Hey...it's been a while

Hi friends,

February to April are busy months in the life of AngelHousePress and consequently in your inbox, so I haven’t sent out regular updates about my own writing, musing and publishing activities. Let’s see what I’ve been up to…

I had the pleasure of reading at Ottawa’s long-standing reading series, Plan 99 with Adam Sol and Gillian Sze in early April. It was what feels now like one of the last days of sunshine and warmth we’ve had since, but surely my memory is just failing. Surprisingly a number of people turned up, for which I am very grateful. I read excerpts from four long poem collections that have either come out since the pandemic began or are forthcoming or in-progress: Beast Body Epic, forthcoming from AngelHousePress this autumn; DIABETES!, a manuscript-in-progress that received funding from the Ontario Arts Council this year, Fear of Elevators (Turret House, 2023) and Trouble (Hem Press, 2022). This was my first in-person featured reading since the before times. I have done some virtual readings and I’ve been attending open mics in person since last summer (continuing to mask up and managing to avoid Covid so far!)

I had two poems published by the League of Canadian Poets as part of their Poetry Pause series online: How to Cope During the Apocalypse and a visual poem, Ode to Joy as part of the joy theme of National Poetry Month.

British visual poet and short story writer Katy Wimhurst was kind enough to write a note about Genesis at Mercurius. Genesis, the first book in my visual poetry series, the Vispo Bible is available from Timglaset Editions.

Since early December, 2022 I’ve been working on a hybrid long work on time, narrative, and linearity. I’ve always had trouble with writing narrative and wondered how to do it in a way that still anchors the work, but doesn’t necessarily respect chronological time. The essay/memoir/prose-poem includes drawings of clockfaced figures I call “time beings.” It also includes quotes on time from various authors I’ve been reading or heard about on the brilliant podcast Between the Covers with David Naimon. When I hang out with a friend over coffee, I talk about the work and they often share an interesting anecdote about time, so that’s going in to the essay as well. This piece is part of a larger work I’ve titled “Companion Reader,” a series of essays that engage with my poetics and foundational and other texts I’ve read over the years. 2023 marks two decades since my first chapbook, so I guess it’s ok for me to have an essay collection published. Typical of me, however, is that I can’t just write an essay, it has to be a mixed bag of all kinds of stuff. Fortunately I had the pleasure of listening to an episode of Between the Covers about Ursula K. Le Guin’s Carrier Bag Theory of Fiction as part of David’s conversation with Lidia Yuknavitch for a series within Between the Covers called Crafting with Ursula. It was so applicable to the way in which I write and what I like about reading.  

As an aside, I have to tell you how much I love Between the Covers. If you haven’t had a chance to listen to it yet, please do so immediately. The conversations are friendly, engaging and go in so many different directions that spark my interest. I am thrilled that I will be speaking to David on The Small Machine Talks later this month, and I’m doing a lot of preparation for that episode by listening to even more of the show than I already have. This has also increased my book wish list greatly.

Finally I had the great pleasure of taking a chapbook binding workshop with dear friend, Christine McNair and Tiffany Eng Moore at VERSeFest at the end of March. I’m a klutz, I’m bad with my hands, I’m poor at measuring things, but they managed to teach me and other more dexterous folk how to do some basic bindings, and guess what? Now I’m doing it. I’m making one off whimsical and ephemeral chapbooks by hand, doing the stitching, illustrations and writing for them. I will include several of these at an ottawa small press book fair table in June in a series of surprise-filled envelopes at the AngelHousePress table. Yes, this means we are returning to the fair! We missed it last fall and so Charles and I will be back with Bywords.ca and AngelHousePress chapbooks as well!  

That’s enough for one post. If it’s raining where you are, I hope you are dry and safe and perhaps listening to the latest episode of Between the Covers with Christina Sharpe as guest.

Christina Sharpe will be reading as part of the Ottawa International Writers Festival on Sunday and I have my ticket! Maybe I’ll see you there. Dear friend Marcus McCann will also be reading from his book Park Cruising, What Happens When We Wander Off the Path, which I’m eagerly looking forward to, and Vincent Lam has a new book out and will be reading as well. The festival is taking place over four days starting on Thursday and is full of great events.

Ok, this is me, signing off until next time. If you want to get together over a coffee in person or virtually, let me know. I’m up for it. I’d love to know how you’ve been doing and what’s on your mind through the ongoing pandemic daze.

For those looking for more information about me and my shenanigans, you can visit

http://amandaearl.com/ and https://linktr.ee/amandaearl