Jason Christie is the author of four books of poetry: Canada
Post (Invisible), i-ROBOT (EDGE), Unknown Actor (Insomniac),
and Cursed Objects (Coach House Books).
Q: How long have you been in Ottawa, and what first brought
you here?
We have lived in Ottawa since 2014. We moved here for work.
Initially we thought we would be in Ottawa for one year, but we decided to
stay! I spent summers and some Christmases in Carleton Place at my aunt's house
when I was young, and always loved getting to explore Ottawa. It's a great
place to raise a family.
Q: How did you first get involved in writing, and
subsequently, the writing community here?
I know it is a cliché, but I have always been a writer. I
wrote comics when I was a kid, then as a teenager I wrote many bad poems long
before I’d actually read any poetry other than my own. I started reading poetry
at York University, and I got serious about writing after meeting Michael
deBeyer and some of the other Writers @ York. From there I branched out and got
to know many of the writers in Toronto.
I moved to Calgary, Vancouver, back to Calgary, and then to
Ottawa, and along the way got to know many writers across the country. It was a
pleasure and a privilege to have been lucky enough to get to know so many
people and spend time in so many communities. I am not as involved in the
community in Ottawa as I would like to be. I work full time and have young
children, which means I’m usually asleep when most readings are just starting!
But I’m hoping to make it to more events this year, and I’m getting back into
publishing again now that my kids are a little older. Who knows? I might even
try to get my backyard reading series going again!
Q: How did being in such a community of writers shift your
thinking about writing, if at all?
Each of the communities I’ve been lucky to be a part of
taught me something different. I think I took for granted the security to take
myself seriously in the communities I was in as a young writer, the
fearlessness, and the support to find the bravery to try. As I’ve grown as a
writer, I have found that I needed that security, comfort, and support less and
less. Now that I’m old(er), I feel that I have a chance to provide that space
for younger or newer writers and that’s exciting! It might only be attending
their readings, and being genuinely excited about what they are doing, liking
posts on social media, or sharing their poems with others, all of which is easy
because the younger or newer writers I’ve met in Ottawa are fantastic.
Q: What do you see happening here that you don’t see anywhere
else? What does Ottawa provide, or allow?
Ottawa and Calgary are similar to me. In both communities I
see a broad interest and acceptance of a variety of styles. In Ottawa there
seems to be a deeper appreciation of literary history, particularly local
literary history, then in any other place I’ve lived. It's fascinating. I learn
so much in every conversation that I have here. I am always impressed by the
sincerity, honesty, and generosity of the community here. Even though I don't
make it to many events, when I am able, people greet me warmly and I'm so
grateful for that acceptance. Ottawa also has an incredibly high number of
extremely talented writers. So in any room I wander into, I'm always a little
star-struck by the talent around me.
Q: Have any of your projects responded directly to your
engagements here? How have the city and its community, if at all, changed the
way you approached your work?
I roll my daily life into the raw material that becomes my
poems, so place is material in that sense. The poems I've been editing lately
are all twisted from a long sequence I wrote when we first moved here that has
loads of local references.
Q: What are you working on now?
I’m working on being calm, present, being kind, and
expressing my support for others more. I want to read more poetry this year. I
read a lot already, but I’ve been on a tear with prose for the last couple of
years and I’m ready to switch it up.
In terms of writing and publishing, I’m trying to get a wee
zine journal called nobody off the ground. I have several manuscripts at
various levels of completion. One is a book-length longpoem called Glass
Language in which I use a Python script to generate new lines, then edit the
whole thing to make it look like it wasn’t randomly generated. The other is a
book in which I think through secular exaltation and grace. I’ve understood it
as the elevation of ordinary events from their milieu through a purposeful act
of attention/devotion, a coming to terms with change and distress. And I’ve
also started writing poems about robots again.
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