OPENING NIGHT CELEBRATION 7:30
pm
The Cherie Smith Memorial Lecture Evening Hal Wake In conversation with Jonathan Safran
Foer
"Ingenious,
hilarious, heartbreaking" are adjectives used to describe JONATHAN
SAFRAN FOER who published his first international
best-selling novel, Everything is Illuminated at age 25.
Foer was celebrated as one of Rolling Stone's "People of the
Year" and Esquire's "Best and Brightest". Everything
is Illuminated has won numerous awards, including the Guardian
First Book Prize, the National Jewish Book Award, and the New York
Public Library Young Lions Prize and it was named Book of the Year
by The Los Angeles Times. The film, Everything Is Illuminated,
optioned by Warner Independent was released in September 2005. It
starred Elijah Wood and was directed by Liev Schreiber. Jonathan
Safran Foer's latest international bestseller, Extremely Loud and
Incredibly Close is in its fourth hardcover reprinting and has been
optioned for film by Scott Rudin Productions in conjunction with
Warner Brothers and Paramount Pictures.
Jonathan Safran Foer has had stories published in The New Yorker,
The Paris Review and Conjunctions. He is the editor of a best-selling
anthology of writing inspired by the bird boxes of Joseph Cornell,
A Convergence of Birds (DAP, May 01). His libretto "Seven Attempted
Escapes from Silence" was performed by the Berlin State Opera
House in September 2005. He is currently collaborating on a book
called Joe with Hiroshi Sugimoto and Richard Serra. Foer lives in
Brooklyn, New York.
HAL
WAKE
has been engaged with the literary community in Canada for more
than 30 years. In the mid '80s he was the book producer for CBC
Radio's Morningside with Peter Gzowski and has hosted or
moderated more than a hundred literary events at Festivals in Vancouver,
Victoria and Sydney, Australia. Hal's reviews have appeared in the
Georgia Straight and the Vancouver Sun and he's currently the Artistic
Director of the Vancouver International Writers Festival.
Book signing
and refreshments following event.
This event
is presented with support from the Cherie Smith Memorial Lecture
Evening Endowment Fund.
Advanced tickets: $25 + GST. Advanced tickets can be purchased at
JCC reception or by calling 604.257.5111. Tickets at the door: $30
including GST per person. Location: Norman Rothstein Theatre
Sunday,
November 19
POETRY
BRUNCH 11:00
am
Host:
A singer, songwriter, author and poet, GENA
PERALA challenges the way she and the people
around her live and think. Gena Perala's books include Keep
it Together (2005) and I am a Worst Case Scenario Girl
(2003). Her debut solo CD will be released this fall. She performs
in Vancouver with her indie rock band "Friends Like Us".
LAURIE
BLOCK
is a poet, playwright and storyteller. His most recent book
Time Out of Mind (Oolichan Books, 2006) is a moving
and honest collection of poems exploring the poet's journey
into darkness, death and desire. Block's other works include
Governing Bodies, and a bilingual poetry collection,
Foreign Grace/Bendiciones Ajenas. Laurie Block lives
in Brandon, Manitoba.
RENEE
NORMAN is
a writer, a teacher and an award-winning poet. She completed
her doctorate at UBC in 1999. She wrote House of Mirrors,
a book based on her Ph.D. dissertation on women's autobiographical
writings. Her recent book of poems, True Confessions
(Inanna, 2005) captures the sensuous and surreal, the serious
and the serene, the simple truths about life. It received the
Canadian Jewish Book Award for poetry. She lives in Coquitlam,
BC.
SUSAN
GLICKMAN
has published five acclaimed books of poetry, most recently
Running in Prospect Cemetery: New and Selected Poems
(Vehicule Press, 2004) and an award-winning book of literary
criticism, The Picturesque & the Sublime: A Poetics
of the Canadian Landscape (McGill-Queens University Press,
1998). Her most recent book, her first novel, The Violin
Lover, is receiving rave reviews. Susan lives in Toronto.
NAOMI
BETH WAKAN
has written/compiled over 30 books. Her most recent books are
Segues (2005) and Late Bloomers: On Writing Later
in Life (2006), both published by Wolsak and Wynn and Writing
(Pacific Edge Publishing, 2006). Perhaps her best known book
is the American Library Association selection, Haiku-One
Breath Poetry. Naomi lives on Gabriola Island, British
Columbia, with her husband, the sculptor, Elias Wakan.
RAFI
AARON’s
book Surviving the Censor: The Unspoken Words of Osip Mandelstam
has attracted international attention. He delivered the Alexander
Mackenzie Memorial Lecture in St. Petersburg, Russia in 2004.
His exhibit, A Seed in the Pocket of their Blood, was
viewed by over a million people in Canada, the US and Israel.
A documentary on Rafi's works, entitled The Sound Traveller,
aired on Bravo TV and Book Television this past year.
POETRY BRUNCH
(7101) - Cost: $12 + GST per person. Register online
or at JCC reception. Please register by Wednesday, November 15 at
5 pm to assure yourself a space. A limited number of seats are available.
Vancouver
illustrator, SIMA ELIZABETH SHEFRIN,
invites children, ages 6 to 10 to join her in a behind-the-scenes
look at what the animals were doing in their less memorable moments,
as they prepared to board Noah's Ark. Participants will create brightly
coloured cut-paper illustrations using the same technique that Sima
Elizabeth employed in her illustrations of Ellen Schwartz's new
picture book, Abby's Birds. The characters created during the workshop
will be displayed at the Young Authors' Tea, which follows the workshop.
Sima Elizabeth Shefrin works extensively in community arts, and
is the artist co-ordinator of the Middle East Peace Quilt, the Kerrisdale
Community Centre Welcoming Quilts, and the Art of Living Together,
a multicultural project, which helped to build bridges between the
Jewish community and other cultures in Vancouver.
(7102) Cost: $5 plus GST. Register online
or at JCC reception. Please register by Wednesday, November 15 at
5 pm. Only a limited number of spaces are available. If space is
available at the door, the cost will be $8 including GST. This workshop
is geared for children ages 6 to10. Location: Adult Arts and Crafts
GUEST AUTHOR and ILLUSTRATOR
at the Young Authors' Tea
1:00 pm - 3:00 pm
ELLEN
SCHWARTZ launched
three new books in 2006, Stealing Home (Tundra Books),
Yossi's Goal (Orca Books) and Abby's Birds (Tradewind
Books) illustrated by Sima Elizabeth Shefrin. Ellen will read excerpts
from her new books and discuss their origins and the writing process.
Yossi's Goal tells the story of Yossi, a Jewish immigrant boy in
Montreal who longs to play hockey. When his father becomes ill and
cannot work, all Yossi's hard earned savings must go to help the
family, not to buy skates. Stealing Home is a can't-put-it-down
story of racial tension, baseball, and everyone's hero, Jackie Robinson.
Abby's Birds is a charming story of an improbable friendship
between a little girl and her elderly Japanese neighbour. Ellen
is the author of twelve books for young readers. She is working
on the fifth book in her Starshine series and planning
a culinary mystery with her daughter who is a pastry chef. Ellen
Schwartz lives in Burnaby, BC.
SIMA
ELIZABETH SHEFRIN
will lead an interactive illustration activity based on Abby's
Birds, the book she illustrated. Sima Elizabeth works extensively
in community arts, and is the artist co-ordinator of the Middle
East Peace Quilt, the Kerrisdale Community Centre Welcoming
Quilts, and The Art of Living Together, a multicultural
project, which helped to build bridges between the Jewish community
and other cultures in Vancouver.
Sunday,
November 19
WRITING WORKSHOPS 1:00
pm
LATE
BLOOMERS WRITING WORKSHOP
It's never too late to begin writing! NAOMI BETH WAKAN's
Late Bloomer's writing workshop is designed for the over-50’s
participant who has always wanted to write, has maybe written a
few pieces and thrown them into a drawer, or left them in a computer
file, and who would like to get going and complete that poem, essay,
short story, memoir, travel piece, or the Great Canadian novel that
lies unfinished. This is a jump-start workshop of encouragement
and empowerment. If you've ever uttered the words "some day
I'd like to write," this workshop will get you going. Naomi
Beth Wakan is an essayist and poet who is devoted to inspiring others
to write. She has written/compiled over 30 books. Her most recent
are Segues (2005), Late Bloomers: On Writing Later
in Life (2006), both published by Wolsak and Wynn and Writing
(Pacific Edge Publishing, 2006).
(7103) Advanced
registration - $18 plus GST - JCC members, seniors or students -
$20 plus GST for non-members. Register online
or at JCC reception. Please register by by Wednesday, November 15
at 5 pm. After Nov. 15, cost will be $25 including GST. Location: Adult Lounge
3:00 pm
PROSE
AND POETRY WORKSHOP
Making the Ordinary Extraordinary - Injecting Wild imagery into
your Writing
RAFI AARON's new book
of prose-poetry Surviving the Censor: The Unspoken Words of
Osip Mandelstam (Seraphim Editions, 2006) is filled with colourful
images and unusual combinations of words one wouldn't think would
sit together on the same line, e.g., "Blue running for its
life in a sea of red" and "a bullet hole in the ankle
of the dream." In this workshop, there will be exercises designed
to jumpstart word associations, to sharpen imagery and to encourage
the participant to write from an entirely new perspective. Rafi
will explore writing about the character of a subject as opposed
to its physical characteristics. Both poets and prose writers are
invited to attend.
(7104) Advanced
registration - $18 plus GST - JCC members, seniors or students -
$20 plus GST for non-members. Register online
or at JCC reception by Wednesday, November 15 at 5 pm. After Nov.
15, cost will be $25 including GST.
Location: Adult Lounge
This workshop
is presented with support from Seraphim Editions.
Wisdom and Folly: Folktales, Personal Experiences
and Just Plain Folly.
Storytellers, Laurie Block and Kay Stone, Share the Stage
A
Talking Kugel, the Nun on a Bun, and a Baba's secret love affair
with Marc Chagall. From a blend of memory, invention and family
history, award-winning author and storyteller LAURIE
BLOCK weaves tales that liberate laughter and wring
a tear. As well as facilitating workshops for teachers, writers
and storytellers of all ages, he's performed at the Sundog, Yukon
and Winnipeg International Storytelling Festivals. His poetry has
appeared in anthologies and magazines across the country and in
two books, the bilingual Foreign Graces/Bendiciones Ajenas,
(1999) and Time Out of Mind, (2006). His short story, While
the Librarian Sleeps won the 2004 National Magazine Award Gold
Medal for fiction. Laurie Block lives in Brandon, Manitoba.
Through
her training as folklorist and then storyteller, KAY
STONE learned that Elijah the Prophet can appear
in the "fairy godmother" role in Cinderella tales, that
a wise horse can advise his foolish master, and that an unwanted
and unnamed Rabbi's daughter can out-riddle a king and become his
queen. Kay has been telling these stories and countless more since
the 1970s, in schools, universities, and at international storytelling
festivals in Canada, the United States and Europe. She has given
workshops and courses at various universities in Canada and the
US, and is the founder of two storytelling groups - Stone Soup Storytellers
and Eldertales. Kay has written numerous articles and two books
on stories and storytelling, The Golden Woman and Burning
Brightly. She is presently completing a third book, Some
Day Your Witch Might Come. Kay Stone lives in Winnipeg, Manitoba.
Admission is
free. Everyone is welcome. Location: Esther and Ben Dayson Board Room
This concert
is being presented with support from the Canada Council for the
Arts Literary Reading Program.
PAPER
BAG DINNER 1
7:00 pm
Enjoy the Storytelling Concert and stay for dinner and a play! Dinner
(salmon, assorted
salads/vegetables & beverage) is catered by Nava Creative Kosher
Cuisine. Deadline to
pre-order dinners is Wednesday, November 15 at 5 pm. The option
to pre-order dinner
is open to anyone. Pick up your pre-paid dinner at Nava’s
and avoid line-ups.
(7105) Cost: $12 + GST.
HELEN
MINTZ' moving and humourous one-woman show, On
the Other Side of the Poem is an act of reconciliation of the
artist with her own Yiddish speaking past in Eastern Europe, with
her role as a storyteller, and with contemporary Germans. The storyteller's
journey leads her to the groundbreaking writing of Yiddish poet
Rokhl Korn (who lived in Canada for the last 34 years of her life
and died in 1982) and to the vibrant world of Yiddish literature.
Helen Mintz has toured in Canada, the United States, Germany and
Lithuania. The play's title is based on the late Rokhl Korn's poem.
"On the other side of the poem amazing things may happen.
Even on this overcast day, this wounded hour." Rokhl Korn
Writer and Performer:
Helen Mintz
Dramaturg and Director: Lynna Goldhar Smith
Sound Designer: Amos Hertzman.
(7104) Advanced
registration - $10 plus GST - JCC members, seniors or students -
$12 plus GST for non-members. Register online
or at JCC reception by Wednesday, November 15 at 5 pm. After Nov.
15, cost will be $15 including GST.
Location: L'Chaim Lounge
This play
was developed with support from the Canada Council for the Arts.
Monday,
November 20
SCHOOL FIELD TRIP 9:30
am JOAN
BETTY STUCHNER will read from her newest book, Sadie
the Ballerina (Scholastic Canada, 2006). When Joan was a little
girl, she took dance lessons at a ballet school. At home she used
to dance in every room and in the garden. When she wasn't dancing,
she was creating characters and making up stories. When she grew
up she became a writer - telling stories instead of dancing them.
She loves ballet as much as she loves books and still dresses up
as a ballerina from time to time. Joan Betty Stuchner's other books
include Shira's Hanukkah Gift (Scholastic, 1998) and A
Peanut Butter Waltz (Annick Press). Her Hanukkah and Rosh Hashanah
poems, as well as Jewish stories, have been published in both Ladybug
and Spider magazines and she has acted in community theatre and
as a storyteller on TV's Tell A Tale Town. She has a B.A. in English
Literature and a teaching diploma. Currently, Joan Betty Stuchner
teaches at Temple Sholom Religious School and is a library assistant
at UBC.
Admission is
free. Everyone is welcome. Vancouver Talmud Torah's grade 2’s
will be in attendance. Location: Isaac Waldman Jewish Public Library
Motivational
speaker and author, LYVIA L. SMITH
will read excerpts from her book, The Joy of Positive Thinking
- How to be Up.... When You're Down! Lyvia has long suffered
with acute rheumatoid and psoriatic arthritis and fibromayalgia.
For eleven years of her illness, she was confined to either a bed
or wheelchair. At one point, she spent more than eight months in
hospitals and during a two-year period she underwent major surgeries
during which she was given a 5 to 10 per cent rate of survival.
She has been cited as the only person in the world whose jaw has
fused as a result of her illness. Despite the recent loss of her
husband and other setbacks, she continues to persevere and to inspire
others to live life to its fullest. Lyvia is a dynamic speaker whose
wit and humour appeal to a wide audience.
FULL
Location: Wosk Auditorium
This event
is being presented in association with the JCC Seniors and the Jewish
Seniors Alliance of Greater Vancouver.
Vancouver
author SHAR LEVINE
is an internationally award-winning, best selling author of children's
science books and science toys/kits. She has written over 50 books
and with her co-author and best friend, Leslie Johnstone, has just
won the prestigious 2006 Eve Savory Award for Science Communication
from the BC Innovation Council. Their book, Backyard Science
(2005), was chosen as one of the best books of the year by Science
Books and Films and was short-listed for the Subaru Prize (hands-on
activity books) from the American Association for the Advancement
of Science. Shar will be performing activities from one of her new
books, Sports Science. Other recent books include First
Science Experiments: The Amazing Human Body, First Science Experiments:
Magnet Power and Smart Lab-Secret Formula.
Admission is
free. Everyone is welcome. Vancouver Talmud Torah's grade 5’s
will be in attendance. (Photo credit: Photo by Jeff
Connery) Location: Isaac Waldman Jewish Public Library
Monday,
November 20
LITERARY
READING with a Musical Twist 7:00
pm
Susan
Glickman will read from The Violin Lover. Macey Cadesky and Agnes
Klinghofer will perform musical excerpts by Bach, Mozart & Respighi.
Award-winning
poet SUSAN GLICKMAN
is receiving rave reviews for her first novel, The Violin Lover
(Goose Lane Editions, 2006). Set in the Jewish community in London,
England, between the two World Wars, The Violin Lover tells the
story of a secret love affair and the many lives it affects. Susan
has published five acclaimed books of poetry, most recently Running
in Prospect Cemetery: New and Selected Poems (Vehicule Press, 2004)
and an award-winning book of literary criticism, The Picturesque
& the Sublime: A Poetics of the Canadian Landscape (McGill-Queens
University Press, 1998). Formerly a professor at the University
of Toronto, Susan currently teaches writing at Ryerson University
and through Writers in Electronic Residence. She lives with her
husband and two children in Toronto.
MACEY
CADESKY
has been a professional violist/violinist and teacher for five decades.
Orchestral credits include fourteen years as a member of The Toronto
Symphony Orchestra (under Walter Susskind, Seiji Ozawa and Karl
Ancerl), the former CBC Toronto Orchestra, Stratford Festival Ensemble
(Solo Viola), Kitchener-Waterloo Symphony (Principal Viola), New
Chamber Orchestra (Principal Viola), National Ballet Orchestra,
Canadian Opera Orchestra (Principal Viola) and others. He has performed
countless Solo Recitals, Chamber Music, in Radio, Television, Theatre
Orchestras and Commercial Recordings. Macey lives in Vancouver.
Born
in Nanaimo, BC, AGNES KLINGHOFER
studied violin and composition at the University of British Columbia,
at the Toronto Conservatory and at Yale University. She has played
numerous radio and public recitals and chamber music concerts as
well as in the Filarmonica de Las Americas in Mexico City, and with
the Vancouver Symphony, the C.B.C. Chamber Orchestra in Vancouver,
the Toronto Symphony, the C.B.C. Symphony in Toronto, CJRT Orchestra
in Toronto, the Chamber Players of Toronto as well as the Canadian
Opera Company Orchestra. In 1998 she returned to Vancouver where
she often plays chamber music.
Admission is
free. Everyone is welcome. Location: Esther and Ben Dayson Board Room
This event
is presented with support from Goose Lane Editions in association
with Congregation Beth Israel.
The Happy Neurotic: How Fear and Angst
Can Lead To Happiness And Success!
According
to DAVID GRANIRER's
recently released book The Happy Neurotic, you can be happy,
productive, and well-adjusted while remaining as neurotic as ever!
David's hilarious and irreverent talk will reveal how to use negative
emotions to create happiness and success and still have a sense
of humour about it all. His book challenges many popular New Age
teachings. Readers will learn why they shouldn't trust the universe,
why self-programming for success often doesn't work, about fear-driven
people who live charmed lives and how to use humour as a powerful
tool for celebrating one's own dysfunctions!
Admission is
free. Everyone is welcome. Location: Esther and Ben Dayson Board Room
Tuesday,
November 21
SCHOOL
FIELD TRIPS 9:30
am
DR.
HILLEL GOELMAN will discuss and read excerpts from
What is Jewish about America's 'Favorite Pastime'? Essays and
sermons on Jews, Judaism and Baseball, a recent book edited
by Marc Lee Raphael and Judith Z. Abrams and published by the College
of William and Mary Press. Hillel has written a chapter in this
book called Mythic Baseball, Mythic Judaism: Time, Space and
the Journey of Soul. He is a professor at UBC, a Rabbi, a lover
of Judaism and of baseball. Hillel Goelman will share his observations
on the similarity of the inner beauty, logic and mystery in both
baseball and Judaism. His bar mitzvah invitation was signed by Sandy
Koufax, the greatest pitcher of all time who refused to pitch on
Yom Kippur in the 1965 World Series.
Admission is
free. Everyone is welcome. Grade 9’s from King David High
School will be in attendance. Location: Esther and Ben Dayson Board Room
This reading
is being presented with support from King David High School.
12:30 pm
Born
in New York City, poet, novelist, teacher and family counselor,
ELLEN S. JAFFE has
spent much of her life in Canada and presently lives in Hamilton,
Ontario. In her first novel for young adults, Feast of Lights
Ellen brings together curiosity about family stories, compassion
for grief and the healing process, love of celebration (and food),
concern about world events, and the conviction that fantasy and
imagination CAN make a difference in "real life." She
has won three awards from Arts Hamilton, for her non-fiction book
Writing Your Way: Creating a Personal Journal, her collection
of poetry, Water Children, and for her single poem Mary,
published in Parchment 2004, the journal of contemporary Canadian
Jewish writing. Ellen has written a play for children, Jason's
Quest, adapted from the novel by Margaret Laurence, who is
one of her literary heroines. Ellen invites her audience members
to come and listen to her story and to bring their own special family
stories to share.
Admission is
free. Everyone is welcome. Grade 8's from King David High School
will be in attendance. Location: Esther and Ben Dayson Board Room
This reading
is supported by Sumach Press.
2:00 pm Toronto
author and storyteller AUBREY DAVIS
delights in telling bottomless, spellbinding, often zany Jewish
tales from many lands. Bagels from Benny is about a young
boy's quest to give thanks. Every Friday, Benny puts a bag of bagels
in the synagogue for God and by Saturday morning, the bagels have
disappeared. This heartwarming tale raises intriguing questions
about belief, generosity and hidden possibilities. Bagels from
Benny won the Canadian Jewish Book Award and the Sydney Taylor
Award. Aubrey Davis is a featured teller at Canadian festivals,
conferences, on radio and television. He has an M. Ed. in psychology
and adult education and is a retired teacher. In 2006 he wrote a
screenplay for Sheldon Cohen's animated short, The Three Wishes,
produced by the National Film Board and PMA productions. His other
books include, Sody Salleratus, The Enormous Potato
and Bone Button Borscht.
Admission is
free. Everyone is welcome. Vancouver Talmud Torah's grade 1's will
be in attendance. Location: Isaac Waldman Jewish Public Library
This reading
is supported by the Canada Council for the Arts Literary Reading
Grant.
Human
rights lawyer, DAVID MATAS will
discuss and read excerpts from his book, Aftershock: Anti-zionism
and Antisemitism (The Dundurn Group, 2005) in which he identifies
the failure of the human rights system to prevent attacks on Israel
and the Jews as an aftershock of the Holocaust. He is the author
of several books including Justice Delayed: Nazi War Criminals
in Canada (1987) with Susan Charendoff; Closing the Doors:
The Failure of Refugee Protection (1989) with Ilana Simon;
No More: The Battle Against Human Rights Violations (1994);
Bloody Words: Hate and Free Speech (2000). David Matas
is senior counsel to B'nai Brith Canada. He has an honourary doctorate
awarded in 1996 from Concordia University. David Matas lives in
Winnipeg, Manitoba.
Admission
is free. Everyone is welcome. Location: Esther and Ben Dayson Board Room
This
reading is being presented in association with the Canadian Jewish
Congress, Pacific Region with support from the Canada Council for
the Arts Literary Reading Program.
6:00
pm
ELAINE
KALMAN NAVES will
discuss and read excerpts from Shoshanna's Story: A Mother,
A Daughter, and the Shadows of History (McClelland & Stewart,
2003) and from her memoir Journey to Vaja: Reconstructing the
World of a Hungarian-Jewish Family (McGill-Queens University
Press, 1996). Shoshana's Story won the 2003 Mavis Gallant
Prize and a 2005 Canadian Jewish Book Award. Journey to Vaja was
the winner of the 1998 Elie Wiesel Prize for Holocaust Literature
and has been made into a documentary film called Paradise Lost.
Elaine was born in Hungary and grew up in Budapest, London and finally
in Montreal, where her parents, ambivalent about their Jewishness
in the face of their devastating losses, fashioned a new life designed
to obscure their past. Elaine Kalman Naves is a journalist, critic,
broadcaster, and the author of five books. She is a frequent reviewer
and contributor on literary subjects for the Montreal Gazette.
Admission
is free. Everyone is welcome. Location: Esther and Ben Dayson Board Room
This
reading is being presented in association with Canadian Friends
of Hebrew University with support from the Canada Council for the
Arts Literary Reading Program.
PAPER
BAG DINNER 2
4:30 - 7:00 pm
For those who want to attend the reading(s) and stay through dinner
for the AGM, we are offering Paper Bag Dinners (salmon, assorted
salads/vegetables and beverage) catered by Nava Creative Kosher
Cuisine. Deadline to pre-order dinners is Wednesday, November 15
at 5 pm.
(7108) Cost of dinner is $12 plus GST. The option to pre-order this
dinner is open to anyone. Please note on the registration form what
time you would like to pick up the pre-paid dinner at Nava Creative
Kosher Cuisine.
A
Birthday Surprise is SEEMAH CATHY
BERSON's debut children's book published in 2006
by Purple PeaPod Press. Born and raised in Calcutta, India, Seemah
has raised four children and grandchildren and has been writing
and illustrating poems and stories for her grandchildren for many
years. She acquired a Masters Degree in Anthropology from UBC. Her
thesis was on Jewish Immigrants to Canada who worked in the Needle
Trades. She is co-editor of an anthology of Canadian Jewish Outlook,
a magazine on whose collective she has been a long-time member and
contributor. Seemah is also a soapstone carver, walking stick designer
and an active community volunteer.
Admission
is free. Everyone is welcome. JCCGV Shalom Preschool will be in
attendance. Location: Isaac Waldman Jewish Public Library
12:30 pm Award-winning
Victoria author REBECCA GODFREY
captivates audiences as she speaks about and read excerpts from
Under the Bridge: The True Story of the Murder of Reena Virk
(HarperCollins Canada, 2005). After six years of researching one
of the most notorious and heartbreaking murder cases in Canadian
history, the stunning truth is revealed about a tragedy that captured
international headlines and created a debate about youth violence.
Awards include The Arthur Ellis Award for Best Non-Fiction, The
BC Award for Non-Fiction, and Finalist for the Pearson Writers'
Trust Non-Fiction Prize. Rebecca Godfrey is also the author of the
highly acclaimed novel, The Torn Skirt (HarperCollins Canada,
2001), which was nominated for a BC Book Prize and widely praised
for its portrait of adolescence. Rebecca currently lives in New
York.
Admission
is free. Everyone is welcome. King David High School grades 11 and
12 students will be in attendance. Location: Esther and Ben Dayson Board Room
This reading
is supported by a Canada Council for the Arts Literary Reading Grant.
NORMAN
RAVVIN
edited and co-published the recent reissue of Henry Kreisel's novel,
The Rich Man, originally published by McClelland and Stewart
in 1948. The Rich Man was the first novel by a Jewish author
on Jewish themes to be published by a mainstream Canadian Press.
It represents the beginning of a tradition that would produce the
work of Mordecai Richler, Leonard Cohen, and Adele Wiseman, among
others. The novel's action opens in 1935 with a striking portrait
of Toronto's working-class Spadina Avenue district. Kreisel's portrait
of prewar Jewish life in Europe and Canada helps us better understand
the oncoming Holocaust. Born in Austria, he fled the Anschluss and,
after being interned by the British and Canadian government as an
"enemy alien," established himself as a writer, professor
and university administrator in Edmonton. He received the Order
of Canada in 1988; he died in 1991.
Ravvin
will place The Rich Man in context, discuss its importance
as a Canadian novel. He will read excerpts bringing The Rich Man's
unusual narrative to life. Ravvin is a critic, editor, teacher,
lecturer and award-winning author. His books include Lola by
Night, Sex, Skyscrapersand Standard
Yiddish, Hidden Canada: An Intimate Travelogue and A House
of Words: Jewish Writing, Identity and Memory. He is the editor
of Not Quite Mainstream: Canadian Jewish Short Stories
and co-editor with Richard Menkis of The Canadian Jewish Studies
Reader. Norman currently lives in Montreal and chairs the Concordia
Institute for Canadian Jewish Studies.
Admission
is free. Everyone is welcome. Location:
Esther and Ben Dayson Board Room
This
lecture is being presented in association with the JCCGV Seniors
with support from Concordia University and the Canada Council for
the Arts Literary Reading Program.
Wednesday,
November 22
COOKING DEMO & LUNCH 12:00
pm
Entrepreneur,
celebrity chef and cookbook author SUSAN
MENDELSON reveals the cooking secrets she has been
using to impress people everywhere for more than 20 years in her
newest book, Mama Now Cooks Like This (Whitecap, 2006).
Through her catering company, The Lazy Gourmet, she has
won numerous awards. She has also been named caterer of the year
by The Vancouver Sun and been featured in Women of Taste.
Susan has published several books including Mama Never Cooked
Like This, Let Me in the Kitchen and Nuts about Chocolate.
(7109) Cost: $12 plus GST - includes cooking demo and a lunch.
SOLD OUT Location: Wosk Auditorium
This
event is being presented in association with the Jewish Family Service
Agency,
Temple Sholom Synagogue and the JCCGV Seniors Department.
ROBERT
KRELL,
emeritus professor of Psychiatry at the University of British Columbia
and founder of the Vancouver Holocaust Education Centre, wrote the
introduction for the recently released book And Life Has Changed
Forever: Holocaust Childhoods Remembered. This book contains 21
precious personal accounts from child and adolescent Holocaust survivors.
The stories were collected and edited primarily by Martin Ira Glassner.
The narratives are grouped by age, those born before 1930, between
1930 -1935, and those born after 1935. In addition to the introduction,
Dr. Krell also wrote a psychosocial commentary following each age
grouping, reflecting on the memories, struggles and accomplishments
of the survivors. Dr. Robert Krell is himself a child survivor from
Holland.
Admission
is free. Everyone is welcome. Location: Esther and Ben Dayson Board Room
This reading
is presented in association with the Vancouver Holocaust Education
Centre.
Wednesday,
November 22
AUDIO-VISUAL PRESENTATION 8:00
pm
SHEILA
DELANY's
talk and stunning audio-visual presentation honour Elias Levita's
achievement in its cultural context: German anti-Judaism, Italian
Renaissance, the first ghetto, the woman reader, attitudes toward
Islam and Catholicism. Elias Levita straddled two fifteenth-century
cultures, German and Italian. His rip-roaring Bovo-Bukh, reworked
from an Italian verse romance, revolutionized Yiddish literature,
became a staple of Yiddish culture for centuries, and gave us the
term "bobe-meises" (tall tales). Dr. Delany taught English
and Comparative Literatures, including Medieval Hebrew Literature
and Yiddish Literature, at SFU until her recent retirement. Her
work is known worldwide among medievalists. She has lectured in
many countries including Israel, Australia, Poland, Holland, England
and Hungary. She is editor of Turn it Again: Jewish Medieval
Studies and Literary Theory, (Pegasus, 2004) and Chaucer
and the Jews: Sources, Contexts; and author of Meanings
(Routledge, 2002), Telling Hours: Journal Stories (New
Star, 1991), and of many books and articles in her field.
Admission
is free. Everyone is welcome. Location: Esther and Ben Dayson Board Room
This reading
is presented in association with Peretz Centre for Secular Jewish
Culture and the Shaya Kirman Memorial Foundation for Yiddish Culture.
Wednesday,
November 22
LITERARY TALK (Downtown location) 8:00
pm
Well
known writer, educator and broadcaster, SID
TAFLER will read from Us and Them: A Memoir
of Tribes and Tribulations (NETBC Publishing, 2006), a story
of a changing country, changing people and a new understanding of
identity, belonging and the place we call home. Tafler has edited
and contributed to several books and has won six national and regional
writing awards, including a Western Magazine Award (2001) for an
article on the first humans in North America and has twice been
a finalist at the National Magazine Awards. He served as editor
of Monday Magazine and writer-in-residence at the Festival of Written
Arts in Sechelt, BC. Sid Tafler was born and raised in Montreal,
has lived most of his adult life in Alberta and British Columbia,
has traveled to Israel frequently and currently lives in Victoria,
BC.
MELANIE
FOGELL's
first book, Ambiguous Selves: New Jewish Identities (Detselig
Enterprises Ltd, 2006), is a profound exploration of her search
for identity as a Canadian Jewish woman, and of the problems of
Jewish identity that Israeli immigrant women face when they move
to Canada. Written primarily in the form of a personal essay, Fogell
uncovers the ways that we are created by society and how we create
society for ourselves, a topic extremely relevant in today's multi-cultural
world. She received two degrees in Women's Studies and her doctorate
in Educational Research, lectured at the University of Calgary in
the Faculty of Communications and Culture and in 2007 will teach
in the Women's Studies program at UBC. Melanie Fogell is an artist,
piano teacher and performer. She is married and has four children.
Her future is ambiguous.
Admission
is free. Everyone is welcome.
NOTE:
this reading will take place at a DOWNTOWN SATTELITE LOCATION
Stanley Park Pavillion
Stanley Park Rose Gardens
610 Pipeline Road, Vancouver
Tel.: 604.602.3088. ext. 3221 Directions
Enter the park from Georgia Street. Proceed straight beyond the
roundabout past the Rose Gardens. The Stanley Park Pavilion is across
from the Rose Gardens beside the Malkin Bowl.
This
event is presented in association with the Vancouver Downtown Jewish
Community with support from NETBC Publishing and the Stanley Park
Pavillion.
Thursday,
November 23
SCHOOL FIELD TRIPS 9:30
am
EVA
WISEMAN
will be reading from her fourth book, Kanada, a powerful
novel set during the long, difficult aftermath of World War II.
In this novel, Eva explores the life of a young girl as she tries
to follow her dreams of freedom. Her first three novels for young
adults, A Place Not Home, My Canary Yellow Star and No One Must
Know, have received high acclaim. A Place Not Home
was included in the New York Public Library annual Best Books for
the Teen Age list and My Canary Yellow Star won the McNally
Robinson Books for Young People award. Eva Wiseman was born in Hungary
and came to Canada as a young girl. She lives in Winnipeg with her
husband and often visits Vancouver where her son, his wife and three
of her six wonderful grandchildren live.
Admission
is free. Everyone is welcome. Vancouver Talmud Torah grade 7 students
will be in attendance. Location: Isaac Waldman Jewish Public Library
This reading
is supported by a Canada Council for the Arts Literary Reading Grant.
12:30 pm CAROL
MATAS
will read from her most recent gripping thriller for teens, Past
Crimes (Key Porter Books, 2006). As always, Matas's fascination
with Jewish history comes into play as she incorporates historical
events that happened during the Spanish Inquisition into the present-day
setting of Past Crimes. Carol Matas is the internationally
acclaimed best-selling author of over thirty novels for children
and young adults, including The Freak, Lisa, Jesper and
the Rosie Trilogy. Her best-selling work, which includes
three award-winning series, has been translated into many languages
and has won numerous awards. Carol lives in Winnipeg, Manitoba.
Admission
is free. Everyone is welcome. King David High School grade 10 students
will be in attendance. Location: Esther and Ben Dayson Board Room
This reading
is supported by Key Porter Books and a Canada Council for the Arts
Literary Reading Grant.
Thursday,
November 23
CLOSING
NIGHT PRESENTATION 7:00
pm
CATHERINE
GILDINER
is the author of the best-selling memoir, Too Close to the Falls
and Seduction, a fictionalized thriller bestseller based on
the Ph.D. thesis in psychology she completed on Darwin's influence
on Freud. Catherine was born in 1948 in Lewiston, New York, and
came to Canada in 1970. She has worked as a clinical psychologist
for more than twenty-five years. She also writes journalistic pieces
for various newspapers and a monthly column for Chatelaine.
She is currently working on a sequel to Too Close to the Falls
covering her life between the ages of fifteen and twenty-five. Gildiner
lives in Toronto, Ontario, with her husband and three sons. She
is on a Masters rowing team that rows competitively worldwide.
In
her third novel, A Wall of Light, Israeli-born writer EDEET
RAVEL unravels the story of three generations in
a Tel Aviv family from the 1950s to the present, as they wrestle
with matters of the heart amid the turbulent, often violent climate
of their emerging nation. Ravel was a finalist for the Governor
General's Literary Award for Ten Thousand Lovers, and winner
of the Hugh MacLennan Prize for Fiction for Look for Me.
She was born on a Marxist kibbutz near the Lebanese border and lived
there until she was seven, when her parents returned to their hometown,
Montreal. Edeet returned to Israel to study English literature and
also holds an MA in creative writing and a Ph.D. in Jewish studies.
Edeet Ravel lives in Guelph, Ontario, with her daughter.
Admission is
free. Everyone is welcome.
However, as this will be a popular event, please assure yourself
of a seat by reserving a ticket. Call the Hadassah-Wizo office at
604.257.5160 by Wednesday, November 15. A food reception to honour the volunteers of our community
will follow in the atrium. Location: Norman Rothstein Theatre
Readings
by these authors are supported by Canada Council for the Arts Literary
Reading Grants. This event is presented in association with Hadassah-Wizo
Council of Vancouver.