Peter Norman: The pursuit

This past weekend, one of Ottawa’s celebrated reading series played host to one of the city’s former residents made good. Author Peter Norman spent three years here at the beginning of his career and found them to be incredibly formative. “I got off the ground in poetry there. It was in that community that I started to write with concentration. I’d write for the open mic nights at reading series and then use the feedback to see what captured peoples’ attention.” He left Ottawa but took with him a long list of friends, supporters and burgeoning projects. “I did a tally once,” he muses, “and about 63 percent of my poems were written in Ottawa.”

Rhodes scholar

W.H. Auden once described a poem as “a well-made verbal object.” Brilliantly, Auden wanted us to realize that the poem is not a catalogue of something, but is in fact a creation made out of the material of language. The most tedious poets are invariably the ones who forget this, and bury the crafting of language under gimmickry or confessional melodrama. At the other end of the spectrum are authors like Shane Rhodes.

The West is broke

The world financial crisis of 2008 has an almost unlimited number of commentators. Honestly, pretty much anyone who was breathing and older than a teenager in 2008 has an opinion on the subject. You might think Dambisa Moyo’s How The West Was Lost would be one of the most technical of the analyses, coming from an Oxford-trained economist. But instead.

Year of Magical Thinking

Winter Cultural Preview: Theatre: Bringing the heat

In 2011, the venerable Arts Court becomes residence to a trio of small companies, giving them a permanent place to hang their hats. Créations In Vivo, Evolution Theatre and the New Theatre of Ottawa all have a new home for 2011. Créations In Vivo starts 2011 with Légendes boréales, a show mixing theatre, acrobatics and music (Jan. 13). Evolution Theatre begins the year with Little Martyrs at the Arts Court (Feb. 9). It tells the story of two preteen murderers who meet up a decade after their crime. Festive! READ MORE

Year in Review: Goodbye to the Gladstone: Goodnight, sweet stage

Maybe the most newsworthy and unfortunate thing to happen to the local theatre community is the announcement this past fall that the Gladstone Theatre, that lovely plaster-white building near Preston and Gladstone, is being put up for sale. Perhaps it was too much to hope that, after the success of the Great Canadian Theatre Company’s Irving Greenberg Theatre out in Hintonburg, Ottawa could afford to support another local professional performance venue. READ MORE

Not quite immaculate conception

As a whole, though, and to put it as gently as possible, Nativity is confused. The two main stories were thrown into a pot together and the mix never really gelled. The play is written in alternating rhyming couplets, which can feel archaic to modern ears even if you appreciate its historical origins, especially when the rhyme is sometimes forced. READ MORE