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In this powerful dramatic monologue, Lorena Gale remembers, by reconstructing for the audience, her childhood and coming of age as an African-Canadian in Montreal.
Her autobiographical protagonist is unabashedly one of those spoil-sport “ethniques” who, for political factions led by the likes of Parizeau, undermined and destroyed the separatist “pur-laine” vision of a new Quebec nation, sparkling and clean in its coat of only three colours—the seamless snow-white of the landscape, the royal blue of the sky, and the golden yellow of the sun (king), all allusions to the symbology of the imperialists who founded this “new nation,” this “new France.”
In a dream-sequence / folksong which is played in ironic fragments between the voices adopted by the actress, Gale lyricizes the long, parallel process of rediscovering her self, first as a dark speck on the horizon where pure white meets pure blue, then finally as a full-grown adult, whose race, gender and class are far more definitive of her person than the vapid dreams of the neo-nationalists of the late 20th century.
Je Nathanaël is an endangered text. Neither essay nor poem nor novel nor sex-show, what it takes from language it gives back to the body.
In this new and updated edition of Je Nathanaël, first published by BookThug in 2006, Nathanaël explores ways in which language constrains the body, shackles it to gender, and proposes instead a different way of reading, where words are hermaphroditic and transform desire in turn. Suggesting that one body conceals another, it lends an ear to this other body and delights in the anxiety it provokes. With parts written in French, other parts in English, this is truly a hybrid text, throwing itself into question as it acts upon itself in translation. It is both originator and recipient of its own echo. In this regard it does not, cannot exist, pulling insistently away from itself in an attempt to draw attention to the very things it seeks to conceal. In this way, Je Nathanaël is a book of paradox, negating itself as it comes into being.
With an afterword by Elena Basile, and a postface by the author.
It is 1933. A journalist travels to the small mining town of Rouyn in northern Quebec – a community that has become a refuge for Russians, Finns, Ukrainians, Chinese, and Jews. While there, he crosses paths with famed Canadian Marxist Jeanne Corbin, who has come to rally a group of striking workers, and sees his life forever changed.
Jeanne’s Road is an essential read, bringing to life a lost era of Quebec history through its powerful yet unsentimental love story.
What’s red and green and a sticky, mushy mess? The legendary Jelly Bean Row no less! How did The Jelly Bean Row get its name? Here’s a slap happy tale nestled inside dozens of bright, rainbow-drenched illustrations that will tickle the imagination and bring a sparkle to the eye of codgers and kids alike. You’re invited to meet some of the colourful characters from one of the most famous streets in the City of Legends. So, don a pair of hip waders and join in the foolishness, fuss and fun. Everyone is welcome and entertainment is supplied, but please bring your own blueberry buckle!
In this revelatory collection of lyrical and poetic essays, Therese Estacion explores vital themes relating to her life as a disabled person.
Defying genre and constraint, Estacion conveys how ableism has impacted her disposition and self-esteem. She also confronts her own internalized ableism and unpacks how she has come to terms with disability in all its complexity.
Jelly, Baby fearlessly uncovers the trauma, grief, and rage inherent to the struggle to accept one’s own vulnerability and reach a place of love. Inspired by Estacion’s psychotherapy training, this book is a tender examination of some of the most vulnerable aspects of the self, and a head-on challenge of self-loathing. The result is a beautiful and astute meditation on ableism and a transformative journey deep into the psyche.
Jenneli is a young girl who feels that she is nothing special until she learns about the Métis Red River Jig from Grandma Lucee. One day Grandma Lucee enters Jenneli into the jigging contest, and Jenneli is both horrified and excited. With Grandma Lucee’s love and support, Jenneli places her doubts and fears aside to dance in the contest.
Winner of the 1983 Chalmers Canadian Play Award, Jennie’s Story is set in the late 1930s on the Canadian prairies. It concerns the Sexual Sterilization Act that was enacted in 1928, allowing a sterilization procedure to be performed without consent on individuals that were deemed to be unfit or mentally challenged. Jennie McGrane takes the title role, and her discovery of what the priest Father Fabrizeau has done to her is the central drama of the play. Believing she had an appendectomy when she was a teenager, the truth is revealed when she’s unable to conceive.In Under the Skin, Emma, the twelve-year-old daughter of Maggie Benton, has disappeared. John and Renee Gifford, Maggie’s neighbours and friends, attempt to console her, but their own ominous behaviour makes this a cold comfort.
Istvan Kantor’s Jeremiad is an autobiographic assemblage of text and images, composed from short segments of semi-fictional episodes from the author’s life, from rhapsodic curtain-raisers to revolutionary manifestos via machine-beat poetry, Neoist propaganda flyers, film scripts, essays, protest songs, performance documents, and sketches.
In 1755, Jeremiah Bancroft enlisted to fight against the French Empire in North America. Embarking from Boston that April
with 2,000 of his countrymen, his attention was focused on the objective of capturing Fort Beauséjour at Chignecto, located
on the present-day border between New Brunswick and Nova Scotia. Bancroft could not have predicted the fort’s rapid
surrender, nor his New England force’s redeployment against the civilian population of Acadia. His journal preserves an
eyewitness account of the deportation of the Acadians in the Grand-Pré area, offering readers a day-by-day account of one
of the most dramatic events in Canadian history. Edited, introduced and annotated by Jonathan Fowler and Earle Lockerby,
and supported with maps and illustrations, this publication marks the first appearance of Bancroft’s diary in book form. It
also launches “Diaries of the Acadian Deportations,” a new series of history books aimed at attentive readers of Canadian
history.
In the mid-nineteenth century a man who became known as Jerome was alleged to have been found on the shores of Baie Sainte-Marie, Nova Scotia, mute and missing both legs. He lived for over forty years with a local family. Many attempts were made to locate his relatives, with hopefuls rumoured to have travelled from as far away as Alabama and Milan, but when he died in 1912 the mystery of his background was still unsolved. The story of Jerome, the Mystery Man of Sandy Cove, has turned up in various collections of folk history over the years. Now, best-selling novelist Ami McKay has written a play centred on Jerome’s appearances as a sideshow curiosity.
Like sliding panels, the knowns of Jerome’s story interchange with fantastical elements of the sideshow. A pair of conjoined twin sisters triple as childhood playmates, nosy housewives and features in Celestin Trahan’s sideshow. Jerome’s rescuers, Isobel Costa and her daughter Madeline, Father Richard, and the meddlesome Dr. Sanders likewise coexist in multiple frames of reality and dream.
“The headline from The Yarmouth Times, June 19, 1899, read ‘Jerome’ to be Exhibited,” says McKay. “Uncovering this bit of Jerome’s history haunted me from the start, taking me on a journey from the world of Acadian folklore to the world of sideshows and circus freaks. What brings one human being to abandon another? How do we measure the worth of an individual’s life? When lives intersect, who can say if we are curses or gifts to one another? Is it happenstance, fate, magic, divine intervention? As these questions stewed in my thoughts, I realized that the historical record held no answers. What had begun as an exercise in historical observation soon became a journey of unexpected twists and turns. In the end, it was the telling of his tale, with all its wild, varied facts and fictionsthat brought forth the ghosts of his truth.”
This book is a smyth-sewn paperback. The text is typeset in Polyphilus & Blado and printed offset on laid-finish paper making (estimated) 112 pages trimmed to 5 × 8 inches, bound into a paper cover and enfolded in a letterpress-printed jacket.
Disability may be his lot, but he decided long-ago not to let it control his fate. A collection of humorous essays centered on life with a disability. These essays give a wry look at the obstacles faced while growing up in a small town in Northern Ontario.
The only patch-wearing outlaw biker to become a sworn police officer — and live to tell his tale
In 1977, Wayne “Big Chuck” Bradshaw was Jersey tough. He was a member of the outlaw Pagans bike gang, a One Percenter, and had earned his colours in a world of boozing, bloody bar fights, and high-stakes crime. But after getting too close to extreme violence, Bradshaw made the life-threatening decision to change his path.
The toughness Bradshaw used to survive biker life led him to a distinguished and heroic career as an undercover narcotics officer for the same New Jersey police department that had once arrested him. Bradshaw tells his story with the truth of the streets, from his time in the U.S. Army to his decision to join the Pagans, to the wild adventures of working narcotic stings. He rode with truly dangerous criminals and then returned to those same places as a cop. He tracks down fugitives in Jersey’s toughest neighbourhoods, risks his life rescuing dozens from a fire in a seniors’ residence, and volunteers in the aftermath of 9/11.
Jersey Tough is an unflinching memoir of personal struggle, of battling with darkness, and ultimately of redemption.
Brandt travels to Jerusalem to visit a friend and to witness the intifada of occupied Palestine.”The good writers offer something new–new to them and new to you. Here Di Brandt collects three long poems that bring honour to our culture. The title sequence is a marvellous achievement. It is a love story filled with hope, yearning, beauty and sadness. I have never seen Palestine so clear.”–George Bowering
Teenage years can be complicated, even when you haven’t been abandoned by your mother at age ten. It is the 1980s and teenage Gemma lives with her well-meaning father, Nathaniel, goes to ‘art therapy’ once a week and tries to come to terms with growing up motherless. She collects facts about her long lost mother, Angie (height, weight, eye-colour, mint lip-gloss) and develops a rare syndrome she calls PMMSM, People-Make-Me-Stupid-Mad. Then comes the strange, almost unthinkable news: Angie is back, attending church in a nearby town. She is ready to return to motherhood, and to prove it, she has adopted a Korean infant. Then an invitation: would Gemma like to stay with a family in Angie’s community over the summer? Gemma, who has never had a friend in her life, suddenly finds herself living in a house full of God-fearing teenagers, and every Sunday, facing the prospect of maybe, just maybe, seeing a mother she is pretty sure she hates.