2022 PROGRAMMING
2022 FESTIVAL SCHEDULE
FRIDAY, SEPT 23, 2022 • Gaelic College, St. Ann’s
7:30 p.m. | Friday Night Reading Series
Hosted by Jared Bland, this event will feature readings by David Chariandy, Bill Conall, Ivan Coyote, Omar El Akkad, Shauntay Grant, shalan joudry, Marsha Lederman, Alexander MacLeod, and Rebecca Rose. It will be held in the beautiful Great Hall of the Clans, at the Gaelic College in St. Ann's.
SATURDAY, SEPT 24, 2022 • Gaelic College, St. Ann’s
9:30 A.m. | What's Funny About That?: A WORKSHOP ON Using Humour As a Major Tool in Character Development
The touch of humour can be as gentle as a feather or as brutal as a broadsword. Who uses it, and when, and why? What does it say about them? And what does it say about us?
Led by Cape Breton author Bill Conall, this 2.5-hour workshop will explore the use of humour in fiction. This workshop is open to writers at all levels; no advance "homework" is required and you only need bring something to write with!
SATURDAY, SEPT 24, 2022 • Gaelic College, St. Ann’s
9:30 A.m. | Poetry Workshop: Inspiration and rhythm of this land Unama’ki
shalan joudry will lead participants in exploring what sounds, sights, smells of this landscape can be woven into written and spoken poetry. All languages are highly encouraged! We will participate in writing exercises, share some of our ideas in a supportive environment. You can write or speak your poetics. Weather-permitting we will include a walk outdoors (not far) to find elements to work with. Please bring: your own notebook, pencil, water and a snack, and please be prepared to go outside.
*A scholarship is available for all Mi’kmaw participants to cover the cost of this workshop; this fee waiver can be selected at the time of purchase from our ticketing website or booked over the phone or by email.
SATURDAY, SEPT 24, 2022 • Gaelic College, St. Ann’s
NOON | WRITERS’ SALON: LUNCH, PANEL AND Q&A
This event is designed to be of interest to writers of all career stages, from seasoned professional to those who just think they might like to put pen to paper one day. The ticket will include a lunch shared with all authors and participants, with time allowed for casual conversation and and meeting and mingling with fellow writers and aspiring writers, followed by a panel conversation titled Publishing 101: The Writing Process & Profession. Author Alexander MacLeod, publisher Jared Bland, and author & arts journalist Marsha Lederman will take part in this relaxed conversation about the writing and publishing process, making ample space to answer audience questions.
SATURDAY, SEPT 24, 2022 • Wagmatcook Culture & Heritage Centre, Wagmatcook
3 p.m. | Medicine Stories: Indigenous Women Writers Share Writings, Teachings, and Dreams
Amanda Peters, shalan joudry and Andrea Currie will co-host this workshop, which will be a hybrid of readings and sharing of thoughts on themes related to their experiences, challenges, and dreams as Indigenous writers. Readings and conversation between these three writers will address issues such as finding one’s voice in a colonial context that has made Indigenous identity confusing and contentious; writing about traditional practices and ceremony while honouring protocols and creating contemporary expressions of our traditions; and exploring how our lands and waters shape our imaginations and speak through our writing.
Amanda is a member of Glooscap First Nation, Shalan is a member of Bear River First Nation, and Andrea is a member of the Métis Nation from the Red River territory in Manitoba.
SATURDAY, SEPT 24, 2022 • Gaelic College, St. Ann’s
6:30 p.m. | WRITING THE PAST, READING THE FUTURE
Moderated by Jared Bland, this panel conversation will feature David Chariandy, Marsha Lederman, and Rebecca Rose exploring the different ways the authors’ books mine the distant or recent past for warnings, insight, healing and resilience for our current times.
SATURDAY, SEPT 24, 2022 • Gaelic College, St. Ann’s
7:45 p.m. | A CONVERSATION WITH OMAR EL AKKAD
Jared Bland will interview Omar El Akkad about his work and influences.
SATURDAY, SEPT 24, 2022 • Gaelic College, St. Ann’s
9 p.m. | STORYTELLING WITH IVAN COYOTE
Ivan Coyote will share stories accompanied by original animations by three artists.
SUNDAY, SEPT 25, 2022 • Gaelic College, St. Ann’s
9:30 A.m. | An INTRODUCTION TO CHOREOPOETRY
Playwright Shauntay Grant leads a workshop on choreopoetry, a form of dramatic expression developed by Ntozake Shange in the 1970s with the creation of her groundbreaking work for the stage For Colored Girls Who Have Considered Suicide / When The Rainbow Is Enuf. Come to this workshop to explore the relationship between poetry, playwriting, music, and movement, and to consider opportunities for theatrical interplay between various forms of expression. This workshop is open to writers of all artistic backgrounds and experience levels.
SUNDAY, SEPT 25, 2022 • Gaelic College, St. Ann’s
9:30 A.m. | Memoir WORKSHOP
Memory is fallible and thus so is memoir. How do you write about your life when you may not be able to remember exactly what happened in your life? When there are uncertainties, or complete gaps? Marsha Lederman faced this issue when she was writing her memoir Kiss the Red Stairs: The Holocaust, Once Removed. A veteran journalist, Marsha used skills she has developed in her reporting career to write about her life and her family history.
For this workshop, participants will be asked to choose an event or incident or memory from their own life or family history to write about, one that is not completely clear – and to fill in the gaps by “reporting” on it. (If possible, this exercise can be completed—or even just begun—in advance to discuss with Marsha and the other participants, but it can also be completed at the workshop.)
Led by Marsha, who will talk about her own methods and some tricks of the trade, the group will share the methods they used, and what they discovered about their own stories along the way. Writers of all stages are welcome at this workshop.
SUNDAY, SEPT 25, 2022 • Gaelic College, St. Ann’s
2 P.M. | Heard in the Highlands
A stroll among the changing colours of the forest surrounding the Gaelic College, featuring literary readings by contributors to the beautiful new Cape Breton literary magazine ‘Magine. Please dress for the weather and meet at the junction of Mackillop Road and the Cabot Trail, just east of the Gaelic College entrance. In case of rain, performances will take place in the Pavillion, a sheltered outdoor performance area at the rear of the Gaelic College campus.
SUNDAY, SEPT 25, 2022 • Gaelic College, St. Ann’s
3:30 P.M. | Festival Book Club with Rebecca Rose
Moderated by Andrea Currie, this conversation will be open to audience questions throughout, offering an opportunity for readers to connect directly with author Rebecca Rose and learn more about her book Before the Parade: A History of Halifax’s Gay, Lesbian, and Bisexual Communities, 1972-1984, and the influences, inspiration and process that helped shape it.
SUNDAY, SEPT 25, 2022 • Inverness County Centre for the Arts, Inverness
5:30 P.M. | Gaelic Harp & Songs
A food truck will be on hand for audience members to grab an informal supper, and enjoy meeting with other festival guests, before taking in a performance by Gaelic harpist and singer Màiri Britton.
SUNDAY, SEPT 25, 2022 • Inverness County Centre for the Arts, Inverness
6:30 P.M. | Readings & Conversation with David Chariandy & Alexander MacLeod
Marsha Lederman will moderate this event, featuring readings by David Chariandy and Alexander MacLeod and a discussion of their work and influences.
SUNDAY, SEPT 25, 2022 • Inverness County Centre for the Arts, Inverness
8:00 P.M. | Songs & Stories
A musical performance by Mi’kmaq fiddler and singer Morgan Toney and multi-instrumentalist Keith Mullins, who will also share stories of their music and its inspirations.
2022 FESTIVAL AUTHORS
Omar El Akkad
is an author and a journalist. He has reported from Afghanistan, Guantánamo Bay, and many other locations around the world. His work earned Canada's National Newspaper Award for Investigative Journalism and the Goff Penny Award for young journalists. His writing has appeared in The Guardian, Le Monde, Guernica, GQ, and many other newspapers and magazines. His debut novel, American War, is an international bestseller and has been translated into thirteen languages. It won the Pacific Northwest Booksellers Association Award, the Oregon Book Award for fiction, and the Kobo Emerging Writer Prize, and has been nominated for more than ten other awards. It was listed as one of the best books of the year by The New York Times, The Washington Post, GQ, NPR, and Esquire, and was selected by the BBC as one of 100 Novels That Shaped Our World. Omar El Akkad’s second novel, What Strange Paradise, was awarded the 2021 Scotiabank Giller Prize.
Photo credit: Kateshia Pendergrass
shalan joudry
is a Mi'kmaw mother, poet, playwright, oral storyteller and ecologist. Using her theatrical background, shalan brings Mi’kmaw stories to a new generation of listeners, as well as recounting personally crafted narratives. The author of three books, her most latest book of poetry is Waking Ground (2020). shalan recently wrote and performed her second play, a one-woman show, KOQM, staged at both the King's Theatre (Annapolis Royal) and Neptune Theatre (Halifax). She lives in her home territory of Kespukwitk (southwest Nova Scotia) with her family in their community of L’sətkuk (Bear River First Nation).
Photo credit: Dan Froese
Bill Conall
is a much-travelled man, first as a road musician and then driving long-haul across Canada and the U.S. He is a constant observer: places, things, animals, of course, but mainly people. The imagery in his songs is vivid, the characters in his stories and books feel like people out of your own experience. He has recorded three albums of original songs and contributed to five short story anthologies, as well as a number of newspaper and magazine articles and stories. The second of his three books, The Promised Land; a novel of Cape Breton, won the 2014 Stephen Leacock Medal for Humour. He is currently in his second term as Storyteller-in-Residence for Cape Breton Regional Library. He lives with artist Rosemary McLean in the peaceful suburbs of Tarbot, Nova Scotia.
Marsha Lederman
is the Western Arts Correspondent for the Globe and Mail. Before joining the Globe, Marsha worked for CBC Radio, mostly in Toronto, where she held a variety of positions, including National Arts Reporter. Marsha also worked in commercial radio as a reporter, newscaster and talk show host. Born in Toronto, she now lives in Vancouver. She is the author of debut memoir Kiss the Red Stair.
David Chariandy
lives in Vancouver and teaches literature and creative writing in the department of English at Simon Fraser University. His first novel, Soucouyant, was nominated for several prizes, including the Governor General’s Award and the Scotiabank Giller Prize. His second novel, Brother, was also nominated for several prizes, winning the Rogers Writers’ Trust Fiction Prize, the Ethel Wilson Fiction Prize, and the Toronto Book Prize. Brother was also named a book of the year by The Globe and Mail, The National Post, The Toronto Star, The Montreal Gazette, The New York City Public Library, Kirkus Reviews, Esquire Magazine, and The Guardian. His most recent book is a memoir entitled I’ve Been Meaning To Tell You: A Letter To My Daughter. David’s writings have been published internationally and translated into a dozen languages. In 2019, he was awarded Yale University’s Windham-Campbell Prize for fiction.
Photo credit: Glen Chua
Shauntay Grant
is an author, poet, playwright, and multimedia artist who lives and works in Kjipuktuk (Halifax, Nova Scotia). She is the author of The Bridge, winner of a Robert Merrit Award for Outstanding New Play by a Nova Scotian, and of the children's picture books My Fade Is Fresh and Africville, which won the Marilyn Baillie Picture Book Award and was shortlisted for the Governor General's Literary Awards. She is a former poet laureate for the City of Halifax, a member of The Royal Society of Canada’s College of New Scholars, Artists, and Scientists, and she teaches creative writing at Dalhousie University.
Photo credit: Steve Farmer
Ivan Coyote
is a writer and storyteller. Born and raised in Whitehorse, Yukon, they are the author of thirteen books, the creator of four films, six stage shows, and three albums that combine storytelling with music. Coyote’s books have won the ReLit Award, been named a Stonewall Honour Book, been longlisted for Canada Reads, shortlisted for the Hilary Weston Prize for non-fiction and the Governor General's Award, and awarded BC and Yukon Book Prize’s inaugural Jim Deva Prize for Writing That Provokes. In 2017 Ivan was given an honorary Doctor of Laws from Simon Fraser University for their writing and activism.
Photo credit: Emily Cooper
Alexander MacLeod
has published short stories in The New Yorker, Granta, and The O Henry Prize Stories. His first collection, Light Lifting (Biblioasis), was a finalist for the Scotiabank Giller Prize and the Frank O’Connor International Short Story Award. In 2021, he and his friend, Andrew Steeves of Gaspereau Press, were awarded the Lieutenant Governor of Nova Scotia Masterworks Arts Award for their collaboration, Lagomorph. Alexander lives in Dartmouth and teaches at Saint Mary's University in Halifax. His most recent book is Animal Person, a magnificent collection about the needs, temptations, and tensions that exist just beneath the surface of our lives.
Photo credit: Heather A. Crosby Gionet
Rebecca Rose
is a Cape Breton-born, and Dartmouth-raised queer femme writer and activist. Rebecca’s book Before the Parade: A History of Halifax’s Gay, Lesbian, and Bisexual Communities (1972-1984) - published by Nimbus Publishing - is a narrative non-fiction account of 1970s and 80s 2SLGB Halifax. In 2021 Before the Parade was shortlisted for The Evelyn Richardson Non-Fiction Award.
Photo credit: Lindsay Duncan