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Arts & Culture Archive

Interview With David Balzer

by Chandler Levack The author of Contrivances discusses Fleetwood Mac, sublimation and writing from a woman’s perspective.

This week marks the launch of Contrivances, a debut collection of short stories from writer and art critic David Balzer. The e-book, published by Brian Joseph Davis and Emily Schultz’s ECW imprint Joyland Books, relays the tragic comedy of women wrestling with muses and musings, from a blonde nudist retiring in the woods in “The Poncho” to the mannered …

Interview With Joshua Clover

by Ian Beattie The poet, academic and activist discusses maps, protest movements and why art isn’t politically effective.

Joshua Clover is a respected American poet and writer based in California, where he teaches at UC Davis. His first collection, Madonna Anno Domini, won the Walt Whitman award for American poetry; Judith Butler called his most recent collection, The Totality for Kids, “a stunning collection” with “an enormous clarity of language in the service of a poetics that brilliantly …

The Unbridled Enthusiasm of Todd Zuniga

by Diana Kole The founder of Literary Death Match will make you believe in literature again.

Todd Zuniga after a Literary Death Match in Beijing. Photo courtesy of Todd Zuniga.

The future of American literature has decamped for Los Angeles. Todd Zuniga, the founder of Literary Death Match, a touring event that pits writers against each other in mock battles, says he wishes he’d made the move earlier. After leaving New York, “I’d avoid …

Interview With Anita Lahey

by Deena Kara Shaffer The Fredericton-based poet discusses her new collection of poems, the allure of organized fighting and impossibility of escaping catastrophe.

Anita Lahey’s second collection of poems, Spinning Side Kick, was released by Véhicule Press in 2011. Her first book, Out to Dry in Cape Breton, was nominated for the Trillium Book Award for Poetry and the Ottawa Book Award, and she is a past winner of the Great Blue Heron Poetry Prize and the Ralph Gustafson Prize for …

Under the Pudding Skin: A Conversation About Bruce Taylor

by David Godkin and Mathew Henderson Two poetry lovers discover a “master versifer” in Taylor’s new collection, No End in Strangeness.

David Godkin (formerly David Kosub) has written poetry and fiction reviews for literary journals across Canada, including the Malahat Review, Prairie Fire, Arc, the Fiddlehead, Quill and Quire, Books in Canada, and What! He has a masters degree in English Literature from York University, is a prolific singer-songwriter and writes the weekly poetry blog Speaking of Poems.

Mathew Henderson is …

Interview With Jonah Campbell

by Diana Kole The author of Food & Trembling on his affinity for linguistic play, the genius of Scotch Club and why Montreal is not a great food city.

Jonah Campbell, logophile and eater, writes in a shifting register that bridges whatever gap there is between the OED and Doritos All Nighter Cheeseburger Chips. Campbell claims that the appeal of his writing lies in “the fumbling charm of the amateur”—but the wit of his recent book Food & Trembling (Invisible Publishing) isn’t so reduced. The essay collection isn …

Tenth Anniversary: Spring

ISSUE 43 Tenth Anniversary: Spring 2012

online content:

also in this issue:

  • Face the Music

    by Tim Falconer How can someone who passionately loves music also be a terrible singer? Tim Falconer takes up voice lessons—and discovers the surprising science of tone deafness.

  • The Big Job

    by Deni Y. Béchard As a teenager, Deni Y. Béchard went to Vancouver to live with his father, an ex-con with a penchant for telling tall tales. He met a man desperate to forget the past.

  • The Homesickness of Astronauts

    by Johanna Skibsrud "She felt a great sadness. She would remember next to nothing of this, even soon."
  • [see full issue contents]