Boreal forest inspires writers, photographer and composer

THE boreal forest covers nearly 60 per cent of Canada's land mass, protects a large amount of the world's fresh water and safeguards the planet's atmosphere. So it's not surprising that a group of Manitoba artists, including poets and fiction writers, have been inspired by the forest.

Prairie Fire magazine unveils the results of the Boreality project, its collaboration with the Manitoba Chamber Orchestra, Thursday at 7 p.m. at McNally Robinson Booksellers, bringing together writers, a photographer and a composer who have created works inspired by nature.

Writers with boreal-forest themed work included in the latest edition of the literary quarterly include Katherine Bitney, Janine Tschuncky, Fran Bennett and Donna Besel.

Wolsak and Wynn of Hamilton, Ont., is publishing Bitney's non-fiction book The Boreal Dragon in the fall.

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Ten books, a documentary film, a touring visual art show and a solo album by Winnipeg rock band Weakerthans front man John K. Samson were honoured earlier this month by the Association for Manitoba Archives for using archival resources to bring the past to life.

Among the books honoured May 10 were Robert J. Sweeney's Portraits of Winnipeg: the River City in Pen and Ink (Turnstone Press), Dale Barbour's Winnipeg Beach: Leisure and Courtship in a Resort Town (University of Manitoba Press), and Ron Stevens's Much Ado About Squat: Squatters and Homesteaders Ravage Riding Mountain Forest (Heartland Associates).

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When the £30,000 Orange Prize is announced Wednesday, the organizers of the international award for writing by women will need to go shopping for a new name.

Canadian women have done well in the prize competition, which has been funded since its creation by the British telecommunications company Orange. But the company has announced that it is dropping its sponsorship in favour of a movie partnership.

Esi Edugyan's Half Blood Blues is among the contenders for this year's prize.

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After a career in broadcasting and filmmaking that took him to Hollywood, Jim Makichuk is returning to his boyhood home of Benito in Manitoba's Swan Valley, via a science fiction novel called The Emperor of Mars.

Makichuk, who lives in Los Angeles, where he has written, directed and produced a variety of films and television shows, launches his novel at 7 p.m. Monday at McNally Robinson. The story, about a 12-year-old boy in the late 1950s who hears over the radio that the Emperor of Mars is coming to his small prairie town, is dedicated to Makichuk's Grade 6 teacher.

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Republished from the Winnipeg Free Press print edition May 26, 2012 J10