Login / RegisterVancouver Writers Fest toasts its 25th anniversary
The city’s most renowned literary festival is celebrating its 25th anniversary this year with a streamlined new moniker. That’s right: you no longer need to set down your drink and ask for quiet as you focus on the task of saying “the Vancouver International Writers and Readers Festival”. The name has officially been changed to the short, sharp “Vancouver Writers Fest”—much less work.
The occasion is also being marked with a bigger lineup of authors and events than ever, one that literally spans the globe. Alongside the writers profiled here in our special Fall Books coverage, the weeklong program will feature controversial Beijing novelist Chan Koonchung, Somalian exile Nuruddin Farah, and Pakistan-born journalist and author Mohammed Hanif—to name just a few.
From closer to home, there’s Victoria’s Bill Gaston, presenting his new novel, The World; poet and fellow Victorian Lorna Crozier, with her latest collection, The Book of Marvels; and Vancouver Island–born Marjorie Celona, speaking about her debut novel, Y. And there are plenty of other sure-fire Canadian draws on the bill: Margaret Atwood, Vincent Lam, Alistair MacLeod, Louise Penny… The list goes on and on, and can be seen in its entirety at writersfest.bc.ca/.
Throw in daily experimental theatre by lauded local outfit Electric Company, as well as music by the likes of Dave Bidini and Veda Hille, and you’ve got a boisterous tribute to a normally silent art form.
