Diaspora Dialogues Upcoming Events

Poetry, Prosecco and Pasta
Diaspora Dialogues adds sizzling romantic poetry to Toronto’s WinterCity Festival!

This February at Toronto’s WinterCity Festival, come in from the cold and let Diaspora Dialogues warm you up with a delectable selection of poets reading in English, Italian and French over a delicious three-course meal.

On Thursday February 5 and Thursday February 12, Pier Giorgio Di Cicco, Jacob Scheier, Rishma Dunlop, Desi Di Nardo, and Dionne Brand will indulge you with readings and conversation that flow between the three languages. Not to worry if you speak only one – you will be seduced by the universal language of poetry. Passionate words for your soul, and sustenance for your belly – how better to wile away a chilly winter’s night?

WHAT: Poetry, Prosecco & Pasta
WHEN: Thursday, February 5, 7 pm (Pier Giorgio Di Cicco, Jacob Scheier, Rishma Dunlop)
Thursday, February 12, 7 pm (Desi Di Nardo, Rishma Dunlop, Dionne Brand)
WHERE: Grano Restaurant, 2035 Yonge Street (just north of Davisville)
COST: $35 per ticket (includes meal and readings)

For event information or media inquiries, contact Julia Chan:
416-944-1101 x 277 or julia@diasporadialogues.com

To buy tickets, contact Roberto at Grano Restaurant:
416-440-1986 or rdm@grano.ca

Toronto's WinterCity Festival is a signature event produced by the City of Toronto.

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Biographies

Dionne Brand is a poet, novelist and essayist. Her nine volumes of poetry include Land to Light On, winner of the Governor General’s Award for Poetry and the Trillium Award for Literature. Brand’s thirsty was nominated for the Trillium Prize for Literature, the Griffin Poetry Prize and the Toronto Book Award, and won the Pat Lowther Award for Poetry. Her poetry has been translated into Italian and French. Her 2006 volume of poetry, Inventory was nominated for the Governor General’s Award, the Pat Lowther Award for poetry and the Trillium Award for Literature. Her last novel, What We All Long For, was published to great acclaim in Canada, Italy and Germany and won the 2006 Toronto Book Award. Her fiction includes the acclaimed novel In Another Place Not Here (a 1998 New York Times notable book), Sans Souci and Other Stories, and At the Full and Change of the Moon (a Los Angeles Times Notable Book of the Year). Her works of non-fiction include Bread Out Of Stone and A Map to the Door of No Return. In 2006, Brand received the Harbourfront Festival Award. Dionne Brand is also a Professor in the School of English and Theatre Studies at the University of Guelph.

Pier Giorgio Di Cicco is the author of twenty volumes of poetry and a book of manifestos on creative cities. He was Goggio Visiting Professor at the University of Toronto in 2004 and in that year was appointed Poet Laureate of the City of Toronto. Since then he has become a major speaker and thinker on creative economies and has informed municipal policy on federal and provincial levels. He is an urban consultant and Curator of the Toronto Museum Project and Global Center for Cities and a recipient of a 2007 Canadian Urban Institute Urban Leadership Award. He is on the design team of BMI/Pace Architects/Planners, Principal of The Municipal Mind Consultancy, and an ordained Roman Catholic Priest.

Desi Di Nardo is a poet and author in Toronto whose work has been published in numerous North American and international journals. Her poetry has been performed in Canada's National Arts Centre, featured in Poetry on the Way on the Toronto Transit Commission, selected by the Parliamentary Poet Laureate, and displayed in the Official Residences of Canada. Di Nardo's poems have also been presented in schools across the country and translated into foreign languages. Her book of poetry is titled The Plural of Some Things. Visit www.desidinardo.com.

Winner of the Emily Dickinson Prize for poetry in 2003, Rishma Dunlop is a Canadian poet, playwright, essayist, and fiction writer. She is the author of four books of poetry: White Album (2008), Metropolis (2005), Reading Like a Girl (2004), and The Body of My Garden (2002). Books as editor include: White Ink: Poems on Mothers and Motherhood (2007), and Red Silk: An Anthology of South Asian Canadian Women Poets (2004). Her radio drama, “The Raj Kumari’s Lullaby,” was produced by CBC Radio. Dunlop’s translations of poems by Cuban poet Maria Elena Cruz Varela are forthcoming in 2009 in an anthology titled Twenty Canadian Poets Take on the World. Her work in progress is a book of translations of the love poems of Palestinian poet Mahmoud Darwish. She is a professor of English and Creative Writing at York University.

Jacob Scheier's debut collection More to Keep us Warm (ECW Press) won the 2008 Governor General's Award for English language poetry. His poems have also appeared in several literary journals. Scheier is the former editor of existere, York University's journal of Arts and Literature. He is also a regular contributor to NOW magazine in Toronto and The Indypendent, a progressive New York City newspaper. Scheier is currently living in New York City, working on a collection of poems about his radical Jewish-American heritage.