Heather Ferguson is the author of A Mouse in a Top Hat (chapbook, Rideau Review Press) and The Lapidary (special issue, Ygdrasil, A Journal of the Poetic Arts). The Lapidary was later translated into Spanish (four broadsheets) and French (The Lapidary / Le Lapidaire, Vermillon).
Petrichor ArtLab comprises Boston-area artist Jeffrey Lipsky and Ottawa poet Heather Ferguson. Their collaborations have appeared in Experiment-O (issueten.pdf (experiment-o.com), and Ygdrasil: A Journal of the Poetic Arts (Y-1805.pdf (lac-bac.gc.ca).
Q: How long have you been in Ottawa, and what first brought you here?
I moved to Ottawa in 1980 looking for translation work, after completing CEGEP and university studies in Quebec City. I have been here ever since. I was born in Deep River, Ontario.
Q: How did you first get involved in writing, and subsequently, the writing community here?
I first started writing poetry in French in Quebec City at the CEGEP de Sainte-Foy, and then at Université Laval. My first influences were Quebec poets.
In Ottawa, I joined the local poetry scene by attending TREE (Markus Jokinnen and Andrew Coward) in the early 1980s, on the advice of Burt Heward, a local journalist and book editor.
Then I started going to sister reading series: Orion (Marty Flomen), Sasquatch (Juan O’Neill), and El Dorado (Luciano Diaz, Jorge Etcheverry, and many other Chilean poets and writers). Those were heady times; one could read in an open set at least five times a month in the main English series, plus El Dorado. And there were other series as well – BARD at the Royal Oak, for instance. There was such a strong tradition of live readings at that time. It was set a good challenge; you had to connect with a live audience unfamiliar with your texts.
As for community involvement, I became a TREE co-director, along with haiku poet Grant Savage. Grant looked after the Canada Council readings, and I did the local readings. I forget the exact dates … 1985 to 1988? About three years, anyway.
Grant and I assumed these roles when Markus and Andrew announced they were closing TREE. I published a perfect-bound TREE anthology (Open Set) and a number of little folded broadsheets to promote local TREE readers. I also did two poetry posters with Jane Avery+Honz Peterson, and and Paulette Turcotte.
I was one of the organizers of the Juryroom workshop, and used it to recruit people to run TREE. The workshop was a joint TREE-Sasquatch initiative that was held initially at an old juryroom at ArtsCourt, hence the name.
I also set up a little stapled magazine called Bywords, with help from Seymour Mayne of the University of Ottawa and his literature students. Seymour has had always had an interest in little magazines. Bywords ran successfully for 9 years, at which point it lost its city arts funding. To my astonishment, it was then taken over by Amanda Earl and her computer wizard husband, Charles Earl, in a completely different electronic online format. I consider the early Bywords to be my best achievement; Amanda and Charles revived a dead literary magazine because people kept asking for it. The rest is history, as we see.
Q: How did being in such a community of writers shift your thinking about writing, if at all?
I would have to say that local Ottawa poets have not had a major influence on my writing. Of course, I learned the basics about writing and promoting my work, which was essential. However, my instinct has always been to reach out to poets and artists outside Ottawa. I am not sure why that would be.
I did learn a lot indirectly, however, from Ottawa. Juan O’Neill was doing masterful translations of Pablo Neruda and other South American poets, and he opened my eyes to the wonders of surrealist poetry. I was hooked for good.
I was supported in my experiments in this poetic tradition by Ottawa’s Chilean poetry community, which is particularly strong. Jorge Etcheverry translated my book The Lapidary (Vermillon. Ottawa) into Spanish and the translation and original were included in the Proyecto Adrianne (2008), and were added to the collection of the national library of Chile along with the massive Spanish-language works of the Chileans here in Ottawa. My poetry is a natural fit for Chilean culture, and South American culture more generally, I’d guess.
I should mention Gary Geddes. I took his masterclass in poetry at Concordia University in the early 1990s. One evening the class went to a reading by Daphne Marlatt, who was promoting her prose poem book Salvage. What a revelation! I have used the prose poem format almost exclusively ever since. For image-based poetry with loose narratives, it’s ideal.
I have had sporadic contact with some local Ottawa-Gatineau Francophone poets and writers for years. This led to the publication of The Lapidary / Le lapidaire.
I must also mention the late poet, artist, musician and publisher Klaus Jens Gerken, who moved to Ottawa from Cuxhaven, Germany, as a child, and who ran the online poetry magazine Ygdrasil: A Journal of the Poetic Arts for almost 30 years, and single-handedly at that. This was the world’s first serious online literary magazine. Klaus liked my writing and published some of it.
Beyond publishing my poetry, Klaus introduced me to poets well beyond Canada’s borders, via the Athens Avenue online workshop, and to this day I have good friends in the United States, Israel and Ireland. My American life partner was in Athens Avenue too. More recently my circle of friends has expanded to include poets in Toronto and Kingston.
I am now part of a Zoom workshop group that meets weekly. Participants are in Israel, the US, Kingston, Ontario and Toronto. And Ottawa (that’s me).
I should also take a moment to thank Stephen Brockwell for publishing a chapbook of my early work, entitled A Mouse in a Top Hat. It was vital encouragement at the time. I admired his own writing then and I still do. He just keeps getting better.
I did take part in Chrysalis, a poetry workshop run by Adele Graf here in Ottawa. After Adele shut that down, I missed the camaraderie but was unable to find a replacement workshop and quickly fell out of touch with the local scene. This was a great disappointment. So, under the international orientation of Ygdrasil, I drifted away from Ottawa around that time. This is not to say that Ottawa writing did not interest me. I have always felt Canadian poets and writers could hold their own anywhere. But I was not shy in mixing with people in other countries, having a natural self-confidence. Of course, these days such international connections are commonplace.
Q: What do you see happening here that you don’t see anywhere else? What does Ottawa provide, or allow?
I can’t say. I have maintained only a few tenuous links with the Ottawa poetry scene for years; my closest poet friend here however is from the US (long-time Ottawa poet Ronnie R. Brown). I can only say that TREE currently has particularly dynamic directors. But it has moved online now and I would not call it a local reading series anymore.
Q: Have any of your projects responded directly to your engagements here? How have the city and its community, if at all, changed the way you approached your work?
I currently have no engagements with the Ottawa writing scene.
Q: What are you working on now?
• Early French texts: I was until recently planning to publish my early French texts in Klaus Gerken’s Ygdrasil. That might still be possible elsewhere, possibly as an English translation. I am loosely associated with a group of Gatineau and Ottawa Francophone writers who are enthusiastic about my poetry. One of them was instrumental in getting The Lapidary / Le lapidaire published by Vermillon here in Ottawa. The book included a translation of the texts into French.
• Collaboration with an American artist: This is with Massachusetts abstract narrative artist Jeffrey Lipsky (see his FaceBook page), in Orange, MA; I have sufficient texts for a book or more. There is a wonderful complicity between our respective works. I am very grateful to be able to work with him.
• Field Notes from the Edge: a manuscript in three sections: The Lapidary, The Bestiary and The Herbarium.
• Old manuscripts?: I found by chance that I had a complete manuscript from the early days that I had forgotten about. It needs editing, but workshop colleagues tell me it is worth sending out.
Q: Other projects?
• Broadsheets for our Zoom workshop participants. These may be printed out or sent electronically. The print versions should be folded into three panels, but they work as flat sheets. These little ephemerals are fun and have great charm. See Karen Alkalay-Gut’s Valentine broadsheet at her February 12, 2023 blog entry at Tel Aviv Blog — Karen Alkalay Gut קרן אלקלעי גוט (karenalkalay-gut.com). A second broadsheet is awaiting author approval.
• The POMO poem-a-day challenge in April and October. This through our Zoom workshop.
• Recording Zoom workshop poetry readings and posting them on YouTube.
So lots to do. This was an interesting quiz. Thank you for this invitation, rob.
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