The unspoken codes of the Canadian school community seeped into my life over the next few weeks. I particularly enjoyed Mr Van Reemer’s English class which was held in the school library. He asked the class to prepare a talk on their favourite book. Out of curiosity or maybe vague remembrance, I picked up The Diary of Anne Frank  and devoured it. The day came for my turn to speak and the students sat lined along tables set up in a U-shape in the library. They jostled, leanin

The saying goes, ‘you can choose your friends, but you can’t choose your family’. Roman and I chose each other. We clicked, but not in...

Julian Burnside asking 'What Sort of Country Are We?' ,Wir sind alle Ausländer. Fast überall' 'We are all foreigners. Almost everywhere'...

Write hot, edit cold. Write drunk, edit sober — Ernest Hemingway After decades of random scratchings I gave myself permission to become a...

Montebore, Piemonte, Italy set to evocative music Dazzling sunlight played on our faces as we drove ever upwards, following first this turn then the next. From high in the clouds, the sweeping valley below and the magical village of Montebore—famous for its cheese—floated in and out of view, and goats’ bells chimed in the autumn breeze. Upon reaching the rugged, windswept peak, we wound up the windows and slid deeper and deeper into the silent obscurity of a dense, swirling

Each night I’m happily ensconced in my bed with Alec Baldwin. Let me clarify. I’m in bed with him; he’s not in bed with me. Given the...

Beware of artists. They mix with all classes of society and are therefore most dangerous.— Queen Victoria' Dear Writer, Have you ever...

“Another child abducted. This time murdered. They found her in the woods. Been interfered with. And those others, one stuffed down a well and another in a cupboard. Awful. Imagine doing that to them,” the paper rustled violently in their grandmother’s hands. “Hush, Mother! The children..” Linda the older girl, stared down at her food, frozen with shock. She didn’t want to see her horror confirmed on the women’s faces. It made her fears too real, too menacing. S

“We are all visitors to this time, this place. We are just passing through. Our purpose here is to observe, to learn, to grow, to love…...

"Writing takes a great deal of sweat. [...] It's during the painstaking redrafting process that the music of [the] work emerges." -...