Damian Rogers - Paper Radio
Can you recall the last time you actually looked forward to a debut poetry collection? Neither can we. To celebrate the release of Paper Radio: Poems (ECW Press), freelance journalist, editor, and poet Damian Rogers will have a lively chat with award-winning playwright and author Claudia Dey. The evening with also feature the premiere screening of a short poetry-dance film by Chris Murphy and Rebecca Mendoza and a poetry listening booth created by Tara White. Special musical guests include Greg Keelor and Jim Cuddy from Blue Rodeo, Wayne Petti (Cuff the Duke), Kate Boothman (Sunbear), and Mike Belitsky and Sean Dean from The Sadies. Marc Glassman, Executive Director of This is Not A Reading Series will host the evening.
– A This is Not A Reading Series event presented by The Force For Cultural Events Production, Gladstone Hotel, NOW Magazine, and Take Five On CIUT.
In her first book, Damian Rogers tracks the transformative moment, where emotion and deep memory seek form through sound and image. Her poems tune into a stream of cosmic chatter, channeling voices that tell their stories slant, from a chaste nineteenth century utopian mystic to a chorus of crones to the radical characters of Detroit’s sixties-era radical underground. Examining the equally futile and seductive impulses to chase both chaos and perfection, Rogers taps into history and mythology as each transmission mines material that is at once personal and public.
"Damian Rogers' troubled teens, ecstatic utopians, and distracted deities are evidence of a powerful poetic storyteller... It's rare to find a young poet so deeply invested in both her own experience and the reader's pleasure. A splendid, memorable debut." —Kevin Connolly
"Tells us of dreams that sound like our own, shooting little arrows of insight that split the heart, revealing the shocking vulnerability of life. Paper Radio is a jewel of a book that you will want to read over and over and over again." —Greg Keelor, singer-songwriter
"In Paper Radio, Damian Rogers emerges as a poet of startling clarity, intelligence, toughness, and tenderness." —April Bernard, author, Blackbird, Bye Bye; Pirate Jenny; Psalms; Romanticism; and Swan Electric
"What the cool kids will be reading." —Afterword, National Post
Damian Rogers is a freelance journalist, editor and poet. Until recently, she was the Arts & Lifestyle Editor at EYE WEEKLY Magazine. Rogers has worked at Poetry Magazine, founded Pontiac Quarterly, contributed to Utopia (Coach House) and edited books for Drag City. Paper Radio is her debut collection. Rogers lives in Toronto.
Claudia Dey is a celebrated playwright, author and columnist. Awards and international productions have recognized several of her plays. Notable amongst these is The Gwendolyn Poems. Her debut novel, Stunt, was published last year to wide acclaim and remains a bestseller. Dey recently stopped writing the popular "Group Therapy" column for the Globe & Mail to focus on her follow-up book, How to be a Bush Pilot: a Field Guide to the Secrets of Female Pleasure. It will be published on Valentine’s Day, 2011, by HarperCollins Canada.
Visit www.tinars.ca
CONTACTS Damian Rogers: Sarah Dunn, sarah@ecwpress.com, 416-694-3348 This Is Not A Reading Series, Chris Reed, coordinator@tinars.ca
