On Tour Blog
April 25, 2009
I’d wanted to post this nearly a week ago, but was stymied first by waiting for information and then by computer difficulties. Tonight (April 25), I’m looking forward to meeting many other people in the BC literary community and seeing my tour-mates again.
On Saturday, April 18, the northern tour traveled to Prince Rupert from Terrace, narrow waterfalls plunging down the sheer rock-face to our right and mountains looming over the water to our left. Bryan started us rolling to Glenn Gould and moved on once again to such gems as “My Baby Loves a Bunch of Authors” (just one good line: “spilled some dressing/on Doris Lessing”). Fortunately, we spilled no dressing – everything was too delicious – at lunch at the Cow Bay Café on the Prince Rupert waterfront. It was a privilege to give our readings at the Museum of the North there, in a room full of First Nations artifacts, with floor-to-ceiling windows through which we could glimpse eagles circling. One of the highlights of this whole trip, for me, was watching Katarina read her story, The King Has Goat Ears, to an eager audience of both children and adults. One young girl was so excited she stood up nearly the whole time, trying to peer at the pages while Katarina imitated the voices of King Boyan and his apprentice barber, Igor.
Afterwards, we had a chance to chat with audience members and the museum director and designer, then tour the exhibits. This museum, the director told me, has been identified as one of the best in BC, along with UBC’s Museum of Anthropology and the Royal British Columbian Museum in Victoria. If anyone is anywhere near Prince Rupert, I hope they’ll visit.
At our final convivial dinner in Terrace that night we were joined by a local author, Brenda Silsbe. I thought how lucky I had been to tour with a group of writers I liked so much and whose work I admired too – at various times on the road, we were all studying each other’s books in the van, discussing characters in Robin’s, the theme and humor in Katarina’s, learning more about the cast and setting in Margaret’s. We were so lucky as well to have such a collected yet mellow chaperone in Bryan, who attended to every responsibility so cheerfully. Thank you again to my fellow authors; to our valiant guide; to the teachers and librarians I met at the secondary schools where Margaret and I read (including Geoff Parr, Al Lehmann, Robin MacLeod, Andrew Williams, Dave Durrant, Jack Law, Teresa Monkman, and Valerie Kilbey); to several writers who introduced themselves to me along the way (Howard Smith, a Haisla poet from Kitimaat, and Gillian Wigmore, Barbara Coupé, and Darcy Ingraham, poets from Prince George); to the students (among them, Adrien Hills in Smithers); to bookstore owners and staff (we all enjoyed meeting Linda and Ken Pitzel at Book Masters in Kitimat); and to all the readers who welcomed us so generously.
Filed under: Northern BC 2009 |
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April 24, 2009
I have been on the road with three great writers: historian Stephen Bown, poet Karen Hofmann, and all around journalist/writer and wise-man Andreas Schroeder. Yesterday, Andreas and I arrived at Vernon Secondary School for what we thought would be a session with a senior writing class. When we arrived, we discovered that a glitch in the students’ schedule made this plan impossible, but that a group of grade-eight students were available.
Okay, we were up for anything, but we felt slightly disappointed, as if we had lost our star students. I imagined we would be imposing upon some 14-year-olds, who probably had better things to do and little interest in our tales of being writers. I prepared for the rolling eyeballs.
When we arrived at the classroom, a large sign on the door announced: “DETENTION ROOM”
Oh, dear. Now we felt certain we would be a flop. Andreas muttered about getting the “Group W bench.”
Teacher Michael Allen greeted us at the door with a welcome smile. I asked if this was the detention class, and was thrilled to discover, no, this was a grade-eight English class. The students reflected the bell curve of personalities, from hip to goth, jock to bookworm. We were used to delivering our stories, reading a bit from our books, and opening the session to questions, but we had discovered that pulling questions from the high school students posed a challenge. We had gradually shortened the questions period.
However, as soon as we began to speak, we realized we were in an inspired learning environment. We could hardly say a word without two or three hands shooting up, students challenging our statements or asking a probing question.
“Has writing changed your life?” a punkish girl wanted to know. “What is it like when people write mean reviews or say mean things about your book?” a dishevelled boy asked. We were in new territory.
Andreas and I abandoned our usual routine and spent the hour answering questions: “What’s the difference between novels and history? Aren’t novels also about real people?” Well, yes. “Don’t people make things up even in non-fiction books?” Uh, yeah, some do. “How do you create characters?” Steal from real life.
“Did you ever write a short story just because you didn’t have enough to say to write a novel or a whole book?”
“Do you keep a journal? Does this help you write?”
These inquiring young minds kept us engaged for an hour, and we felt genuinely sorry to have to depart. We carried on in the library with several students and teacher-librarian Mark Bendall.
We sat at the computers and discussed the reliability of the Internet versus print media. We all agreed that it’s a toss-up. Misinformation exists everywhere. Check your sources. Don’t trust “experts” until you can confirm what they claim. Mark Bendall pointed out that Wikipedia is a great source, but he encourages his students to use it as a starting point for deeper research.
I don’t know what they’re doing at Vernon Secondary School, but they appear to have created an environment in which students love to learn. That may be the greatest gift of education.
At Vernon Secondary School
At Mount Baker Secondary School in Cranbrook
Filed under: Southern BC 2009 (Kootenays & Okanagan) |
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April 24, 2009
Questions.
Posted by Andreas Schroeder
The students—especially the writing students—are asking lots of them. How long does it take to write a book? Does anyone really care what you write? How can you make a living as a writer? What can you do if you’re attacked, belittled, dumped on? And how do you really know if you’ve got what it takes to be a writer? They’re not all serious, these questions, but the ones that are can be heart-breaking. They can take you right back to the same place, decades ago, when you asked those same questions yourself. How to put half a lifetime of that struggle into a two-minute answer? And even if you could, would it be a good idea?
It’s easy to forget how tenuous and unpredictable their position might be or feel, these eager and anxious kids, poised on the crossroads of so many possible directions, trying to make what might well be the most serious decision of their lives, usually based on less reliable information than what underpins most disaster-prone marriages.
So how much do we tell them?
Do we tell them that the competition to publish in today’s print media is many times more fierce than it was three decades ago? Do we mention that BC Bookworld’s author index currently lists over 8,000 authors in B.C. alone? Do we admit that the fees for magazine articles in Canada are lower today than they were as far back as 1970?
How much in the way of such hard facts should one dump on budding young writers at this stage in their development? Would truth of this kind have derailed me all those years ago when I asked those same questions (but didn’t have access to a touring author to vet the answers)?
I put this to my fellow touring authors on our drive from Nelson to Vernon yesterday. It led to an animated and wide-ranging discussion. Rex felt that it was important to urge these kids to follow their passions—regardless the cost. Though, being a practical freelancer, he also emphasized developing a back-up talent—something to fall back on during lean times, or as a part-time cash generator alongside an unpredictable writing career. Karen recalled that as a creative writing student she was overwhelmed by warnings of the impossibility of making a living as a fulltime writer, and would have appreciated a more encouraging perspective. After all, there are a lot of different ways to skin that cat. Stephen felt there was no reason to varnish the facts, but made a distinction between encouraging students to write and encouraging them to write for a living. He always urges kids who are contemplating the latter to find themselves a niche in the field, and to develop their talents in that area with relentless resolve—something, I note, he’s done with admirable success himself.
There’s probably no single all-purpose answer to this question, unless one wants to fall back on a totally Darwinian, laissez-faire approach. And that—on a brightly sunlit day, in a classroom full of enthusiastic, optimistic and brashly inquisitive young writer wannabes, seems just a bit too categorical for any of us.
With Mark Bendall at Vernon Secondary
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April 24, 2009
One of my favourite cities in BC, and very conducive to writing.
Filed under: Southern BC 2009 (Kootenays & Okanagan) |
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April 24, 2009
The audience for the Nelson Public Library reading was a great pleasure to read to! Obviously great support for the arts. It’s so gratifying to read poetry or fiction to an audience that interacts, laughs, groans, etc. along with you.
Filed under: Southern BC 2009 (Kootenays & Okanagan) |
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April 23, 2009
Another busy day of driving today and talking today. I’m amazed how tiring it can be. The school in Vernon was fantastic. The kids were really keen with endless numbers of great questions that kept both Karen and I talking and reading. One student asked several unusual and off-topic questions about zombies and I replied that the only zombie I knew was myself when I hadn’t had my morning coffee yet, but I don’t think he appreciated the joke. I would say that visiting the schools has been just a fantastic experience.
There is one hilarious event that has to be mentioned. It happened yesterday (I think, time seems very fluid on tour). We were discussing Readers Digest and how they like to edit everything in half - Andreas was telling a story of how he once wrote for them. They told him that he was getting the best editing in the world and that people love it that way, really condensed - or something like that. Bryan then quipped that he really enjoyed their novels, the Tale of One City and the Two Musketeers. Very witty, as they say. Tomorrow Kelowna and Vernon.
With students at Pinewood Elementary and their research projects on Captain George Vancouver
Filed under: Southern BC 2009 (Kootenays & Okanagan) |
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April 22, 2009
We’ve been uploading lots of photos to our Flickr Photostream over the past week and a half. There are lots of Northern tour photos, and here are some great ones from the Southern tour:
Rex reading to the students
Rex and Andreas talking with students after the reading
Filed under: Southern BC 2009 (Kootenays & Okanagan) |
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April 22, 2009
In Trail we spoke at JL Webster Elementary to a group of mostly grade 7 students, with some grade 5 and 6 students. Grade sevens were knowledgeable about poetry terms (persona, alliteration), and didn’t ask to know the name of the cat. The teachers attending were enthusiastic writers as well, and contributed greatly to the event.
We had the afternoon between readings to explore Trail, and I spent some time on the river walk, enjoying the mallards and Barrows goldeneye on the Columbia River, and the swallows above it. The temperature was 30 degrees. (But one swallow - or even a small flock - does not a summer make; the forecast is for snow Thursday…)
At the really wonderful Cornerstone Cafe in Warfield for a reading in the evening; a local writing group came. It sounds like the West Kootenays has a flourishing literary community.
Filed under: Southern BC 2009 (Kootenays & Okanagan) |
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April 22, 2009
Stephen and I talked to a group of grade 4-6 children at Pinewood Elementary, These kids had lots of good questions, and participated enthusiastically in poetry exercises. All wanted to know the name of the cat in the poem “Skewed” At the public library reading, a chic German woman told me that she enjoyed my reading, but couldn’t get her head around poems that don’t rhyme. I gave her the usual explanations about English not being rich in rhyming words (as compared for eg to German) and about the rise of Modernism in the first part of the 20th century. She agreed that the world had “come apart” during WW I, and said she could see how the social and political disintegration could change the form of poetry. I hope that Ursula will find a century of new poetry opening up for her now!
Filed under: Southern BC 2009 (Kootenays & Okanagan) |
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April 21, 2009
We’ve been on tour for a few days, but we’ve been getting get back to the hotel so late that I’ve been too tired to write until now.
I’m so glad I was able to join the BC Book Prizes author tour. My fellow authors Karen, Rex and Andreas, and our intrepid guide Bryan, have been so interesting and entertaining that hours of driving have just melted away and I feel like I’m at an extended dinner party with intelligent and witty companions.The beautiful scenery doesn’t hurt either. I’m familiar with the Kootenays, I love being here, and yet giving our tour talks has added a new dimension to my appreciation for the region. We’ve enjoyed fantastic meals in Nelson and Trail and chatted with interesting and curious people at the events. Sure is hard work! Actually its tiring being on the road for so many hours each day.
I have to admit that talking at the schools for me has been eye-opening and very rewarding. I’ve never visited schools before to give talks because my books are written for adults. My own two kids, Andrew aged 6 and Clara aged 5 (in a few days) are too young to have any real interest in what I write about. But these students, some of whom I believe are studying explorers and George Vancouver in grade five or six, are very attentive and ask the greatest questions. A student at Pinewood Elementary in Cranbrook asked me how exactly we know what illness Vancouver suffered from since he’s dead. Great question! We don’t know anything in history absolutely, of course, but just asking the question is the first step to finding out as much of the truth as we can.
In Trail this afternoon, at J.L. Webster Elementary, a student wanted to know, when I mentioned that Vancouver sailed from London to Pacific America, what was the route by which he sailed around the world. After the talk the students clustered around Karen and I for autographs - I never knew I was so famous ! 
Filed under: Southern BC 2009 (Kootenays & Okanagan) |
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