VERSeFest: Ottawa’s International Poetry Festival (our rebuilding year) fundraiser : the home stretch,

Be aware that there are only two weeks left in the VERSeFest fundraiser, as part of the grand rebuilding year for VERSeFest: Ottawa’s International Poetry Festival! It’s amazing to realize we’re already at seventy percent of our target, and we’ve received an enormous amount of support and assistance, which is very much appreciated. Thank you to everyone who has offered support!

There are still plenty of poetry manuscript consultations available, including with Madeleine Stratford, Otoniya J. Okot Bitek, rob mclennan, Jérôme Melançon (in English/French), ryan fitzpatrick (for a chapbook-length work) and Stephen Collis (for a full-length poetry manuscript!). Here is your chance to get manuscript consultations some of the best working poets in Canada!

A number of book perks have already gone, but we’ve just added two copies of Nicole Markotić latest poetry collection (signed), books by Ottawa poet Frances Boyle and Vancouver poet Renée Sarojini Saklikar, and there are still signed copies of a limited edition hardcover by Montreal poet and critic Erín Moure! As well, there are numerous book bundles of donated titles by Metatron Press, Book*hug Press, Apt. 9 Press (including a very cool William Hawkins Bundle), Nightwood Editions, Gordon Hill Press, Véhicule Press, Coach House, Invisible Publishing, New Star Books, Anstruther Press and a set of the Arc Poetry Magazine ArcAngels (broadsides by Sylvia Legris, Susan Musgrave and Monty Reid, produced for Arc patrons; designed and produced for Arc Poetry Magazine by Christine McNair).

And watch for information soon on our spring festival : March 21-24, 2024! Some of the poets confirmed include Anita Lahey, Monty Reid,  nina jane drystek, MayaSpoken, Amanda Earl, DS Stymiest, Madeleine Stratford, Sneha Madhaven-Reese, Jaclyn Pudiuk, Chris Turnbull, Mark Goldstein, Sandra Ridley, AJ Dolman, Myriam Legault-Beauregard, Nduka Otiono, Klara du Plessis and Khashayar Mohammadi. That sounds pretty cool, doesn’t it?

the VERSeFest fundraiser is live!

the VERSeFest fundraiser is live! to officially launch our rebuilding year, check out perks including an in-person poetry workshop with Stephen Brockwell! manuscript consultations with Madeleine Stratford, Otoniya J. Okot Bitek, Sandra Ridley, Stephen Collis, ryan fitzpatrick, Stephanie Bolster and Annick MacAskill! books, chapbooks and magazine subscriptions! and more to come!

2023 Ottawa Promise Walk for Preeclampsia : Sunday, Sept. 10

We are thrilled to be hosting our 4th Promise Walk for Preeclampsia Canada in Ottawa! The Promise Walk for Preeclampsia™ began in 2005 by our sister organization, Preeclampsia Foundation. These walk events have raised millions of dollars to fund research and improve health care practices globally.

Preeclampsia affects 5-8% of all pregnancies and approximately 10 million mothers will develop preeclampsia across the world each year, yet according to the World Health Organization (WHO), preeclampsia is one of the least funded areas of research. We need your help to realize our vision of a world where preeclampsia no longer threatens the lives of mothers and babies. Please join us!

Register for a walk here or donate today by following this link. Registration is FREE. We encourage you to start your team today!

Event Details:
DATE: Sunday, Sept. 10th, 2023
Location: Terry Fox Athletic Facility, 2960 Riverside Drive, Ottawa, ON, K1V 8N4

Timeline of events:
8:30-9:00 am Registration & Resource Fair Opens
9:00am Welcoming remarks
9:30 am Warm up
10:15am Moment of Silence
10:45am Closing remarks and Prize Draw
11-12pm Take down

Walk Chairs: Christine McNair & Karin McNair
E-mail: ottawa@preeclampsiacanada.ca

the above/ground press 30th anniversary fundraiser!

Across the thirty years-to-date of my poetry chapbook publisher above/ground press (b. July 9, 1993) I’ve worked hard to engage with numerous threads of literary activity, from multiple elements of poetic form (prose poems, long poems, visual poems, lyric forms, etcetera) to different geographies and communities, and a whole slew of individual writers across North American and beyond in their ongoing works. Centred in the Ottawa literary community, above/ground press publishes single-author poetry chapbooks as well as a handful of ongoing journals (Touch the Donkey [a small poetry journal], GUEST [a journal of guest editors] and The Peter F. Yacht Club), and has published chapbook debuts alongside works by award-winning authors and produced works in translation and collaborative efforts, running the gamut between wildly experimental works and more traditional forms. Last year, above/ground press started producing a series of festschrifts, celebrating the works of individual poets from across North America, attempting to find a spark of positive throughout the weight of the Covid-era.

The very nature of chapbook publishing is both ephemeral and immediate, and able to take a particular kind of risk that almost refuses anything commercial. Unfortunately, of course, publishing is an expensive enterprise, and subscriptions alone provide far less than half of publishing costs. I’ve long resisted increasing my subscription rates, precisely due to not wishing to outprice anyone who wishes to engage with the work.

While the pandemic years managed with roughly the same amount of annual above/ground press subscribers overall, the press saw severely reduced individual sales, as well as wiping out in-person readings and small press fair possibilities (from the ottawa small press book fair to Toronto’s Meet the Presses), so there hasn’t been the same ability to replenish the financial coffers to feed back into production. My personal Public Lending Rights and Access Copyright monies have also fed directly into the press, but it still hasn’t been enough to not worry about how one might keep the lights on. Given the enormous backlist the press holds, much of which is still in print (although half of the titles I’m listing include some of the final copies), I thought this might be an opportunity to offer a series of curated packages of titles, many of which highlight a variety of threads the press has deliberately attended.

Fully aware that chapbook publishing, especially poetry chapbook publishing, is inherently a not-for-profit enterprise, I’d like to keep moving forward, otherwise I might have to seriously reassess how best to keep publishing, if at all.

A whole slew of available chapbook bundles of experimental writing have been posted or shall be soon, including Ottawa Poets, Brooklyn Poets, Bay Area Poets, Canadian Surrealists, Canadian Minimalists, Canadian Long Poems,  language poets, collaborative projects, visual poetries, translation bundles, Toronto Poets, Vancouver Poets, prose poems, Montreal Poets, chapbook debuts, Philadelphia Poets, Kingston Poets, prose chapbooks and Chicago Poets, as well as various bundles featuring the works of Jessica Smith, Jason Christie, Derek Beaulieu, Phil Hall, Ken Norris, Julia Drescher, Sarah Mangold, Stephanie Bolster, Amanda Earl, Hugh Thomas, Amish Trivedi, rob mclennan, etcetera. There will probably be others.

The goals for this fundraiser are to keep going. Check out the campaign at the link here.

Support The Capilano Review's Kickstarter!

Save The Capilano Review! Check out their clever video for their Kickstarter, and all their magnificent perks! Send something, if you are able.

As they write: "The Capilano Review is re-inventing itself as an independent magazine in a Vancouver office. Help us launch our new venture!

'When reading TCR, one knows that literature and art are alive.' — Nicole Brossard

The Capilano Review is a literary and art magazine that for 43 years has published acclaimed writers and artists, fascinating interviews, pithy essays, and stunning visual sections, along with hosting readings, workshops, writers-in-residence, and more. We’ve done all this while housed at Capilano University, but we are soon to be cut adrift from Cap U—a loss of $85,000 per year to our operating budget. Despite this drastic cut, we are determined to continue! We plan to move into Vancouver as an independent magazine with an unchanged commitment to the avant-garde in the contemporary arts. We need your help launching our new office and our first independent issues!"

help Arc poetry magazine put poetry in classrooms!

Arc - putting poetry in classrooms

Arc poetry magazine is fundraising to put poetry into classrooms. Check the link here, and possibly help them out!

Arc's new issue is a special issue of poetry for children and youth. You can help us put new Canadian poetry into the hands of young readers across the country.

We are all born with a love of language, a passion for expression and creativity. Babies babble, entertaining themselves with language. But as we get older, many people feel less free to play with words and lose touch with their creative impulses.

Teachers recognize the role poetry can have as a catalyst for unleashing students’ natural interest in language and encouraging their creativity and self-expression. But Canadian schools are constrained by limited budgets and limited time for developing new poetry resources.

That is why Arc Poetry Magazine put together a special issue of poetry for children and youth. And now you can help us put this unique Canadian poetry collection into the hands of young readers across the country.

We’re packing up class sets of our special kids issue, adding ready-to-use lesson plans and teacher resources, and sending Poetry-in-a-Box out to a network of talented teachers across the country that are standing by to bring contemporary, Canadian poetry into their students' lives.

Arc Poetry Magazine is an award-winning magazine that offers the best in Cana­dian poetry and criticism. For over 30 years, Arc has been bringing great poetry to readers in Canada and beyond. Now, Arc’s special issue for children and young readers is here, featuring a diverse and exciting assembly of new and established Canadian poets, including work by Robert Priest, Anne Szumigalski, Barbara Nickel, Paul Tyler, and many others.

And we need your help to put it in the hands of young readers!

“There’s kind of a black hole in grade school,” notes guest editor Jenny Haysom.

“You start with a love of nursery rhymes and cradle songs, and you get less and less as you go through school.” By the time you get to high school and university, poetry appears strange to you, she says. This is the gap we’re trying to fill with our new issue.

Teachers tell us that when young people encounter poetry in school, the results can be magical. Kids who get the right poetry at the right time often make poetry a lifelong companion; but if they miss it, poetry may not find them again.

As Susan Telfer reminds us, “a poem can be a lifeline to a reader.” Whatever we can offer to young people to help them work through their difficult times and connect with creative expression makes all the difference.

“I always wish we had a longer poetry unit in school; we always focus on the older poets . . . there’s just so much out there!” said a Rideau High School student. But as teacher Steve McCormick notes, “if you have to seek it out yourself, it’s overwhelming.”

Join us in bridging that gap! With your support, we can create and deliver Poetry-in-a-Box to Canadian teachers from coast-to-coast, fresh from today’s contemporary poets; adopt a classroom today and help us cultivate the next generation of poets and poetry lovers!

*If you can't donate today, you can help us by sharing the campaign on facebook or twitter (sharing tools on this page), or telling friends, or commenting on the campaign here on IndieGoGo. Thank you!*

While we have your attention, if you're a high-school teacher who wants to be on the receiving end of the Arc poetry-class-in-a-box, raise your hand by emailing classroom@arcpoetry.ca with your shipping details - we'll put you on the list!