Smashing Idea!

 By Grae Burns


Last night’s main stage event, “Changing the Family Channel”, offered a unique presentation of the ideas that surround family.  Authors Lauren B. Davis, Andrew Kaufman, Ann Shin, and Cassie Stocks each took turns reading excerpts from their recently published works. The stories ranged from a woman coming to terms with her addictions, a grandmother trying to reconcile with her past with the help of her (unwilling) granddaughter, a series of poems addressing what we inherit from our families, and a story about a 27 year old painter who is just about to give up on her dreams when she meets and befriends a ghost named Gladys. 

Motherhood, nostalgia for an ideal past/childhood, hope, love, support, the need for independence, reconciliation and forgiveness were just some of the topics present, making it very clear that family is a very big, and very fluctuating idea.

A pair of lovely ladies enjoy a game of Pretzel Scrabble at MTYP.

To underscore this, the second half of the evening was dominated by Ann Shin’s film-in-progress, The Family China.  The film was made up of several series of photos, each documenting a person or people smashing a piece of china against a hard wood table, sometimes aided with a baseball bat or hammer.  As the items were meant to represent objects from individuals' lives, each photo was accompanied by a narration. The voices in these monologues explained what the items represented, from the joys of breaking free of inherited clutter, to breaking with outdated family values. The latter complimented the theme of the night, that the idea of family is in constant flux.

After the film, the authors took turns sharing what items they felt the characters in their stories would smash if they could. The list included a bottle, a window, a camera, and a bowl. They also took a moment to discuss the fear, exhilaration and liberation felt when breaking something, either literally or figuratively, that we have been conditioned to respect or revere. The authors then enthusiastically invited the audience to take part in what they dubbed “Smashing Parties.” 

As the night came to a close, the audience was left to consider what they had inherited from their own families, what ideals they might break away from, and what objects they might need to smash to make that happen. I, for one, left with the excitement of considering the dates for my very own smashing party.

Nous sommes ici/We Are Here

By Steve Locke

It could have been the early sunset, or the blustery wind and proliferation of warm-wear amongst readers and audience members, including John K. Samson’s flannel shirt and vest. Or maybe it was the geese soaring in formation, south across the Assiniboine as John Weier delivered a line on bird watching. It could also just be the fact that the vernal equinox took place the day before, but something felt so perfectly “autumn” about the “Voices From Oodena” event on Sunday evening.

The heart of the city: an intersection of languages, stories and people. Photo by Leif Norman.

 In its ninth incarnation, the heart of the city was home to yet another diverse gathering of Winnipeggian (is that a term yet?) storytellers who explored their relationship to this place that will soon be ever so cold. And while the weather was still quite tolerable for this essential festival event, Thin Air provided a hearty line-up of voices to give us a fine sense of our community.

First to take the podium was improviser/performer, RobertMalo, who is also known in many classrooms and historical tours as the time-displaced voyageur, TiBert. Taking the microphone aside, Malo dove into performance poems that addressed issues of bilingualism. Alternating lines and phrases between French and English, a “lover’s quarrel” took place between the language identities, where each side asked the other, “How can I better understand you?” The poet ultimately concluded, “Je suis que je suis.”

From a yet-unpublished manuscript, John Weier shared part of a story in which a man returns to Winnipeg after fifty years. Upon visiting the banks of the Red River, he experiences vivid flashbacks of his family’s exodus from poverty just as southern Manitoba was about to begin macerating under the famous deluge. Where as the character’s childhood home was deconstructed to make money for food, Weier haunted us with visceral descriptions of a bullying river that destroyed homes and utterly changed the local landscape. In an unfortunate  end to the passage, the man recollects his family arriving at their new home in the Niagara region, their basement completely flooded.

McNally Robinson Book For Young People Award winner Colleen Nelson was next to read, selecting a passage from her latest YA novel, The Fall. With the skate park in walking distance of Oodena, Nelson made reference to the importance of such meeting places to youth who strive to gain independence from their parents, including the precocious skate-kids in her book.

And then some musician-guy read from his book of Lyrics and Poems.

The view of the prairies from a paper airplane.

Seriously, though, it was a truly special, surreal experience to hear John K.’s lyrics on their own. Where I would have sang along, I spoke instead, following along to the likes of Hospital Vespers and others from Weakerthans albums gone by, as well as his solo album, Provincial. It goes without saying that John K. has contributed to our sense of identity, and I sure as Salisbury House have seen The Weakerthans live enough times to run out of fingers on one hand. But to hear John K.’s gentle, empathetic voice utter “Before the nurses came to take you away/ I stood there on a chair and watched you pray,” made it feel like a cross between the Jets returning home and Christmas.

Where one might assume Samson to be the one to close the show, the evening still had one more reader who managed to take the audiences spirits up one notch higher. A strong and genial presence, Dave McLeod took us home with poetry selections from the well-celebrated anthology of aboriginal writing, Manitopawow. His pieces navigated the nooks and crannies of aboriginal identity in and the political act of writing, which he said, “puts a magnifying glass on the truth”. By the end of his reading, McLeod had us all chanting for the “equality of bannock rights” in the city, and answering the question, “are you full enough to know when you are full enough?”

After the event, we felt ever closer to the centre of our identity as we all drew away from the heart of our city, like floodwaters receding. As the wind died down, we unzipped our jackets a little bit and revealed a bit more of ourselves to the elements before the chill of the night set in. It was a perfect autumn evening. Perfectly Winnipeggian...Winnipegger-ish...You know what I mean.

Sentiment and Bodily Fluids

By Courtney Stevens

Some participants of the Haiku Death Match, including winner Mike Johnston.

What would soon become an emotional and truly memorable evening began with a trip to Smokes’ Poutinerie in the Exchange District. There, my friend Tiana and I crossed paths with two random strangers dining on the poutine that our stomachs suddenly desired, and we had to have some. We finished our meal and thought nothing of the women until we entered the Winnipeg Free Press Café, and Tiana started flipping through her program. Upon glancing at the last page, she whispered to me, “Isn’t this the lady we ran into at Smokes’?” As if on cue, she walked in; the director of the Winnipeg International Writer’s Festival, Charlene Diehl.

The evening continued with a buzzing café and a line-up of readers preparing for performances and the Haiku Death Match. After an introduction from Bruce Symaka and Charlene Diehl, the members of the Winnipeg Poetry Slam team took their turn on stage. 

Local poetry slam legend T'ai Pu conducts the audience.

First was T’ai Pu, who taught us the power of the people by cleverly conducting some enthusiastic audience participation.

Next, Mira Black glided to the stage and captured the audience with her romantic styling, looking stunning as always. She utilized her liquid velvet voice to entrance the audience and deliver her innermost thoughts like none I have ever seen before. 

Then, changing the tone was Steve Currie with his witty body - I mean - brain, sharing what truly was the worst date in history. Steak Tartare. That is all.

The evening took a turn towards the intimate when Mike Johnson dedicated his second poem to his wife, who was present at the event. The poem centred on their experience of losing a child to miscarriage, and we could see how wrought with emotion he was during the performance. He received everyone’s standing ovations as we all sympathized with the couple and their loss. I remarked to T’ai Pu how an audience can change the entire performance, for we had seen Mike perform it just two weeks earlier with a much less intense reaction. Here, some people had tears in their eyes and many others felt the punch of pain as he came off the stage and into his wife’s arms.

As emotions settled in the room, Aaron Simm took this opportunity to sneak onto stage with a poem that commented on American foreign policy, and brought Disney to Bagdad. Its gun for the entire family! M-16-K-E-Y-M-O-U-S-A! Yes Sir! Yes Ma’am!

Genni Gunn with an encouraging message to a fellow poet concerning undergarments. 

In a change of pace, Genni Gunn seized the crowd with a series of poems based on the miraculous true story of a woman who was delivered from suicidal death by none other than her canine companion. Though this resulted in the mutilation of half her face, a strange irony resulted in how reconstructive surgery involved a transplant from another woman’s face – a woman who had committed suicide herself. She finished her performance by delivering the Panty Poem, which was a response to friend, Sheri-D Wilson’s Panty Portal Poem. Try saying that one five times fast.

Topping the evening off was the featured Haiku Death Match. Blood, and other bodily fluids were left splattered everywhere, and some people left the building with some serious wounds. It was Mike Johnson who returned to the stage to split our sides and steal the proverbial cake to win the title as Haiku Death Master.

Overall, the evening was happy, sad, intense, provocative, and only slightly offensive. But aren’t all lasting memories constructed from great sentiment?


Photographs of the event were provided by Anthony Mark Schellenberg. Visit his website here.

Welcome!

By Steve Locke

Last night, Thin Air kicked off with an event that inspired audience members with ideas that are at the very heart of the festival. At the Salle Antoine Gaborieau in the Centre culturel franco-manitobain, the festival was introduced as an occasion for isolated readers and writers to interact in a rich diversity of what director Charlene Diehl referred to as “story traffickers”. Despite representing a small sample, “Opening Night” also established the Winnipeg literary community at large in the best possible, most inclusive use of the word “us”. And the prevailing message to us (you too!) was “welcome”.

Thin Air Director, Charlene Diehl with Lee Maracle, Columpa Bobb (both in the centre), and The Urban Indigenous Theare Company at "Opening Night".

The evening was a special opportunity to consider these very ideas with the deeply personal readings and discussions of The Urban IndigenousTheatre Company’s The Moving Gallery: Beyond Survival. Spearheaded by actor and playwright Columpa Bobb, and written by Bobb’s mother and celebrated storyteller, Lee Maracle, Beyond Survival was a massive, multidisciplinary and multi-generational project that could not possibly fit on the Antoine Gaborieau stage. With the full production including live painting, film clips, and 30 different performers, it was boiled down to core series of excerpts performed by 6 impassioned individuals. And at no point did anyone consider that anything was missing.

On stage, Bobb and Maracle were joined by actor Phillip Duncan and three young cast members/co-creators who navigated indigenous history in cultural and personal realms. Using the voices of residential-school survivors as a jumping off point, the narrative later manifested in a present-day urban setting, with themes of dissonance, alienation, and identity.

In fine spoken-word style, the storytellers fully utilized their range of voices to explore the “us” in great emotional detail, creating vocal harmony between elder and youth while each endured great internal dissonance. As Bobb, Maracle, and Duncan explored a history of indigenous struggle, the youth discussed personal narratives on enduring displacement and racism within modern social contexts. And despite overwhelming insecurity, inherited rage, and ever-present issues of inequality, these bold, intergenerational artists offered the hope it is possible to live free in the universal vastness of the moment. What’s more, they proved that with such courageous, competent, and truthful contemporaries, the future of indigenous culture is in good hands.

An intimate and heartfelt discussion.

Following the reading, festival Director, Charlene Diehl, engaged in a discussion with the creators about the impact of writing about such intense personal issues, and the prevailing emotional truth that attracts and compels listeners to create for themselves. Such was the case for Mary, an audience member who was herself compelled to ask for the opportunity to reciprocate the stellar storytelling with a song of her tribe. According to her grandfather, one could not exist without the other, and by the second chorus, the entire room was singing along. It was the perfect end to the evening, as therein lay the heart and soul of the festival, in the exchange of ideas, art and culture, and the enduring hope possessed by every one of us.

Tiny Little Pieces

By Steve Locke


Poetry, like ancient pottery, often comes to us in pieces. Language and ceramics are worn down by history and innovation until they are re-discovered, and then reassembled into new lines, shapes, and functions. Or, in the case of a particular transmedia project by Toronto poet, filmmaker and journalist Ann Shin you can smash your family china and tchotchke into tiny little bits, then reassemble their stories and meanings into whatever form suits you.

Gallagher-esque in delivery, but innovative in narrative concept and design, Shin opens up her second collection of poetry, The Family China, to readers and festival goers alike. Her work explores the brackish lines in which humanity interacts, particularly between family members in a place of diaspora which one calls home, wherever that may be.

Ann Shin's next project: pseudo grunge band/performance act called "Smashing Watermelons".

Consider moving day, wherein one's lease on a particular plot of habitation is at its end. One has to decide what to bring and what to leave behind, which may be both liberating and traumatizing. Then, at a new destination, the individual's way of being is unpacked and reassembled. Things go in different places. Some things might be missing, and some new things take their place.

In the process of deconstructing, building, and transforming, we adapt and define ourselves. And sometimes, it's really fun to smash the crap out of junk you don't need anymore. This is also a part of Shin's on stage antics, as illustrated by this article. Shin has been known to invite audience members on stage to literally smash their heirlooms and knick-knacks to bits, then share a story in a little bit of show and tell. As anyone can imagine, it must be a cathartic and liberating experience as any, and it sure makes for a memorable literary event.

Come see Ann Shin at Thin Air's mainstage event "Changing the Family Channel" on Tuesday, September 24, and listen in on a discussion on letting go of objects with Cassie Stocks, Lauren B. Davis, and Andrew Kaufman.

Where Everybody Knows Your Name

By Dave Williamson

Thin Air's own Sam Malone, Dave Williamson.

As an insatiable book reader, I look forward to the festival for at least three reasons: to learn about good new books, to hear samples from them read by the authors themselves, and to meet the ones I like and have them autograph their books for me. It's terrific to have so many writers showcased in a single week.

I like to volunteer at the festival to get an even closer look. There's a great feeling of camaraderie (especially when you're tending bar), taking part in the celebration of books with other book lovers, and helping books to continue to be a major part of our cultural lives.

And then there's the daunting, humbling, but ultimately rewarding experience of being one of the featured readers, as I was last year. I love the mainstage venue: spacious and intimate at the same time. You're literally in the spotlight -- a star for fifteen minutes -- with the audience, your potential readers, so attentive, reacting directly, letting you have the last word.


Dave Williamson is the author of Dating: A Novel and was a feature reader at last year's Thin Air mainstage event, "New Scripts For Love".

Restlessness and Wanderlust

By Genni Gunn

Genni Gunn: writer and world traveler.

My new book is a departure from my other work, in that it is creative nonfiction – a combination of travel/memoir. I have been travelling all my life, and have rows upon rows of travel journals. While I have used many of my travels as the backdrop to short stories or novels, I felt compelled to write about some of those journeys as my experiences, without the filter of fictional drama.

As I accumulated these stories, I began to think about my fascination with travel, with movement, and while sorting through the mass of stories to include in Tracks, I began to realize how much my childhood experiences have shaped my wanderlust.

When I think of travel, I don’t think of destinations, I think of movement, of assuaging restlessness, of being rootless, as immigrants are, always reaching for that elusive imagined home, like trying to catch a mirage on a hot desert highway, the illusion shimmering and enticing.

Travel for me is a comfortable state, a detachment from the trappings of a physical place. It’s the motion I crave, the to-and-fro, taking flight and landing, going to cities or countries, towards new landscapes and emotional terrains, because when one travels, the unknown awaits to be discovered — about one’s self, about others, about one’s relationship to time and place.

Sometimes, I travel to explore new landscapes, the sea, the sky, the natural world a perfect metaphor for memory, for (e)motions, for relationships, for all that is in endless motion and change. Nature is organic and as close to perfect in its properties as anything could be. In the intricate design of a leaf or a tree trunk is art and architecture, texture and colour; in any living thing is the constant metamorphosing, the visible stages of birth, life and death, evident within a moment, or a season, or a month or a year. All life, a three-stage play of beginning, middle and end. I leave home, I travel, I return.

And if I stay away long enough, on my return, home reappears slightly altered, discordant, a melody played in the wrong key. For a while, I feel unsettled — the city louder, greyer, the people strange. I long for solitude and open spaces, recreating myself elsewhere in memory, until slowly I settle into the busyness of my city life.

Sometimes I travel to enter a state of alienation — not as flights to and from anything, nor as quests, but as journeys into the unexpected, through which even the ordinary becomes extraordinary, as if an opaque film has been removed from my eyes, rendering my vision more acute. In Sittwe, outside my window, a tree heavy with hanging fruit bats appears miraculous, as if it had borne the breathing creatures that cling to its branches until dark; scarlet lava flowing into the sea in a thunderhead of vapour in Hawaii is a sharp reminder of the earth’s fearsome power. In the hills of Myanmar, I jump to safety when water buffalo approach, then realize they are afraid of me. Nothing is what it seems, my perceptions in continual flux. Motion is my aphrodisiac: the possibility of discovery versus the claustrophobia of continuity. The unknown, a constant attraction/distraction.

Because my sister was living in Myanmar, my travels there in the years before the election were not only an opportunity to reconnect with her, but also to visit a country closed to the outside world for decades, to glimpse the evolving political landscape and the effects of events that led up to the election of 2010. These were journeys into the foreign, into uncertainty, into mystery — the antithesis of our media-saturated, technological, reality-TV, public artifice. In Myanmar, my sister and I remembered our child selves, and recounted who we were, mixing and matching our memories, as if to rediscover each other.

To Italy, I travel often, because Italy, for me, is a return to the echoes of childhood — both familiar and foreign — a mythical home: a ghost town I populate with the memories of those who knew me then, their version of me more palpable than my version of myself. Each return leads me to a slightly altered place, a fata morgana of hilltop towns and cliffs toppling into the sea, of experiences distorted and magnified, unlike the ones fixed inside the snow-globe of memory.


Genni Gunn is an author, musician, and translator. See her read from Tracks at the Thin Air "Forewords" event, and compete in the Haiku Deathmatch on Saturday, September 21 at the Free Press Cafe.