The Capilano Review

Lecture Series

In 1999, The Capilano Review joined the Leon & Thea Koerner Foundation, the Capilano College English Department and Humanities Division, and the Capilano College Foundation to launch a Lecture Series that would bring noted writers, academics, and artists to Capilano College to address students, faculty, and members of the community. The series ran regularly until 2006.

• Dan Bilsker
• Laura Marks
• Hadani Ditmars
• Penny Le Couteur
• Ingrid de Kok
• Ruth Scheuing
• August Kleinzahler
• Peter Quartermain
• Judith Forst
• Margaret Somerville
• Frank Davey
• George Bowering
• Eleanor Wachtel
• Stanley Coren
• John Keane
• Gwynne Dyer
• Michael Turner
• Nettie Wild
• Duncan McNaughton

21 March 2006

Dan Bilsker

“Antidepressant Skills Training: Emotional Self-management for Young Adults”

This talk tells the story of an ambitious project to provide training in management of negative emotions like sadness or despair, designed to help overcome or prevent depression. The skills training approach is especially relevant to young adults, who are learning to cope with a world and self in flux. Two aspects of emotional self-management will be explored: the explicit purpose of the antidepressant skills training, to overcome or prevent clinical depression; and an implicit purpose, to provide a psychological-coping narrative as an alternative to contemporary 'biologizing' of intense negative emotions.

Dr. Bilsker consults to the Centre for Applied Research in Mental Health and Addictions at Simon Fraser University and works in the psychiatric emergency service of Vancouver General Hospital. He is a Clinical Assistant Professor in the Department of Psychiatry, University of British Columbia. He has published journal articles in these areas and has produced Self-Care manuals for adolescents and adults that are available for free download on the web.

16 February 2006

Laura Marks

“Taking a Line for a Walk”

One of the common qualities of both classical Islamic art and contemporary computer-based art is that the work of art plays out in time. Laura Marks illustrates what she calls a “performativity” in terms of the relationship between point and line, tracing the latter as a living, directional, potentially infinite movement from Islamic calligraphy to vector graphics.

Dr. Marks is Dena Wosk University Professor in Art and Culture Studies School for the Contemporary Arts at Simon Fraser University. Her interests include non-Western approaches to media technologies; representation of the senses; and Arab and African cinema. Author of The Skin of the Film: Intercultural Cinema, Embodiment, and the Senses (Duke University Press) and Touch: Sensuous Theory and Multisensory Media (University of Minnesota Press).

30 November 2005

Hadani Ditmars

“Dancing in the No Fly Zone: A Woman's Journey Through Iraq”

Join us for a multimedia presentation, complete with live music by Iraqi oud master Serwan Yamolky and video footage, complimenting Ditmars' unique narration of her travels and work in present-day Iraq. When Hadani Ditmars first went to Iraq in 1997 for the New York Times, she was shocked at what she saw. Six years of the worst sanctions ever inflicted on a modern nation had brought the people to their knees. Yet there was so much more to the "cradle of civilization" than misery and suffering. In the midst of despair she found art, beauty, architecture, music. She discovered orchestras who played impassioned symphonies on wrecked instruments, playwrights who pushed the limits of censorship, artists who spent their last dinars on paint and canvas, families who still celebrated weddings by dancing to makam--traditional love songs.

Hadani Ditmars is an international journalist based in Canada and the author of the bestseller, Dancing in the No Fly Zone: a Woman's Journey Through Iraq, a book that provides a unique perspective on the troubled nation both before and after the US invasion. Amid a sea of books written by mainly male, U.S. correspondents with little experience of pre-invasion Iraq, Dancing in the No Fly Zone celebrates the culture and humanity of a place that has been demonized, bombed and tyrannized for decades.

9 November 2004

Penny Le Couteur

“The Story Behind Napoleon's Buttons”

Penny Le Couteur, Dean of Arts and Science at Capilano College, will speak about her best-selling book Napoleon's Buttons: How 17 Molecules Changed History and the revelations -- scientific, historical and literary ¬-- that she encountered in the process of writing her first book.

Dr. Penny Le Couteur is the Dean of Arts and Science at Capilano College where she has taught chemistry for the past 36 years. She has a PhD in Physical Organic Chemistry from the University of California, Santa Barbara, and a MSc and BSc from the University of Auckland in New Zealand. She recently published Napolean's Buttons: How 17 Molecules Changed History with Penguin Putnam. She is a member of and past-president of both the Society for Canadian Women in Science and Technology and the College of Chemistry Canada.

28 March 2004

Ingrid de Kok

“'Verbs that move mountains': Commitment and the Lyric Poem”

The lecture reflects on the nature of a poem’s authority in the public sphere. As de Kok explains: “In many countries that have experienced repression or great social change, poetry becomes present as witness or mobilizing force. South Africa is no exception. But what does it mean to write a committed lyric poem? Is there such a thing? Should there be?”

Ingrid de Kok grew up in Stilfontein, a gold mining town in South Africa. In 1977 she emigrated to Ontario, Canada and returned to Cape Town in 1984. She has a MA from Queen’s University. Her poetry books, Familiar Ground, Transfer, and Terrestrial Things were published in South Africa and her work has been given much attention in Europe, the US, and Canada. It has been translated into Italian, Japanese, French, and Dutch.

6 April 2003

Ruth Scheuing

“Unravelled: On Textiles, Art, Language and Technology”

What does a knitted Balaclava hat by Rosemary Trockel have in common with Joseph Beuys’ piano all covered in industrial felt; or a quilt, with a series of stealth bombers by Barbara Todd, have with Kai Chan's sculptures and body pieces made of toothpicks; or Ann Newdigate's tapestries depicting a mysterious text with Debra Sparrows weaving of contemporary Salish blankets. And what did Ada Lovelace mean with her famous quote in 1843: “The Analytical Engine weaves algebraic patterns just as the Jacquard loom weaves flowers and leaves”? This is all part of contemporary art and the ways textiles express ideas.

Ruth Scheuing has been teaching in the Textile Arts Program at Capilano College since 1992. She is an artist who works with textiles and explores textiles as language and myth. Her works have been exhibited across Canada and internationally and she received the Chalmers Award in Crafts in 1996. She was a contributing co-editor of a book of essays entitled material matters: the Art and Culture of Contemporary Textiles, published in 1998. Currently she is working on a series of computer-assisted Jacquard weavings that explore various historical floral textile patterns as representations of nature.

9 March 2003

August Kleinzahler

“The Wood-thrush in the Burning Cineplex”

San Francisco poet August Kleinzahler will discuss the experience of the poet in the city: 1855-1965 in Paris and New York.

August Kleinzahler is the author of seven collections of poetry, the most recent being Live from the Hong Kong Nile Club (2000) and Red Sauce, Whiskey and Snow (1995), both published by Farrar Strauss and Giroux in the US and by Faber in the UK. His poems have also appeared in The New Yorker, the New York Times, Harper’s, and The London Review of Books. Of local interest, August Kleinzahler received his BA in English from the University of Victoria where he studied with the British poet Basil Bunting in 1971-72.

26 January 2003

Peter Quartermain

“Inventing a Life: An Autobiographical Mutter”

Inventing a Life will reflect, sometimes anecdotally, on the puzzles confronting the writer of autobiography; the subtitle, An Autobiographical Mutter, points to the tentative and uncertain nature of this, and indeed all, discourse.

Since retiring in 1999 as Professor of English at the University of British Columbia, Peter Quartermain has been writing his autobiography and practising the art of water-colour painting. Among his publications are Disjunctive Poetics: from Gertrude Stein and Louis Zukofsky to Susan Howe (Cambridge UP), Basil Bunting: Poet of the North (Basil Bunting Poetry Archive), (with Ric Caddel) Other: English and Irish Poetry since 1970 (Wesleyan UP) and (with Rachel Blau DuPlessis) The Objectivist Nexus: Essays in Cultural Poetics (U of Alabama P). He and his wife Meredith Quartermain run Keefer Street Press. Samples of his mail-art have appeared in exhibitions curated by English artist John Furnival in England, France, and Germany.

21 April 2002

Judith Forst

“My Life in Music”

The British Columbia-born mezzo-soprano will present a lecture about her musical career. Judith Forst has performed to great acclaim in the world’s leading opera houses. She is a recipient of the Order of Canada, the Order of British Columbia, and of and of two honorary degrees (UBC and U Vic). Her recording of “From the Diary of Anne Frank” with the CBC Vancouver Orchestra was a 2000 Juno Award winner. Ms Forst has just returned from Holland where she performed to great acclaim with the Netherlands Opera in Amsterdam: other recent successes include performances with the Czech National Opera in Prague, with the New York Metropolitan Opera, the Canadian Opera Company, and world premieres in San Francisco and Washington DC. She will be performing the role of Clytemnestra this spring in the Vancouver Opera Association’s new production of Richard Strauss’ “Elektra.” Judith Forst has been a staunch supporter of new composers, fellow performers, directors and conductors. Each year, she performs benefit concerts and gives her time and energy to volunteer and fundraising projects throughout B.C.

23 March 2002

Margaret Somerville

“From A Teenager's Dying Wish to Human Cloning: The Ethics of the Everyday and the Avant-Garde”

Doing ethics means asking, "Is it right?" In post-modern, pluralistic, multicultural, technologized, secular, democratic societies such as Canada, we must pose that question in an increasingly wide range of situations. Some of these situations are not new, but are seen in new ways – for instance, a dying teenage boy wants to experience sexual intercourse. Others are unprecedented – for example, establishing a "human embryo manufacturing plant" to produce therapies for the rest of us. The conflicts of values these situations raise and the ethics that may govern them will be explored in this lecture.

Margaret Somerville is Gale Professor of Law, professor in the Faculty of Medicine, and founding director of the McGill Centre for Medicine, Ethics, and Law at McGill University. She is also the author of The Ethical Canary: Science, Society, and the Human Spirit (Viking/Penguin, 2000) and of Death Talk: The Case Against Euthanasia and Physician-Assisted Suicide (McGill-Queen's University Press, 2002).

Two additional sponsors: The Hon. Thomas A. Dohm Q.C. Lecture Series, Women's Studies/International Women's Day Committee.

19 October 2001

Frank Davey

“Bar Codes on TISH: Publishing Little Magazines in an Era of Global Capitalism”

This lecture celebrates the 40th anniversary of TISH (1961-69), a magazine the National Library of Canada calls “the most influential and controversial little magazine of its generation.”

Frank Davey was chief editor of the first 19 issues of TISH. For 35 years, he has edited Open Letter, a magazine of poetry and theory. Together with Fred Wah, Davey founded Swift Current, the first ever literary e-journal. He is currently Carl F. Klinck Professor of Canadian Literature at the University of Western Ontario in London, Ontario.

A panel of speakers – Sharon Thesen, Jason LeHeup, Derek Beaulieu, Russ Rickey, Susan Clark, and Michael Barnholden – will respond to Davey’s lecture.

27 May 2001

George Bowering

“Jabez: How to Turn an Orphan into a Chestnut”

Using his much-anthologized poem “Grandfather” as a starting point, George Bowering will present reflections on his own career as a poet and on the history of modern Canadian poetry. One of Canada’s best-loved poets and internationally known, Bowering is a prolific writer of fiction (Shoot!, The Rain Barrel, Burning Water), nonfiction (Bowering’s B.C.), and poetry (Kerrisdale Elegies, Blondes on Bikes). He has won the Governor General’s Award for poetry (1969) and for fiction (1980). His most recent book, a poetic memoir, His Life was shortlisted for the latest Governor General’s Awards. George Bowering has been published by TCR throughout his career, and will next appear in the resurrected TISH in Volume 2 of Host: A Small Magazines Anthology (TCR 2:34).

11 March 2001

Eleanor Wachtel

“The Lives of Writers”

Eleanor Wachtel is the much admired and lauded host of CBC’s “Writers and Company”. When the show won a CBC award for programming excellence, judges noted that “Writers and Company” would be their choice if they were allowed one hour of radio on a desert island. Selections of her interviews have been published in Writers & Company (1993) and More Writers and Company (1996). Eleanor Wachtel also hosts the celebrated radio show “The Arts Today.” She has received two honorary degrees: D.Litt from St. Thomas University (1999) and D.Litt. from Athabasca University (2000).

22 October 2000

Stanley Coren

“The Mind and Language of Dogs”

Stanley Coren is the author of the books How to Speak Dog: Mastering the Art of Dog Human Communication, What Do Dogs Know, and The Intelligence of Dogs. A Fellow of the Royal Society for his contributions to psychological research, Coren’s work has covered many areas in psychology, including human vision and hearing, neuropsychology, laterality, sleep, birth stress, behavior genetics, cognitive processing, and handedness. He did his undergraduate work at the University of Pennsylvania and completed his Psychology Doctorate at Stanford. Coren is also the Director of the Human Neuropsychology and Perception Laboratory at UBC.

Coren is well-known to the public and the media, having done various television and radio spots including CBS Good Morning America, NBC Today Show, Canada AM, The Fifth Estate, Oprah Winfrey, Dini Petty, The Vicki Gaberaux Show, with CBC’s Arthur Black, Quirks and Quarks in Canada, and many others. Print coverage has been in The New York Times, the Globe and Mail, USA Today, Time Magazine, Maclean’s, Saturday Night, Omni, Discovery, and The Smithsonian.

9 November 1999

John Keane

“The Political Tragedy of Vaclav Havel”

John Keane is Professor Politics at the University of Westminster and Director of the Centre for the Study of Democracy. Born in Australia and educated at the universities of Adelaide, Toronto, and Cambridge, he has been awarded many scholarships and prizes. In 1992, he was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts. He has written ten books, including The Media and Democracy, which has been translated into sixteen languages, and is a frequent contributor to radio, television, newspapers, and magazines. The Times recently ranked him as one of Britain’s leading political thinkers and writers whose work has “world-wide importance."

12 March 2000

Gwynne Dyer

“Democratic Overdog: Strategy, Morality, and Etiquette for the New Masters of the Universe”

Gwynne Dyer’s twice-weekly column on international affairs is published in 175 newspapers in 45 countries. Born in Newfoundland and with degrees in history from Canadian, American, and British universities, he has served in three navies and held academic appointments at the Royal Military Academy Sandhurst and at Oxford University.

In the mid-1980s, his seven-part documentary television series War was aired in 45 countries, and one episode, “The Profession of Arms,” was nominated for an Academy Award. The accompanying book won the Columbia University School of Journalism award. The 1994 series, The Human Race, examined the roots, nature, and future of human politics, and his 1995 series, Protection Force, focused on the peacekeepers in Bosnia. His radio documentaries include The Gorbachev Revolution and Millenium.

19 February 1999

Michael Turner

“The Tyranny of Genre, or Why Listen to Peter Gzowski When You Can Talk About Contemporary Writing?”

Michael Turner addresses issues of genre, modernism, experimentation, recent trends in Can Lit in relation to “our” international profile, and will explain “how Peter Gzowski has ruined writing in this country.” He will also relate these issues to selections from his own work, from the documentary poems of Company Town (Arsenal Pulp Press) to his forthcoming book, The Pornographer’s Poem (Doubleday Canada). Michael Turner is the author of four books, including the novel-in-verse Hard Core Logo, which was made into an award-winning motion picture. American Whiskey Bar, Turner’s latest book, was recently made into a short film by City TV.

7 March 1999

Nettie Wild

“Outside Eyes: Art, Politics, Contradictions”

In this lecture Nettie Wild will show selections from her recent documentary, A Place Called Chiapas, and will discuss the relationships she sees between the politics of Mexico and Canada. She will also speak about “the role an artist plays in relation to political movements where the stakes are high.” Wild’s other award-winning films include A Rustling of Leaves: Inside the Philippine Revolution (1989) and Blockade (1993). She is travelling North America and Europe to attend screenings of A Place Called Chiapas, which was also broadcast as a two hour prime time special on CBC TV this last fall.

19 March 1999

Duncan McNaughton

“another set / of circumstance: Poetry & Historical Geography”

In this lecture Duncan McNaughton will discuss the relationship between poetry, history, and geography, arguing there is no history without geography, and that poetry as a form is central to contemporary thought. He will read from and speak to the work in his most recent book, another set / of circumstance. (hawkhaven). He has published over eleven volumes of poetry, including the wrapped church (Blue Millennium/AIOU), Kicking the Feather (First Intensity), and Valparaiso (Listening Chamber).