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Dancing a score: Mark Morris Dance Group’s “L’Allegro, il Penseroso ed il Moderato”
Reviewed in this essay: L’Allegro, il Penseroso ed il Moderato, Mark Morris Dance Group, which ran June 2013 at Canadian Stage as part of the Luminato Festival During the most recent Luminato Festival, the Mark Morris Dance Group (MMDG) finally reconnected with Canadian audiences after an absence of nearly two decades. L’Allegro exemplifies Morris’ commitment…
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“Forgive Us Our Trespasses”: A Review of Denis Villeneuve’s Prisoners
Prisoners is the English-language debut from Quebeçois auteur Denis Villeneuve, known for the Oscar nominated film Incendies (2010), as well as Polytechnique (2009), Maelström (2000), and Enemy (2013, which debuted at TIFF this year). Prisoners is an engrossing thriller situated in a small town in America gripped by recession and despair. The film is carefully…
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Remembering Family and Searching for Home: New Books of Note
Much-anticipated, curious, or simply thrilling, here are some new and notable books out this month. Strays by Ed Kavanaugh (Killick Press) — Kavanaugh’s ten short stories revolve around emotional and social vagabonds from all walks of Canadian life. Despite the succinctly despondent title and theme, readers are promised stories told with humour, insight and sensitivity.…
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TRB’s First Print Anthology: On Sale at Word on the Street 2013
We’ve been cooking a book all summer and we’re salivating to announce that our first print anthology, The Toronto Review of Books Tasting Menu: Choice Selections from the First Two Years, is tumbling off the press this week. This Friday, September 20, marks the TRB’s second anniversary. We’re celebrating with this feast of a book…
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Meet bibliotherapists, millionaire librarians, and time traveling photographers: Bookishness for September 16, 2013
A prescription for loneliness “Books that fill you with friends are… great – such as Robert Graves’ I Claudius. And Emil Zola’s Rougon -maquart series, 19 novels, which will fill your mind with an amazing population of characters!” Maclean’s takes a look at bibliotherapy. Millionaire, librarian, and my newest hero An Ohio librarian secretly amassed a…
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Margaret Atwood, The Word on the Street, and The Eden Mills Writers’ Festival: T.O. Events for September 12-26, 2013
Author Lawrence Hill (The Book of Negroes) meets fans and discusses his upcoming Massey Lectures (Blood: The Stuff of Life) at CBC Live at The Toronto International Film Festival. 12:30PM. September 12. 250 Front Street. Free. Need a painting? Itching for a new wardrobe? Does papa (or mama) need a brand new bag? The Liberty…
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CanLit Canon Review #16: Northrop Frye’s The Educated Imagination
In an attempt to make himself a better Canadian, Craig MacBride is reading and reviewing the books that shaped this country. Northrop Frye’s The Educated Imagination is about literature—why we write it, why we read it, why we bother at all—but it’s also about who we vote for and what we buy; it’s about civilization…
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Atwood’s BookTweetables No. 7
Margaret Atwood’s best tweets, every two weeks. [View the story “Atwood’s BookTweetables No. 7” on Storify]
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Advice: Bookishness for September 9, 2013
For coffee nerds of the ages (book nerds, too) Ask the past: How to make instant coffee. Read, read, read “It’s no secret that great writers are great readers, and that if you can’t read, your writing will often suffer. Similarly, if you can read but have to move your lips to get through the…
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(Does it Matter that) Chuck Klosterman Wore Converse to the Gladstone Hotel?
In the Times review of Chuck Klosterman’s latest book, I Wear the Black Hat, the author is described as “the envy of every culture critic who ever tottered home from a Starbucks laptop session with his clothes smelling of caffeine and cremated ideas.” (Full disclosure: this writer often drinks caffeine and cremates ideas at your local…
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Sad Clowns, Family Secrets, and Secret Gardens: New Books of Note
Much-anticipated, curious, or simply thrilling, here are some new and notable books out this month. Kolia by Perrine LeBlanc, translated by David Scott Hamilton (House of Anansi) — Born in a Siberian gulag, Kolia receives basic survival training as well as higher education from fellow prisoner Iosif. This past and its memories follow and haunt…
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Nerd Nite, School Night Poetry, and Kathleen Verret’s Arable Lands: T.O. Events for August 29-September 12, 2013
Nerd Nite Toronto stages research presentations by local experts. This event includes The Game of Operation: True Stories of Medical Marvels by Heili Orav, about organ transplantation, and He’s a Pinball Wizard by Joe Ciaravino, about the history of pinball. 7PM. September 12. Tranzac. $5. School Night! is a monthly spoken-word poetry class led by…