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Staff Selections: Ellis Iyomahan
The resident IT expert at Play de Record and owner of Studizzy Productions recently sat down with me to talk DJing, music, and life. Born in Oslo, Norway, to Nigerian parents, Iyomahan has been living in Toronto for the past four years, and has produced tracks for the likes of Susie Kylie, Jhyve, and the late…
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Can’t go home no more: An interview with Chris Williams, editor of The Richard Burton Diaries
Forty-two years after Richard Burton played to Toronto audiences in John Gielgud’s Hamlet during its pre-Broadway run, Swansea professor of Welsh History and former director of the Richard Burton Centre for the Study of Wales Chris Williams was in town to promote The Richard Burton Diaries (Yale University Press, 2012). The book is his edition…
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Diplomacy in the doghouse: Dachshund UN
I am a fully grown adult. At 24 years of age, I read heavy books, pay taxes, drink whiskey and, when called upon, can grow a very serious beard. Even so, I have absolutely no immunity to wiener dogs. I find them highly adorable. In their presence, my insides go all fluttery. I make noises along…
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Food pairs, podcasts and the Game of Thrones cookbook: Bookishness for Mar. 4, 2013
Point 1: Be okay with chaos The 12 trends that will rule products in 2013. Dinner is coming Recipes from the official Game of Thrones companion cookbook (including Dothraki blood pie). Pantone Pairings Still hungry? Check out David Schwen’s food #pantonepairings on Instagram. (Then, you know, eat something.) Gamify Your Life EveryThing gamifies everything! Did you just wake…
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#ManuscriptZoo: Erik Kwakkel’s menagerie
Last Friday paleographer Erik Kwakkel charmed thousands of book and animal lovers on Twitter with hourly pics of creatures in medieval manuscripts. Here’s his #ManuscriptZoo. [View the story “Erik Kwakkel’s #ManuscriptZoo” on Storify]
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Freedom to Read Week in Toronto: A guide
Though some of you will no doubt choose to celebrate Freedom to Read week in Toronto by exercising your freedom to stay home and read (for which we would never fault you), the week of Feb. 24-Mar. 2, 2013, does promise a thrilling roster of events about censorship and books to draw you out of…
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Sheet music, Sriracha, and the Harry Potter Alliance: Bookishness for Feb. 25, 2013
Pencils, penises, pigeons, goblins, Hitler, and tea cosies What will be the oddest book title of the year? An army of fans, activists, nerdfighters, teenagers, wizards and muggles: fighting with love “Did you ever wish Harry Potter was real? Well it kind of is.” Join the Harry Potter Alliance and fight for social justice. Soooooo…
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Hope at life’s end: Michael Haneke’s Amour
Reviewed in this Essay: Amour. Written and Directed by Michael Haneke. Starring Jean-Louis Trintignant, Emmanuele Riva, and Isabelle Huppert. Running time: 127 minutes. Mainstream cinema often treats death with cosmic reverence or ignores it altogether, but Michael Haneke’s Amour forces its viewers to confront mortality, as intimately and physically as possible. The film is nominated for five Academy…
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Office patois: Business language and what it means to speak it
Ah, business language. It is a concept that gets more interesting the longer you consider it. Native to the office environment, it is a linguistic transition that individuals in a professional setting just automatically consent to as a group. They engage in a mass translation of simple everyday thoughts into a jumbled creation of formal…
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Hatchet jobs, Toronto Talks, and authors becoming subjects: Bookishness for Feb. 19, 2013
The Subjects Take four artists, add four scientists, subtract a bunch of sleep = this. “The prize is a year’s supply of potted shrimp” 2013’s Hatchet Job of the Year awarded to Camilla Long for her review of Aftermath, by Rachel Cusk. “Ambitious participatory event” alert “On Wednesday, February 20, Authors at Harbourfront Centre will…
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Canada Reads 2013: And the winner is…
It was the last day of Canada Reads 2013, the last chance for actor Jay Baruchel and comedian Trent McLellan to pitch their chosen books as the one all Canadians should have on their nightstands. And at 10:53 am, after a lively and sometimes venomous debate, the winner was declared: February, by Lisa Moore. “I…
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Canada Reads 2013: Debate Day 3
And we’re down to the last pair! After the third day of Canada Reads 2013, only Two Solitudes and February remain in contention for the big prize. Indian Horse, an audience darling and the early favourite to win, was voted out today, leaving Jay Baruchel and Trent McLellan to duke it out tomorrow in this…