some author activity: Dolman, Flemmer, Iijima + Gray,

Anita Dolman has a new essay up at my (small press) writing day; Kyle Flemmer is interviewed over at Touch the Donkey; he also takes over from Nikki Sheppy as Managing Editor of filling Station magazine this April; Brenda Iijima and Wendy Burk have a conversation over at Entropy; and forthcoming above/ground press author, the Brooklyn poet and filmmaker Stephanie Gray, has a poem up in the "Tuesday poem" series over at the dusie blog.

Nikki Sheppy reviews Renée Sarojini’s After the Battle of Kingsway, the Bees— (2016) in filling Station #68

Calgary poet and editor [and Touch the Donkey contributor] Nikki Sheppy provides a new review of Renée Sarojini’s bpNichol Chapbook Award-shortlisted title After the Battle of Kingsway, the Bees— (2016), alongside reviews of new works by Jordan Abel, Helen Hajnoczky and Natalie Lauchlan, in filling Station #68, an issue billed as “the small press issue.” Thanks so much! This is actually the second review of Saklikar’s chapbook, after Scott Bryson was good enough to discuss it over at Broken Pencil. As Sheppy writes:

Bees, not moths, figure in Renée Sarojini Saklikar’s butter-coloured chapbook, After the Battle of Kingsway, the Bees— from above/ground press. The 15-page suite is an excerpt from volume 2 of Saklikar’s ongoing long work about place and identity, thecanadaproject—from which her first book, Children of Air India, un/authorized exhibits and interjections, also draws.

Set on Vancouver’s Kingsway, the poem suite sidles back and forth between the floral homeland of bees and urban scenes of protest and assembly, curiously counterpoising natural and built habitats: “Blackberry, buttercup, fireweed, / hairycat’s ear, thistle // of demonstrations.” Probing issues of housing, Saklikar seamlessly moves from Carder bees congregating on clover to demonstrators behind barricades outside Rentalsman, from a bee’s warmed wax cup to abductions and detainees. The contrast is strategic, but gentle, thoughtfully placing a magnifying lens over snatched moments and details.

Her “many genera” moving in the lee of “condo cranes,” or roused to action on the steps of a public building, yearn in solidarity: “O for a hundred thousand / homes we might call to.” Their struggles bend them towards nature’s weedy resilience: “they longed to feed him / larkspur, large-leaved lupine, / wrap him blue weed, viper’s bugloss.” The collection closes with testimony, incarceration, and lament, but also with asylum amidst the cedar and sequoia.

Nikki Sheppy reviews Julia Polyck-O'Neill's Femme (2016) in Arc Poetry Magazine #83

Calgary poet and critic Nikki Sheppy was good enough to post the first review of Julia Polyck-O'Neill's Femme (2016) in the new issue of Arc Poetry Magazine. Thanks so much! You have to pick up a copy of the issue to see the full review, but a fragment of it reads:

In this collection, the room is a feminist forum inhabited by poet Sylvia Plath, conceptual artist Gillian Wearing, literary theorist Hélène Cixous, and postcolonial queer theorist Sara Ahmed, among others. These lines of influence are named and engaged: Polyck O’Neill invokes several titles that absorb her attention: Plath’s “Elm,” Cixous’ Stigmata, and Ahmed’s “Affective Economies.” The effect is to expand the subject, the body and its language to surrounding feminist genealogies, engendering an inquisitive dialogue that is genuinely rhizomatic. In the matter of communication, “Hers is a field model.”

The Factory Reading Series: Paige, Sheppy + Thomas, February 20, 2015

span-o (the small press action network - ottawa) presents:

The Factory Reading Series presents:

Abby Paige (Ottawa)
Nikki Sheppy (Calgary)
+ Hugh Thomas (Fredericton)

lovingly hosted by rob mclennan
Friday, February 20, 2015;
doors 7pm; reading 7:30pm
The Carleton Tavern,
223 Armstrong Street (at Parkdale; upstairs)

Abby Paige is a writer and performer whose work has been published in the US and Canada, recently including Room, Ottawater, Arc, and the Montreal Review of Books. Her chapbook, Other Brief Discourses, was published by Ottawa’s above/ground press in 2013. Abby was born and raised in Northern Vermont, and her solo show, Piecework: When We Were French, explores the legacy of French-Canadian immigration to northern New England. She has toured with the show throughout New England, and it is now available on DVD.

Nikki Sheppy is a poet, editor and arts journalist. She has a doctorate in English literature from the University of Calgary. Her book reviews have appeared in Uppercase Magazine, Alberta Views, and Lemon Hound, and her poetry in Event and Matrix. She serves as President of the Board of filling Station, Calgary’s experimental literary and arts magazine, and is the author of the poetry chapbook, Grrrrlhood: a ludic suite (Kalamalka 2014).

Hugh Thomas is a poet and translator living in Fredericton, where he teaches mathematics at the University of New Brunswick.  His most recent chapbook, Albanian Suite, was published by above/ground press in 2014.  His previous chapbook, Opening the Dictionary, also published by above/ground press, was shortlisted for the 2012 bpNichol chapbook award.

Helen Hajnoczky etc in Calgary: 100 Tender Buttons: a celebration of Gertrude Stein

Sunday, July 27, 2014
7pm
LOFT 112
535 8 Avenue SE, Calgary Alberta T2G 5S9

Montreal poet and above/ground press author Helen Hajnoczky is in Calgary, and she's doing a reading as part of a celebration of Gertrude Stein along with two other above/ground press authors: derek beaulieu and Natalie Simpson. See the facebook invitation here.

2014 is the 100th anniversary of the publication of Gertrude Stein's masterpiece TENDER BUTTONS. Join Calgary's Poet Laureate derek beaulieu on July 27th (the 68th anniversary of Stein's death) as he hosts an evening of poetic responses to Stein's work including readings by Natalie Simpson, Nikki Sheppy, Rachel Shabalin, Anj Fermor and Helen Hajnoczky!