves room for social change and challenges to old thinking—in other words, Fanon’s position makes space for innovations that Fanon could not himself yet imagine. Ideas are not good just because they’re African. They are good if they lead to liberation.
            And liberation always needs the future. (Wayde Compton, “Afrocentripetalism & Afroperipheralism,” 3.46)

Even beyond considering the amount of other presses and journals that appear to be falling by the wayside lately (Catapult, Bear Creek Gazette, Ambit), it is important to acknowledge those journals (and presses) that are not only still around, but managing to consistently publish an array of stunning work, let alone for fifty years and counting [see my review of their 40th anniversary issue here]. And The Capilano Review isn’t the only one to celebrate, as Arc Poetry Magazine (b. 1978) will soon be releasing their special 100^th issue, Derek Beaulieu recently produced an anthology celebrating twenty-five years of publishing through his combined housepress/№ Press, and even my own above/ground press (b. 1993) is working on some exciting project for this year’s thirtieth anniversary, including a third ‘best of’ anthology out this fall with Invisible Publishing (and don’t forget the pieces posted five years ago for above/ground press’ twenty-fifth, or even the array of pieces published not long after, to celebrate forty years of Stuart Ross’ Proper Tales Press). I wonder what Brick Books, as well, might attempt in two years’ time for their fiftieth?

I haven’t seen a copy of the debut issue of The Capilano Review (despite my best efforts over the years), but as part of the “20^th Anniversary Issue” (Series 2:10, March 1993), then-editor Robert Sherrin offered both a sense of quiet humility and forward thinking in his preface that seems the lifeblood of the journal’s ongoing aesthetic: “It is traditional at such a time to present a retrospective issue, but on this occasion the editors of TCR decided that while it is appropriate the acknowledge those who have contributed significantly to our culture, it is equally important to present those who will extend, transform, and renew our culture. The present issue is our attempt to acknowledge the past and to welcome the future.” Too often, it seems, journals begin with such good and even radical intentions, and become tame as the years continue, some to the point of self-parody, something The Capilano Review has managed to avoid, remaining as vibrant, or perhaps even moreso, than it has ever been. Consistently working beyond the bounds of the straightforward literary journal, The Capilano Review has always seemed a space for a particular assemblage of shared aesthetic approach and rough geography, occasionally branching out into features on and by works by predominantly west coast writers and artists. Whether produced as combined or full-issues, some of these over the years have included features on George Bowering, Daphne Marlatt, Michael Ondaatje, Brian Fawcett, David Phillips, Barry McKinnon, Gathie Falk, Robin Blaser, Roy K. Kiyooka, Gerry Shikatani and Bill Schermbrucker, among numerous others, as well as a sound poetry issue, “With Record Included,” guest-edited by Steven [Ross] Smith and Richard Truhlar.

The Capilano Review has always been unique in Canadian literature through offering, from the offset, an ethics of exploration, resistance and experiment; offering an aesthetic influenced by west coast social politics, critiques of colonialism, issues of race and environmental concerns, all of which have been shared with others in their immediate vicinity, including The Kootenay School of Writing, Writing, Raddle Moon and Line (and later, West Coast Line), and more recent journals such as Rob Manery’s SOME. And yet, unlike most of those examples, The Capilano Review is still publishing, still evolving, exploring and pushing, and seeking the possible out of what otherwise might have seemed impossible. Welcoming the future, indeed.

They will ask you what you ate. They will ask you where you walked, what you saw. The trees, for instance, so copious we assume they are free.

Take account, they will say. They will not ask who you are. Who you were. Were you queer. Did you matter.

Dear question mark you mark me.

It is a mix and match of images leading to a vanishing act. Expect the best is it evasion. It is a way of reversing fortunes.

I want to tell you the story of Lori because it is the opposite of nation-building. It is the opposite of canon.

She was in her room; it was just before midday in her life when the word opened.

How did she look. It was a hooked glance. it would not rhyme. It was another time.

Under the sun a hook of green eyes. No one wanted to be recognized. We all wanted to be seen.

Every day I do a now, and then it passes.

What is asking. An animation of statement. A transformation of intent.

I reach for my phone and vanish. (Sina Queyras, “DEAR QUESTION MARK,” 3.48)

Sina Queyras, Rooms: Women, Writing, Woolf

 

I reached up and into her sentences as though I were being pulled out of gravity because, for the first time in my life, I was encountering writing that felt organically similar to what was happening inside my mind – but, to be clear, I was not at all in control of the thoughts, or the words; my thoughts were broken here and there with clichés and fawning. Sentimentality was possible. Yes, she was sections of them all, and they were sections of her. ‘We are shaped by time and tide,’ I wrote, ‘exposed to the elements.’ I quoted directly from The Waves: ‘I have lived a thousand lives already. Every day I unbury – I dig up. I find relics of myself in the sand that women made thousands of years ago’ (127). I allowed more guessing about who, or what, Woolf was.
            Of course, the question really being asked here was, who am I? (“Prologue”)

Montreal writer, editor and critic Sina Queyras’ latest title is Rooms: Women, Writing, Woolf (Toronto ON: Coach House Books, 2022), a book-length essay/memoir that works through the author’s reading of Virginia Woolf, and how an early introduction to Woolf’s work offered them a way not only out but through an upbringing punctuated by abuse, poverty, loss and trauma. As Queyras’ writes early on: “It’s almost true that I have published only a handful of short stories and one novel – one that experimental novelists might argue is conventional and conventional novelists might describe as experimental – but I have, like Woolf (although certainly not at the same level as Woolf), studied, read, written, critiqued, and thought about writing across genres for more than thirty years. / Is that enough to convince myself that I might have something to say about Virginia Woolf?” Rooms: Women, Writing, Woolf is an essay on influence, an essay on Virginia Woolf and a memoir of trauma, offering the details of how Queyras “got here from there”; how a discovery of Woolf’s work early on allowed them an example of how to lift beyond a dark history, and literally write themselves into the possibility of something else. “How did people who survived such trauma ever achieve smoothness in their lives? Equanimity? How did people who didn’t assume for themselves the right to safety, achieve safety, let alone perceive themselves as having a voice? As writers? Artists? Anything beyond a basic survival mode? It was bullshit. How could you tell your story if your story wasn’t one the world wanted to hear?”

Queyras writes of their reading and post-secondary experiences, of their relationships. They write of reading and experiencing the work of Adrienne Rich and Toni Morrison, Constance Rooke and Evelyn Lau, Jane Rule and Sylvia Plath; of academia, gender, sexuality and violence, and of linearity, writing on Woolf as figure, influence, possibility, anchor and example. “Lau wanted – and deserved – a literary career,” Queyras writes, describing a Constance Rooke reading and post-reading conversation during their time at the University of Victoria, and hearing the audience of predominantly older women tut-tut what they were hearing about Lau’s then-forthcoming memoir, Runaway: Diary of a Street Kid (HarperCollins, 1989), “and the way she found a book contract and entry into literature was by dragging herself through the streets and living to tell about it. Isn’t this why Sylvia Plath published The Bell Jar under a pseudonym? Because she saw that story as something not yet transformed? Too close to the bone? Something other than literature? Is this the women’s literature we’ve been fighting for?” Queyras writes of working and feeling through form and the difficulty of being present. They write of being transformed.

            The text itself made me. It demanded a response. But it also literally made me.
            And that is no small thing. Again and again, whenever I lose my way, I go back to Woolf. I go back to her texts and realign myself. Bring all the folds of my being into the work. I go back to the sentences that appear to contain while trajectories – subtle and extensive – and look up into them. I feel a complicated lineage. They appear before me like cathedrals and street maps, like soft spaces to settle, like flares, sent up in moments of anguish and adoration, lighting a path I can always go down. They appear like furrows of joy I might harvest. They appear like girders, vertical and reeking of futures Woolf herself could not have foreseen.

Queyras writes of an ongoing fight for space, and attempting writing not simply as a mode for thinking and responding but one through which best to experience and live. In Why Must a Black Writer Write About Sex? (Toronto ON: Coach House Press, 1994), referencing his infamous debut, How To Make Love To a Negro (Without Getting Tired) (Coach House Books, 1987), Dany Laferrière wrote of how he wrote that first novel to “save his life.” This is “no small thing,” as Queyras well knows, and they centre their third poetry collection, Lemon Hound (Coach House Books, 2006) as the beginning of where they wished to exist as a writer; the collection that first achieved what they were aiming for (and allowing all else to follow). Through the precise sentences of Rooms: Women, Writing, Woolf, Queyras writes of the failures and attempts, the stumbles and missteps, and how Woolf remained an anchor through the worst of it. “It had been my intention to follow in Woolf’s footsteps – a ridiculous desire,” they write, early in Chapter One, “because of my impoverished education and the fact that essay writing has always been a challenge. But journalism, of a kind, and speaking to the common reader, have always been goals (as well as my first writing experience). Creatively, I wanted to try it all: write plays, novels, and essays, not only poetry. I fell, however, not to essays, but blog posts, and those devolved further into tweets. I meant to write more novels but wrote only one before I was caught up – for better and worse – in parenting and the business of a creative writing department. Or, with capital-S Service and Patriarchy.” Through Women, Writing, Woolf, Queyras writes on the pull and possibility, the destructive nature of rooms; finally able to remove themselves from one before even able to entertain another; they write on exactly what proponents of literature offer as the best example of what reading can offer: the transformative possibilities of the experience.

            It isn’t until I say this out loud that I realize this is one thing I am trying to make clear in this book. the way that there can seem to  be no exit at all from the trauma of the body. That it is ongoing. That we have all accepted this, not only for us, but for our children. And for our students. And that the room can be a place that keeps us apart from ourselves and the world. The room can easily become a closed door. A locked place. A prison of our own devising, or our own resignation, and that we have to get out.