Showing posts with label black moss press. Show all posts
Showing posts with label black moss press. Show all posts

Monday, September 24, 2012

Press Release: Writing Salon with Marty Gervais

     
     
     
    “THE WRITING SALON” WITH MARTY GERVAIS

    Every other Monday starting Monday September 24th at the Arts Council Windsor Region starting at 5:30pm. 

    “The Writing Salon” is an opportunity for both established and aspiring writers to meet and workshop their work in a productive setting under the guidance of Windsor writer and publisher Marty Gervais. This is sponsored by the Resident Writing program at the University of Windsor in partnership with the Arts Council Windsor and Region. Writers are asked to bring 
    one or two pages of poetry or prose, but not exceeding 750 words (fiction or non-fiction).

    It is suggested that writers bring multiple copies (7 to 10 copies) of these works so they can be distributed to other workshop members. This program is free of charge and runs every two weeks. Writers will gain knowledge of how to improve their work, and details about editing and publishing. The sessions are held between 5:30 and 7 p.m. every two weeks beginning Sept. 24 at the Arts Council Windsor Region Office (Artspeak Gallery) 1942 Wyandotte St. W., Windsor.

    BIO

    Marty Gervais is an award winning journalist, poet, playwright, historian, photographer and editor. In 2011, he was nominated as the City of Windsor’s first Poet Laureate, and runs a Poet Laureate’s Blog.

    In 1998, he won the prestigious Toronto’s Harbourfront Festival Prize for his contributions to Canadian letters and to emerging writers. In 1996, he was awarded the Milton Acorn People’s Poetry Award for his book, Tearing Into A Summer Day. That book also was awarded the City of Windsor Mayor’s Award for literature. In 2003, Gervais was given City of Windsor Mayor’s Award for literature for To Be Now: Selected Poems.

    As a writer, he has written more than a dozen books of poetry, two plays and a novel. His most successful work, The Rumrunners, a book about the Prohibition period was a Canadian bestseller in 1980 and was re-released in an expanded format in 2010 and was on the top ten Globe and Mail bestseller list for non-fiction titles. Another book, Seeds In The Wilderness (a collection of essays with Quarry Press/General Publishing) stemmed from interviews he conducted with such notable religious leaders as Mother Theresa, Bishop Desmond Tutu, Hans Kung and Terry Waite. With this latter book, Gervais photographed many of these world leaders.

    Gervais received his M.A. in Creative Writing under the supervision of Morley Callaghan. He is founder of Black Moss Press, one of Canada’s oldest literary publishing firms, and is managing editor of The Windsor Review



Press Release: Having Words; Art Talks with Marty Gervais

HAVING WORDS; ART TALKS WITH Marty Gervais, Windsor’s Poet Laureate. This new monthly series brings together writers who will read and talk about their work with Marty Gervais at ArtSpeak Gallery. The series is intended to promote informal discussion about the craft of writing, exploring the challenges and joys related to poetry. The event to be held on Thursdays is free. It begins at 7 p.m. The event is sponsored in part by the Poet Laureate program of the Cultural Affairs Office of the City of Windsor and the English Department at the University of Windsor.

Saturday, April 14, 2012

Review: Touch the Dead by Mary Ann Mulhern



The grave digger's daughter, former nun, and present poet Mary Ann Mulhern shares her peculiar childhood in this collection of poems inspired by growing up in a graveyard in the 1940s. Mary Ann, from St.Thomas, Ontario, now lives in Windsor. Her poems have appeared in Tower, the Windsor Review, Room of One's Own, and Windfall.

Touch the Dead was short-listed for the Acorn-Plantos award in 2007, an award for Canadian poetry written with accessible language and imagery. The poems in this collection are directly inspired by the poet's memories of her childhood, experiences reflected and transformed into strikingly moving images. The language is intimate and narrative. Each short poem tells the story by drawing the reader into a moment from years ago. Coming to terms with mortality, but also the co-existence of life with death run through the poems making the collection very engaging.

'Root Cellar' by Mary Ann Mulhern from Touch the Dead

My father digs a root cellar
deeper than a grave
Earth takes back her harvest
apples, potatoes, turnips and squash
Seeds still alive
like a woman whose
buried children turned to ghosts
while they still had breath and eyes
to beg for sustenance
Apples for a Sunday pie
potatoes for a stew
turnips and squash streaming in a pot
Sweet resurrection

Touch the Dead and other works by Mary Ann Mulhern are published by Black Moss Press and available from Amazon.ca.