| Moonie memoirs, clothesline poetry, literary translation and bunraku puppets – they’re all on the menu at the sixth annual Word on the Street Book and Magazine Fair (WOTS) this Sunday, September 26 at Eau Claire Market. The events run from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. As always, WOTS is about words in the broadest sense. It’s a day of literature, with booths featuring publishers and a full slate of author readings, but it’s also a day of support for literacy, magazine publishers and word games for children. And it’s a day of events in tents – because who knows what the weather might do in late September in Calgary?
Geist, National Geographic and AlbertaViews are among the magazine exhibitors. In "the Village" you can meet with reps from literary groups as diverse as the Alexandra Writers’ Centre Society, Redd Skull Comics, the Mystery Writers Ink/Crime Writers of Canada, and the Canada Council for the Arts. In Enbridge Literacy Lane, 20 literacy groups will share information on their programs and on volunteer opportunities, as well as on ways to encourage kids to read.
Then there’s the Amazon Authors’ Reading Tent. Geoffrey Bromhead, who won the 2002 Three-Day Novel Writing Competition while a University of Calgary student, will be among the authors reading there. Other readers will include playwright Sandra Dempsey, poets Christian Bök and Dennis Cooley, fiction writers Natalee Caple and Jessica Grant, along with cultural historians George Melnyk and Fil Fraser. Then, smack in the middle of the day, the inaugural Dave Greber Freelance Writers Award will be presented to Calgary writer Brian Brennan at 1 p.m.
Since it would really undermine the whole lifelong literacy idea if you left the kids at home, WOTS offers plenty for them to do at the Canadian Children's Authors Tent. Children’s authors including Marty Chan, Clem Martini and Jacqueline Guest will share the stage with the WP Puppet Theatre and Dan the One Man Band. There’s also a Kumon Family Tent featuring face painting, "Reading Grannies" and bookmark making, plus another tent just for kids who want a place to read. For event times and further details, see www.thewordonthestreet.ca/calgary.php.
If you can’t get to WOTS, you can still catch Martini reading from The Mob: Feather and Bone, volume one of his Crow Chronicles. Pages on Kensington sponsors a reading on Saturday, September 25 at 3 p.m. at Hillhurst United Church Hall (1227 Bowness Road N.W.). There’s a draw and the winner gets a bag of young-adult books.
Pages also joins up with WordFest to host David Elias, Byrna Barclay and Marlis Wesseler on Tuesday, September 28 at 7:30 p.m. All three authors are from Saskatchewan, and have new work published by Coteau Books.
As if to bookend the above event, two authors well known to Calgary readers return on Monday, September 27 and Wednesday, September 29. Monday’s reader is Alberto Manguel, who’ll read from A Reading Diary: A Year of Favourite Books. Louis De Bernieres follows up on Wednesday with Birds Without Wings. Both events are free, and take place in the John Dutton Theatre at the W. R. Castell Central Library at 7:30 p.m. I’d get there early if you want a seat. Peter Oliva will guest-host both events, and it’s all brought to you courtesy of the library’s Author! Author! series in partnership with Pages and WordFest. |
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