CanLit lightly roasted
Anansi’s Scott Griffin and Ken Whyte pondering name change over appropriation concerns
Storied Canadian publishing house House of Anansi may be in for a new name according to rumours swirling around the press. Anansi’s newest board member, and noted lifelong opponent of cultural appropriation, Ken Whyte, reportedly advised Anansi’s owner Scott Griffin that “our founders were white guys who clearly just helped themselves to a piece of African culture for their own personal gain without ever making any kind of commitment to systematically uplifting the African voices in their midst. I speak of course of African-Canadians who have been part of this land’s diverse history since at least the seventeenth century! It’s a miracle you haven’t been Dundas-Ryerson’d already!” Griffin, founder of The Griffin Poetry Prize, Canada’s most prestigious poetry prize for foreigners, could not be reached for comment.
Michael Redhill out as poetry editor of Iguana Books
CanLit stalwart Michael Redhill is out as the poetry editor of Iguana Books. Newly appointed Iguana Books General Manager, Kwame Eff and Redhill have made a mutual decision to part ways after 16 years.
“I was really intrigued by the potential for Iguana Books to offer a literarily credible hybrid publishing alternative for poets who don’t fit in with the traditional presses. When I heard Michael was our poetry editor, and had worked on award winning Canadian poet and writing instructor Kateri Lanthier’s debut collection Reporting From the Night, I instantly began thinking about how we could get a slice of Canada’s lucrative poetry industry.” said Eff.
“On speaking with Michael however, I discovered that the Giller Prize winning author and celebrated poet hadn’t turned up for work since finishing the edit on Kateri’s collection. I understand taking time off after a major project, but 16 years of absenteeism struck me as excessive.”
When reached for comment, Redhill said “I have no idea what you’re talking about. I did one freelance gig I think over 15 years ago. I think Kwame is using my name to generate interest in whatever it is he’s doing now. Did he really say lucrative poetry industry?”
Thomas King joins Sweetwater Workshops as peer mentor
Award winning writer and photographer Thomas King has joined author Joseph Boyden’s Sweetwater Workshops as a peer mentor. King is the best selling author of Medicine River; Green Grass, Running Water; One Good Story, That One; Truth and Bright Water; A Short History of Indians in Canada; The Back of the Turtle (winner of the Governor General’s Literary Award for Fiction); The Inconvenient Indian (winner of the RBC Taylor Prize); Sufferance; the DreadfulWater mystery series; Indians on Vacation (winner of the Stephen Leacock Memorial Medal for Humour) and the poetry collection 77 Fragments of a Familiar Ruin. A Companion of the Order of Canada. King, like Boyden, is also the recipient of the National Aboriginal Achievement Award.