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Where writers are dangerous and sexy
Oct. 19th, 2007 09:25 pmVancouver has an annual literary festival, The International Writers & Readers Festival. Last year, ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
rythos42 and I went to a couple of events together, and we continued the tradition this year. Most events are what you expect from a literary event: darkened theaters, authors reading, and thoughtful discussions about character's motivations.
Last night's event was a little different. Our first clue that this wasn't quite the same as the other events we'd gone to was that there was a bar. After some confusion about how to buy a glass of wine (the process involved tracking down and buying tickets, then using the tickets to acquire alcoholic refreshment), we settled into seats. We were just discussing our expectations for the evening when the dance music came on. And then the go-go dancers came out.
There were three male go-go dancers. They wore American Apparel briefs, t-shirts, headbands, and white knee socks with stripes at the top. One was in green, one in red, and one in yellow. Green was really into it. He was dancing his little heart out, even pulling up his shirt to show his belly button and playing to the crowd. The other two seemed a little self-conscious, maybe because their underwear didn't fit as well as Green's did. If you are going to be showing your underwear, it's a good idea to make sure it fits your ass tightly. Baggy-bum is not sexy.
After the go-go dancers came some readings, featuring selections from a biography of Houdini written entirely in poetry, "the dirtiest story in my short story collection" (about a woman working on a sex website), a poet with very poet hair who brought wine to the reading stand and repeatedly, adorably, lied that he was calm, and the 3-Day Novel winner of 2006, The Convictions Of Leonard McKinley.
I had chosen this event in order to see the 3-Day writer, Brendan McLeod.rythos42 and I had both read his book ahead of time – and unintentionally almost scared Russ out of reading it with our veiled references to the story's almost-very-disturbing conclusion. It is a funny book... and it is even funnier when he reads it. I would like to propose that all authors who have to do readings should get training by slam poets first – Brendan and the other performance poet who read from her first novel were both wonderful to listen to.
More go-go dancing during the intermission – this time without the t-shirts. Green was still enthusiastic. We'd all been given a free copy of subTerrain magazine and I used was relieved to find it full of short stories and poems. The last time I was given a magazine for free, it was a surprise to me when it turned out to be full of furry porn. Not really my thing, but very educational.
After the intermission, an audience participation game called "Tops or Bottoms" for book prizes, followed by more readings: an author who apologized for being smashed before reading a very serious passage about a mother with dementia, a novel section about giant killer ants and a milk chicken bomb (I don't know), a piece about a bridesmaid having a fling with the wedding bartender in her parents' house, and a story about a couple who sleep in a cage to prevent the man's jealous pet chimp from attacking the girlfriend. The last author, Catherine Kidd, also performed one of her poems, which was a very interesting combination of science and politics and artistry, set to music. I wouldn't want to read it – I don't think it would very interesting on paper – but it was a great performance.
After the event was over,rythos42 and I hung out near Brendan McLeod until he extracted himself from another conversation. I told him that I'd also done the contest and all three of us, along with a friend of his who had also done the 3-Day twice, commiserated on the problems of writing fast (making characters walk off cliffs, sudden earthquakes, and multiple kidnappings).
He hated his novel after writing it and didn't think it would win (which doesn't give me any hope that my novel that I hate has any chance of winning, but it is interesting given that I love his novel).
He said that the published novel is pretty close to what he wrote during the contest; he added about ten pages, took out the parts where random characters he didn't need anymore ended up walking off of cliffs, and fixed the ending so that it actually was what he'd intended it to be when writing the original manuscript. Which took us to talking about the ending (which I won't spoil; read the book!) and I think he was pleased that we'd already read the book (rather than just having bought it at the table at the other side of the room) so we could share in the joke when he told us that a middle school decided to give copies away as prizes, only to find that they really should have read the whole book first and not just the first couple of pages and that parents weren't terribly pleased with this particular literary prize. Brendan sent them some more youth-friendly and parent-pleasing poetry recordings as replacements, even though he had told them that their plan was a bad one, and one of them surely should have been able to read all 111 pages.
He signed my book, adding "P.S., Do cocaine!"
rythos42 and I went to a couple of events together, and we continued the tradition this year. Most events are what you expect from a literary event: darkened theaters, authors reading, and thoughtful discussions about character's motivations.Last night's event was a little different. Our first clue that this wasn't quite the same as the other events we'd gone to was that there was a bar. After some confusion about how to buy a glass of wine (the process involved tracking down and buying tickets, then using the tickets to acquire alcoholic refreshment), we settled into seats. We were just discussing our expectations for the evening when the dance music came on. And then the go-go dancers came out.
There were three male go-go dancers. They wore American Apparel briefs, t-shirts, headbands, and white knee socks with stripes at the top. One was in green, one in red, and one in yellow. Green was really into it. He was dancing his little heart out, even pulling up his shirt to show his belly button and playing to the crowd. The other two seemed a little self-conscious, maybe because their underwear didn't fit as well as Green's did. If you are going to be showing your underwear, it's a good idea to make sure it fits your ass tightly. Baggy-bum is not sexy.
After the go-go dancers came some readings, featuring selections from a biography of Houdini written entirely in poetry, "the dirtiest story in my short story collection" (about a woman working on a sex website), a poet with very poet hair who brought wine to the reading stand and repeatedly, adorably, lied that he was calm, and the 3-Day Novel winner of 2006, The Convictions Of Leonard McKinley.
I had chosen this event in order to see the 3-Day writer, Brendan McLeod.
rythos42 and I had both read his book ahead of time – and unintentionally almost scared Russ out of reading it with our veiled references to the story's almost-very-disturbing conclusion. It is a funny book... and it is even funnier when he reads it. I would like to propose that all authors who have to do readings should get training by slam poets first – Brendan and the other performance poet who read from her first novel were both wonderful to listen to. More go-go dancing during the intermission – this time without the t-shirts. Green was still enthusiastic. We'd all been given a free copy of subTerrain magazine and I used was relieved to find it full of short stories and poems. The last time I was given a magazine for free, it was a surprise to me when it turned out to be full of furry porn. Not really my thing, but very educational.
After the intermission, an audience participation game called "Tops or Bottoms" for book prizes, followed by more readings: an author who apologized for being smashed before reading a very serious passage about a mother with dementia, a novel section about giant killer ants and a milk chicken bomb (I don't know), a piece about a bridesmaid having a fling with the wedding bartender in her parents' house, and a story about a couple who sleep in a cage to prevent the man's jealous pet chimp from attacking the girlfriend. The last author, Catherine Kidd, also performed one of her poems, which was a very interesting combination of science and politics and artistry, set to music. I wouldn't want to read it – I don't think it would very interesting on paper – but it was a great performance.
After the event was over,
rythos42 and I hung out near Brendan McLeod until he extracted himself from another conversation. I told him that I'd also done the contest and all three of us, along with a friend of his who had also done the 3-Day twice, commiserated on the problems of writing fast (making characters walk off cliffs, sudden earthquakes, and multiple kidnappings). He hated his novel after writing it and didn't think it would win (which doesn't give me any hope that my novel that I hate has any chance of winning, but it is interesting given that I love his novel).
He said that the published novel is pretty close to what he wrote during the contest; he added about ten pages, took out the parts where random characters he didn't need anymore ended up walking off of cliffs, and fixed the ending so that it actually was what he'd intended it to be when writing the original manuscript. Which took us to talking about the ending (which I won't spoil; read the book!) and I think he was pleased that we'd already read the book (rather than just having bought it at the table at the other side of the room) so we could share in the joke when he told us that a middle school decided to give copies away as prizes, only to find that they really should have read the whole book first and not just the first couple of pages and that parents weren't terribly pleased with this particular literary prize. Brendan sent them some more youth-friendly and parent-pleasing poetry recordings as replacements, even though he had told them that their plan was a bad one, and one of them surely should have been able to read all 111 pages.
He signed my book, adding "P.S., Do cocaine!"
