SEPTEMBER
1986
t'failing Address: P.0. Box 24624, Stn.
0ffice
Address:
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126 736 Granville Phone No. 683-2057
C Vancouver, B.C. V5T 4E2 Street Vancouver, B-C. V6Z lG3
about the status of writers 'i n thi s prov'i nce. The f i rst took p'lace i n the i nteri or th'i s summer, where over a beer I met w'ith one of our more successful members - his book 'is in its third printing, but he didn't know how many copi es had been printed altogether. H'is publisher wouldn't
They are reminiscent of the situation across this land before the founding of national groups such as the hlriterst Union, have the PWAC and the Poetrs League. I here, so situation uneasy feeling that the as it such far from the heartland, may be have reg'ions i s because wri ters i n these provided the media and the not yet rea11y publ ic with the necessary informational i nput. Any thoughts on this? - Jan Drabek
him. And when the writer, dissatisfied with the amount of promotion for the book (1itt1e to
EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR'S REPORT
I.IESSAGE FROI,I THE CHAIRI.IAI{
Several recent experiences made me wonder
tell
none), went out and promoted the book on his own, he received a letter from his
publisher. In a somewhat didactic manner the l'imitations of an authorrs partic'ipati on were c 1 earl y outl i ned as the publisher saw them.
This sort of thing would be all right' I suppose, had not the pulisher received a block grant from the federal government for the spec'ific purpose of helping Canadian I iterature, 'i.e. Canadian writers. Such grants are not g'iven to provi de a carte blanche for publisherst paternalism but to
establish a partnership between two equals. The idea here is not to engage 'in publisher bashing. It would seem that a majority of them have the welfare of writers very much in mind, but there 'is still the bothersome mi nority. Something else that bothered me this summer was a report I read from a prov'incial study group. It tal ks about a computer system "which contains alI the steps 'in producing a book from the receipt of the manuscript ...." It would seem that the writing of a manuscript wh'ich usual ly precedes the receipt of it, 'is not considered one of the steps.
In a way, many of the views on writers and writing 1ocal1y tend to be quite archai'c.
Itts
been business as usual through the this year -- a departure from the past, attri but'ive to our havi ng an of f i ce that is st'ill somewhat under-used, but there neverthel ess -- and some exci t'i ng summer
things have been happening. First and foremost, the idea seems to be growing in ci rcu I ati on that the Federati on i s something of a Chamber of Commerce for writers in this province. The ana'logy isntt bad: wetve received regular enquiries these past few months for writer services, most of them inspired by the use of the Directory of Members. Vancouver Schoolboard Librarians contacted a pair of high-profile members but wanted to know the go'ing rate for lectures -- $200 apiece didntt seem to shock them. Wetve also had calls from U.S. groups wanting speakers on Canlit and the book trade, from a pubfisher looking f,or a specific genre writer, calls
from several regional communities about 'l i n i ng up read i ngs and workshops, and positive response from several schoolboards in suburban Vancouver about the longawaited young writers workshops in the schools. That's al I with'in the f irst few months of the Directoryts being circulated.