Wine and Words: Dimsum with the Authors

May 5th, 1.00pm – 3.00pm (PST) at Floata Restaurant.

Join Word Vancouver and the LiterASIAN Festival to once again swap stories, feast on dim sum, and meet an incredible lineup of authors!

Join Word Vancouver and the LiterASIAN Festival for an afternoon of food and festivities! This fundraiser will include dim sum, wine tastings, author readings, and live and silent auctions. All event proceeds go to supporting this year’s Word Vancouver literary festival in September.

Registration: Tickets are $75, and discounted at $70 each when purchasing 8 (a full table).


Featured Authors: Joy Kogawa, Lindsay Wong, Ujjal Dosanjh, Keiko Honda, Jennilee Austria-Bonifacio, and Angie Wong (Hosted by: JJ Lee)

Between Bowls of Borrowed Rice: Harvesting Hope Through Storytelling

 

May 4th, 6.00pm – 7.30pm (PST) at Chinatown Storytelling Centre.

Panel featuring Lindsay Wong, Ujjal Dosanjh, Keiko Honda, and Jennilee Austria-Bonifacio

Join us for an enriching evening of cultural exploration and storytelling as we delve into the fascinating tapestry of the past to uncover stories that resonate with the present. Immerse yourself in captivating tales from the past as our speakers skillfully unearth stories that have long been hidden in the folds of time. From ancient traditions to personal anecdotes, discover the threads that bind us to our heritage. This panel of knowledgeable and passionate writers who will share their expertise on personal and historical narratives, cultural heritage, and the art of storytelling. Experience a sense of connection as we celebrate the diverse cultural tapestry that enriches our Asian Canadian communities.

Registration: 

“Between Bowls of Borrowed Rice: Reaching Into the Past for Stories of the Present”

Chinatown Storytelling Centre, 168 E Pender St, Vancouver, BC V6A 1T3

Laughing Back at Empire - Asian Canadian Activism

May 4th, 4:00pm – 5.00pm (PST) at Centre A.

Panel featuring Angie Wong, Cheuk Kwan, and Todd Wong

A ground-breaking book about the Asianasian, one of Canada’s first anti-racist, anti- sexist, and anti-homophobic magazines, “Laughing Back at Empire” recounts the significance of this seven-year run publication that established a national platform for then-emerging Asian Canadian writers, artists, musicians, activists, and scholars such as SKY Lee, Jim Wong-Chu, Joy Kogawa, Himani Bannerji, and Paul Yee.

As a small but mighty magazine that led a nation-wide dialogue for all Canadians on the struggles and social issues that concerned Asians in Canada, the magazine inspired and paved the way for succeeding generations of Asian Canadian magazines, including Ricepaper Magazine. Join us as one of the founders of The Asianadian, Cheuk Kwan, moderates this session with author Angie Wong and ACWW President, Todd Wong.

Centre A: Vancouver International Centre for Contemporary Asian Art, 268 Keefer St Unit 205, Vancouver, BC V6A 1X5

Registration: “Laughing Back at Empire – Asian Canadian Activism”

From the Lost and Found Department with Joy Kogawa

 

May 4th, 2.00pm – 3.00pm (PST) at Vancouver Japanese Language School.

A career-spanning volume that brings together new and selected works by an iconic voice in Canadian literature. From the Lost and Found Department, by the trailblazing Joy Kogawa, is a profound work of spare, trenchant, and haunting poems that lets us stay with the quietest qualities of beauty and the sublime.

This essential volume brings together thrilling new work with selected poems from The Splintered Moon (1967), A Choice of Dreams (1974), Jericho Road (1977), Woman In the Woods (1985), and A Garden of Anchors: Selected Poems (2003).

Kogawa’s poems here are evidence that our every vulnerability can open into vast channels of grace.

Vancouver Japanese Language School & Japanese Hall, 487 Alexander St, Vancouver, BC V6A 1C6

Registration: “From the Lost and Found Department with Joy Kogawa”

LiterASIAN Writers Festival 2024 in Toronto

 

Join us for the LiterASIAN Writers Festival in Toronto!

We invite you to the LiterASIAN Toronto 2024 event, hosted at the Cheng Yu Tung East Asian Library in collaboration with The Asian Canadian Writers’ Workshop (ACWW). This year’s theme is Recovery, where writers engage in a literary dialogue towards fostering cultural understanding, promoting diversity, and amplifying Asian Canadian voices. Through exploration, the panellists collectively navigate pathways toward recovery.

• This event is free, and all are welcome to attend.
• Space is limited, registration is required in advance by MAY 15th.

Date: Wednesday, May 22, 2024
Time: 2:00 p.m. - 4:30 p.m. (EDT)

Location: The Cheng Yu Tung East Asian Library, 8th Floor, Robarts Library, 130 St. George Street, Toronto

Registration Link: https://forms.gle/VqdWHF5a38DrrBTy9

LiterASIAN is a proud celebration of Canadian writers and artists of Asian heritage and their valuable contributions to Canada’s amazing literary and artistic scenes.

 

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Panelists

Marjorie Chan was born in Toronto. She is a writer, director and dramaturge in opera and theatre. Her published works include her plays China Doll, and Lady Sunrise, both nominated for the Governor General’s Literary Award. Other produced plays include A Nanking Winter, The Madness of the Square, Tails from the City, and most recently The Year of the Cello, co-created with composer Njo Kong Kie. Her writing for opera includes Sanctuary Song, The Lesson of Da Ji, M’dea Undone, The Monkiest King, and The Nightingale of A Thousand Songs. Nominated for ten Dora Awards variously as a writer, actor, director, and the recipient of four. Marjorie has also received the K.M. Hunter Artists Award, Entertainment World Award (Best New Work), Harold Award, Bra D’Or Award, as well as the George Luscombe Award for Mentorship. Currently, she is adapting the novel Do Not Say We Have Nothing by Madeleine Thien into an opera with composer Tim Brady. Marjorie is also the Artistic Director of Theatre Passe Muraille, with a focus on innovative new Canadian works in Toronto.



Denise Chong is the author of prize-winning books that portray the lives of ordinary people caught in the eye of history. She is best known for her family memoir, The Concubine's Children, which is being adapted for film. Her previous books include The Girl in the Picture, about the napalm girl of the Vietnam War; Egg on Mao, a story of love and defiance in China of 1989; and Lives of the Family: Stories of Fate and Circumstance, about Chinese who immigrated to Canada in the mid-20th century. In 2013, she was appointed an Officer of the Order of Canada for "writing books that raise our social consciousness." She currently lives in Ottawa.




Janika Oza is the author of the novel A History of Burning, winner of the 2024 Asian/Pacific American Award for Literature, a finalist for the 2023 Governor General's Award for Fiction, and a New York Times Editor’s Choice. She is the winner of a 2022 O. Henry Prize for Short Fiction and the 2020 Kenyon Review Short Fiction Award. She is an assistant editor at The Rumpus and lives in Toronto.



Linda Rui Feng is Associate Professor at the Department of East Asian Studies, University of Toronto. Her research in Chinese cultural history often takes her to long-forgotten books from the ninth century and, more recently, the history of scent and aromatics. She is the author of the novel Swimming Back to Trout River, which was longlisted for the 2021 Scotia Giller Prize, and a finalist for the Center for Fiction First Novel Prize, and the 2022 William Saroyan International Prize for Writing. Her fiction has been supported by residencies at MacDowell and by the Toronto Arts Council, and her prose and poetry have appeared in journals such as The Fiddlehead, Kenyon Review Online, and Washington Square Review.

Moderator

Larissa Lai is the author of nine books, including, The Lost Century, The Tiger Flu, Salt Fish Girl, and Iron Goddess of Mercy. She is the recipient of the Jim Duggins Novelist's Prize, the Lambda Literary Award, the Astraea Award, and the Otherwise Honor Book. She has also been a finalist for the Books in Canada First Novel Award and the Governor General's Award. She has held a Canada Research Chair in Creative Writing at the University of Calgary and a Maria Zambrano Fellowship at the University of Huelva. She holds the Richard Charles Lee Chair of Chinese Canadian Studies at the University of Toronto.

 

  

 

 

 

 

"Denise Chong: Out of Darkness" at Vancouve Public Library on Saturday, April 27, 2024

How do you rebuild a life after being blinded by an act of unspeakable violence?

In 2011, news about Rumana Monzur shocked the world: her husband brutally assaulted her in front of her children when she returned home to Bangladesh, after completing her graduate studies at the University of British Columbia. The attack left her blind.

In her new biography Out of Darkness, Denise Chong goes beyond the headlines to tell Rumana’s story: one not only of betrayal, abuse and tyranny but also of loyalty, perseverance, and a woman’s determination to rebuild a life with meaning.

Denise will discuss her book with award-winning writer and poet, Renée Sarojini Saklikar.

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Denise Chong is an award-winning author whose work portrays the lives of ordinary people caught in the eye of history. She is best known for her family memoir, The Concubine's Children; The Girl in the Picture about the napalm girl of the Vietnam War; and Egg on Mao, a story of love and defiance in China of 1989.

Renée Sarojini Saklikar is the author of five books and was poet laureate for the City of Surrey 2015–2018. Her books include the award-winning Children of Air India and Listening to the Bees. Her poetry, essays and short fiction have appeared in many literary magazines and anthologies, including Exile Editions, Chatelaine, The Capilano Review, and Pulp Literature. Bramah's Quest is the latest volume of her epic fantasy in verse, THOT J BAP, The Heart of This Journey Bears All Patterns. Renée Sarojini teaches creative writing and editing at Kwantlen Polytechnic University and hosts Lunch Poems at SFU.

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This event is part of Uplift Asian, a programming series at VPL designed to celebrate Asian cultures and perspectives, and push back against discrimination in our communities.

Registration