Mark Sampson Writers in Residence Archives
Mark Sampson is the author of the novels Off Book, Sad Peninsula, and The Slip, as well as a short-story collection, The Secrets men Keep, and a poetry collection, Weathervane. He has published fiction and poetry in literary journals across Canada. Mark lives in Toronto.
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May 24, 2018
In Praise of … Reading Widely
I wonder if other writers feel a particular dread I sometimes get when I’m working on a new story or poem. It happens when an idea, or an approach, or a certain trope comes into my mind, one that suddenly ...
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May 21, 2018
In Praise of … Performing Your Work
A passion for public speaking, for public performance, has been with me even longer than the passion for writing. I trace it back to when I won a public speaking competition as an elementary school student ...
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May 17, 2018
In Praise of … Writing Manuals
Writing cannot be taught. It’s a phrase I hear a lot, and I totally get the sentiment. Writers sometimes want to believe that what they do on the page is pure magic, and some people have the gift and ...
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May 14, 2018
In Praise of … Rewriting. No, Actual Rewriting
Everybody says to do it. No matter where my writing life has taken me, the message, the orthodoxy, the shibboleth, has always been the same. Journalism profs have said it. Writing manuals spell it out ...
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May 10, 2018
In Praise of … Celebrating Success
Ours is a household that celebrates everything. Each year my wife and I mark the following occasions: the anniversary of our first date (March 19 – she gets roses, and we go back to the restaurant where ...
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May 07, 2018
In Praise of … Book Reviewing
I still remember where and when I got into the book-reviewing racket. It was the late 1990s in Halifax, about a year after I graduated with my journalism degree from the University of King’s College. ...
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May 01, 2018
In Praise of … Routine
So my first column was all about generosity, and now I’m going to tell you about one of the least generous things I’ve ever thought in the presence of another human being. It happened maybe a dozen ...
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April 25, 2018
In Praise of … Generosity
I’ve been told I sometimes need to tone it down in the hospitality department when entertaining company at our place. I am told this by my wife, acclaimed novelist and short story writer Rebecca Rosenblum, ...