Risky behaviour

Aqua Books will celebrate it's last Mondo! Poetry festival at its location at 274 Garry Street...and it's a humdinger!

March 6-10, we'll celebrating Anne Szumigalski, the author of fifteen books, and one of Canada’s most respected poets, essayists and editors.

Szumigalski was the recipient of many literary awards and prizes and left behind a rich literary legacy in her wake. Her passing in April 1999 was mourned by all those she had touched.

Here are the first two events of Mondo! Szumigalski:

Mondo! Szumigalski
MARATHON of Anne Szumigalski's Risks

When: Tuesday, March 6, 7 pm.
Where: Aqua Books (274 Garry Street)
Cost: FREE

Featuring 32 of Winnipeg’s established and emerging poets, some surprise out of town guests AND an introduction from Montreal writer Mark Abley, Anne’s literary executor.

Anne Szumigalski's Risks: a poem (Red Deer College Press, 1983) is an exuberant play on words, a serious poem that reflects on life and the craft of poetry – Risks is these and more. It is the story of L – poet, critic, lover. His poignantly comic love affair with the creations of his own imagination, with the beguiling Crystal, with his own words, and finally with himself. In poetry ranging from the delicate and subtle to the sardonic and ironic, Anne Szumigalski has forged a style uniquely her own.

Mark Abley is a writer and editor living in Montreal. As a young man in Saskatoon, he was deeply influenced by Anne Szumigalski, whose literary executor he would eventually become. He has written three collections of poetry, two books for children, and several non-fiction books. The best-known of them, Spoken Here: Travels Among Threatened Languages, was published internationally and translated into French, Spanish and Japanese. Abley is now preparing a volume of selected poems as well as a creative non-fiction book about Duncan Campbell Scott.

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Mondo! Szumigalski
Launch of A Woman Clothed in Words
Featuring Mark Abley, Elizabeth Philips and Anne Simpson

When: Tuesday, March 6, 8 pm.
Where: Aqua Books (274 Garry Street)
Cost: FREE

Anne Szumigalski was one of Canada’s most prominent poets. With her published works, as well as with her teaching and magnanimous guidance, she did much to put prairie Canadian poetry on the map. But Anne was more than a poet. She also wrote fiction, drama, literary non-fiction, and even a Prairie liturgy. A Woman Clothed in Words (Coteau Books, 2012) is a treasure trove of the best of the many literary faces of Anne Szumigalski.

Please join Coteau Books and Mondo! Szumigalski for the launch of A Woman Clothed in Words. Light refreshments will follow the launch.

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Anne Simpson was a winner of the 2004 Griffin Poetry Prize for Loop, her second poetry book. Is, her most recent book of poems, is structured around the proliferation and division of cells. She writes fiction and non-fiction as well. She has worked as a writer-in-residence at a number of universities and libraries across the country.

Elizabeth Philips is the author of four collections of poetry. Her most recent collection, Torch River, was released by Brick Books in 2007. Her poetry has won two Saskatchewan Book awards and been nominated for other provincial and national awards. She has taught creative writing in various programs across Canada and is Director of the Banff Centre’s Writing with Style program. She works as a freelance editor and mentor. She lives in Saskatoon.