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February 08, 2018Debut Poet Mallory Tater on Dionne Brand, Her "Almost" File, & How Poems End
Mallory Tater's debut collection of poetry This Will be Good (Book*hug) delves into the push and pull between the feminine body and disordered eating - not only the tension and pain of that experience, ...
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October 26, 2020You, Too, Can Be a Mediocre YouTube Star
A few fun facts about me: When I was about five-years-old, I starred as Dopey in a production of Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs at camp and killed it. Everyone was laughing. I also studied improv for ...
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April 12, 2014
Poet for Hire
I heard a few days ago that a colleague did a major job of editing that took the better part of a year to complete for a mere five-hundred dollars. I happen to mention this to a friend who works as a ...
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April 03, 2014
Voice
Maureen McLane’s book, “My Poets,” goes beyond poetics and criticism into a kind of channeling of the poets themselves: her versions of their work, her obsessions with their obsessions. She not ...
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April 23, 2014
More Revision
A friend confesses that he could spend the rest of his life revising a handful of the same poems. One change leads to another. It’s like a glassblower unsure whether to make a swan or a squirrel, the ...
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February 07, 2015
Re: (Whether It Is) Becoming (To Be) a Lady and the Use of the Word in Jamaican Creole (Jc)
News flash! Author copies of my novel, Red Jacket, arrived in the mail yesterday. https://www.dundurn.com/books/... About to post this exploration of the use of the word ‘lady’ in the land of my birth ...
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October 31, 2018
We've always been here
My time here is drawing to a close and I’d like to express great thanks to the Open Book team for inviting me to this space for the past month. It’s been a real pleasure and an immense honour to have ...
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April 17, 2019Creative Life
I was asked to give a keynote address at the launch of the student literary journal, Scarborough Fair at the University of Toronto Scarborough. The theme was “The Creative Life”. As their Writer in ...
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October 26, 2020"Say what?"
“All the information you need can be given in dialogue.” — Elmore LeonardAnytime dialogue carries the story it’s pure joy. Sometimes it’s straight up, other times it’s slippery with manipulation. ...
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September 06, 2019
I Joined a Writing Group and I Liked It
When I moved to Kingston two years ago I was transitioning to the happy stage of life after raising kids that I’d been anticipating for a few years—tidy house! Lower grocery bills! The reality of ...
