Chris Ewart interviewed for 'Freedom to Read Week'

Chris Ewart, author of Miss Lamp, was interviewed in FFWD Weekly this past Thursday about his participation in a Freedom to Read event happening February 28:<!--newline--><!--newline-->BOOKENDS<!--newline-->by MARK HOPKINS<!--newline-->Against all odds?<!--newline-->Freedom to Read Week starts<!--newline--><!--newline-->The Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms guarantees Canadians the freedom of expression, and from February 25 to March 3, the Freedom of Expression Committee sponsors a nation-wide awareness campaign to remind us that our rights need to be upheld, defended and celebrated.<!--newline--><!--newline-->Censorship may seem like a foreign concept, not to mention a dirty word, in Canada, but that doesn’t stop books from being removed from library shelves or banned at the border. For a well-publicized example of Canadian censorship, we need look no further than the Little Sisters Book and Art Emporium’s more than 20-year ongoing struggle with the Canada Customs and Revenue Agency. For more information about Freedom to Read Week, or about censorship in Canada, check out www.freedomtoread.ca.<!--newline--><!--newline-->There are a number of Freedom to Read events this week, including a visit to City Hall. This year’s official book is Val Ross’s You Can’t Read This, a history of reading that documents the struggle against censorship from Empress Shotoku in ancient Japan, to Ghengis Khan’s brother, to modern Afghanistan. A copy of the book will be presented to Calgary City Council on February 26 at 9:00 a.m., at City Council Chambers in City Hall.<!--newline--><!--newline-->The Writers Guild of Alberta gets into the spirit of things with Writing Freely and the Impact of Censorship, a discussion that internalizes the issue of censorship. Chris Ewart, local writer and author of Miss Lamp, joins up with psychologist Janet McMahen, a regular contributor to Calgary’s Child Magazine, Fast Forward and an Alberta Anthology writing contest winner, to chat about the creative process, motivation, confidence and self-censorship.<!--newline--><!--newline-->I managed to nab a phone interview with Ewart on his way to the airport to catch a flight to Cuba, where he’s excited to observe another culture’s perspective on censorship and maybe bring home some stories for the discussion. "I think a privilege of living in a society where censorship isn’t very prevalent is that we can look at it on a different level," he says. "Like, now that you’ve written what you wanted to write, did you censor yourself during that process? Why or why not?"<!--newline--><!--newline-->When Ewart was writing his novel, he ran into the question of how to best portray deviance, violence, sexuality and disability. "Sometimes stories are too explicit or too forward," he says. "You need to leave information for the readers to discover. There are certain scenes where I did pull back, because I wanted to avoid the sensational for sensationalism’s sake."<!--newline--><!--newline-->The discussion will be followed by a reading of Miss Lamp, during which Ewart will read from chapters that illustrate his balancing act with self-censorship. "There’s a scene where Banana Tray Hair goes to a meeting of the Unionized Workers of Safeway, and one of her lines is ‘Don’t fuck with the sign,’" he says. "I think that’s the only time I dropped an F-bomb in the book, and even then I thought, ‘If I swear in this book, does that close off certain audience possibilities?’ I’ll be reading a selection of chapters like that one, where I actually thought twice before I typed in what I was thinking."<!--newline--><!--newline-->The discussion/reading takes place February 28 at 7:00 p.m., on the third floor of the Rose & Crown Pub. It’s free for WGA members and $5 for everyone else. "I won’t lie to you," says Ewart, "I’m sure some of my best writing has come out of discussions fuelled by a few drinks."<!--newline--><!--newline-->British Columbian author/counsellor Andrea Nair hits town this week with Stripped Down Running, her first novel. A traumatic childhood forces Hanna Friesen to throw away the perfect life she’s built for herself and confront her inner darkness lest she become engulfed by it. Nair reads from her novel on February 22 at 7:00 p.m., at McNally Robinson.<!--newline--><!--newline-->It’s time for the sixth annual CBC Poetry Face-Off. The Canada-wide competition commissions 70 poets from 14 cities to write and perform poems based on this year’s theme – "made in Canada." The Calgary competitors will be Wakefield Brewster, Möe Clark, Jordan Dack, Rosemary Griebel and Kirk Ramdath. Hosted by CBC’s Katherine Duncan, the event will be held on February 22 at 7:30 p.m., at the Auburn Saloon. Come to cheer on our local poets, and to see who will become the regional winner to proceed into the national competition.<!--newline--><!--newline-->Nature photographer Darwin Wiggett has published 10 pictorial books, and he appears this week with a slideshow presentation of photographs from the Canadian Rockies. You can see his breathtaking work on February 27 at 7:00 p.m., at the Crowfoot Library.<!--newline--><!--newline-->And don’t forget filling Station magazine’s monthly flywheel series, next Thursday, where flywheel will be hijacked by the University of Calgary’s NoD Magazine. Join me, the effervescent host, for readings by Douglas Briggs, Sarah Gibbs, Diana Lyuber and Paul William Zits on March 1 at 7:30 p.m., at McNally Robinson.<!--newline--><!--newline-->Also, note that the presentation of the CBC Radio literary awards has changed to Friday 23 at 8 p.m. on Radio 1.