bpNichol celebration this Wednesday!

I'm stoked for the bpNichol celebration at Toronto's Supermarket this Wednesday. Full details below. I'm honoured to have been asked to participate, and to join the awesome roster of readers. I'll read a brief excerpt from one of my most loved Nichol texts, Journal.

Literary event at Supermarket celebrates three new pieces of Nicholmania from late Canadian author bpNichol

‘His wit, along with the seriousness, was there to keep the language free and untethered, to keep the poem aware of its roots, like a tuxedo worn with bare feet in a muddy river ... No other writer of our time and place was so diverse, attempted so much, and never lost sight of his intent.’ – Michael Ondaatje

A member of the sound-poetry performance group The Four Horsemen, winner of a Governor General’s Award for Poetry and writer of Fraggle Rock, bpNichol was one of Canada’s most important writers. Nichol was the author of countless publications in a variety of forms, including poetry (lyric, concrete, visual, sound). He was known as a promoter of poetry and the small press, a manipulator of the lines between genres and a prolific Canadian word artist, and they even named a Toronto laneway after him.

In late 2007, Coach House Books published The Alphabet Game, edited by Darren Wershler-Henry and Lori Emerson, a selected reader of Nichol’s work designed as an introductory overview to Nichol’s texts. This spring, Canadian literary criticism journal Open Letter publishes the first of two new bpNichol-focused issues, and the long-awaited bpNichol site, bpnichol.ca, is unveiled. The spring also sees the release of Brian Nash’s bp: pushing the boundaries on DVD.

To celebrate, Coach House Books, Open Letter and bpnichol.ca present NicholBack, a stellar night of Nichol performances.

NicholBack

with performances by Paul Dutton, W. Mark Sutherland, Nobuo Kubota, Frank Davey, Lola Lemire Tostevin, damian lopes, Gary Barwin and a.rawlings.

Supermarket, 268 Augusta Avenue

Wednesday, April 2, 2008

8:00 p.m.

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With an introduction of Alphabet Game co-editor Lori Emerson is split into two rounds of performances.

Four Horsemen member Paul Dutton leads off the evening with a short work from bpNichol, then he and fellow acclaimed sound poets W. Mark Sutherland and Nobuo Kubota perform an entirely new collaborative sound performance piece inspired by the work of bpNichol.

Following a break, five of today's most innovative writers ­– Frank Davey, Lola Lemire Tostevin, damian lopes, Gary Barwin and a.rawlings – read their favourite Nichol works.

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For information on The Alphabet Game or media requests, contact Evan Munday at 416 979 2217 or evan@chbooks.com.