Edited
by derek beaulieu and rob mclennan, and designed by Chaudiere co-publisher
Christine McNair, The Calgary Renaissance highlights some of the diverse and
astonishing experimental poetry and fiction that has emerged out of the past
two decades of Calgary writing. An essential portrait of some of the most
engaged and radical of Canadian writing and writers from one of the country’s
most important literary centres. You can order a copy directly, here.
For
further (ongoing) interviews with contributors to The Calgary Renaissance, check out the link here.
Emily Ursuliak writes both fiction
and poetry and has an ma in English, with a focus in creative writing,
from the University of Calgary. She is the host and producer of CJSW’s literary
radio show, Writer’s Block, and teaches creative writing courses for the
Alexandra Writers’ Centre and other community organizations.
Q:
How long have you been in Calgary, and what first took you there?
A:
I moved to Calgary to pursue my English MA at the University of Calgary. That
was about five years ago now and I ended up staying because I love the writing
community here so much.
Q:
How did you first get involved in writing, and subsequently, the writing
community in Calgary?
A:
I’ve always written. I don’t really have a distinct memory of when I started,
or why, it’s always seemed very impulsive, something that I need to do. In
elementary school I used to show my appreciation for teachers I liked by giving
them a copy of whatever poem I had just written (I was a bit of a teacher’s
pet). They were often nature poems that I would layer over a top of a
photograph that I felt went with the poem.
I
got involved with the writing community in Calgary pretty much as soon as I
moved here. I was really hungry for a larger writing community. I remember
researching writing events in the city months before I ever moved and writing
them down in my day planner. A lot of the people that I consider to be my “core”
writing community I met through going to the Flywheel Reading Series that filling Station magazine puts on.
Q:
How did being in such a community of writers shift your thinking about writing,
if at all? What did Calgary provide, or allow?
A:
What Calgary exposed me to was a variety of different styles and approaches to
writing. I didn’t really know any experimental writers before moving here, and
conversations with them have taught me a lot about new approaches to writing.
It’s also been great to learn from fellow lyric poets and fiction writers, as
well as nonfiction writers.
The
core group of writers I’m friends with meet up every other Sunday at a pub to
write and chat and often bring books along with them. I’ve written down a lot
of book titles just from my conversations with them, and I appreciate how being
a part of this community has introduced me to the work of writers I might not
have encountered on my own.
Q:
Have any of your projects responded directly to your engagements there? How did
the city and its community, if at all, change the way you approached your work?
A:
2013 was the year of the flood for Calgary, and it was an experience that I
feel like solidified my identity as a Calgarian. I volunteered in two of the
affected areas. In the neighbourhood of Bowness I helped clear out a basement
that had been completely flooded, and then later in the week helped load random
rubble from the streets in Sunnyside into a semi trailer. Two poems came out of
those experiences, the poem about Sunnyside was published in The Calgary Project: A City Map in Verse and
Visual. So I think the landscape of Calgary as a city has been a definite
inspiration for me, and I hope to engage more with it in the future.
I
think the books I’ve read as a result of suggestions from other Calgary
writers, as well as engaging with their work, have taught me about the power of
more economical writing, where every word counts. I think of local poets like
Monica Kidd, for instance, whose last book, The
Year of Our Beautiful Exile, uses language in such a crisp, precise way. I
admire her work a lot and hope that I can use language as masterfully as her
one day.
Q:
What do you see happening in Calgary that you don’t see anywhere else?
A:
This is the first literary community that I’ve had much experience with, so
it’s hard for me to compare it with what’s going on in other cities. But I
think there’s a spirit of rebellion here, and that’s in part due to the
negative stereotypes that Calgary is sometimes saddled with. People have this
notion that Calgary is very redneck and conservative, and it can be, and so
those of us in the arts communities feel a strong drive to prove the stereotype
wrong, to show people outside of Calgary that there is a vibrant, diverse
cultural scene here.
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