28 May 2005

Final map of Tour route


Having reached St. John's (see post below), I feel free to upload the final map of the Tour, covering the whole thing from start (in Vancouver, 12 April) to finish (well, we're not finished yet, but we're not leaving St. John's before it's over!).


We passed the 11 000 km mark today, just after Gander. We're now 200 km closer to Minsk than we are to Silicon Valley, where the first entry on this blog was written.

St. John's reached


[view from our hotel window overlooking St. John's harbour]

We have reached St. John's. 10 hours it was indeed, but through some of the most beautiful country we've seen so far. This island is rugged! Uniquely, too, the Trans-Canada is not populated in this province, instead acting as a highway linking regional highways, along which the many towns of Newfoundland are situated. So we saw a great deal of completely untouched wilderness: lots of gushing rivers (it rained most of the way), lots of towering rockfaces, miles and miles of trees (some strange kind of cedre; pine; avenues of budding birch), breathtaking vistas across lakes and sea inlets, and the whole topped by gigantic banks of fog, into which the hilltops receded. It was quite low-lying, and the last 100 km through the Avalon peninsula were completely fog-bound: I could only make out the highway signs as I passed underneath them. No traffic.


[fog on the TCH]

One of the great delights of travelling through Newfoundland is the way the towns and geographical features are named. A certain amount of whimsy went into naming this province, eg. Deep Bight, Mistaken Point, Witless Bay, Heart's Desire, Heart's Content, Little Paradise . . . Here's a fuller listing. My all time favourite is Random Sound.


[A detour, by chance?]

What little we've seen of St. John's (est. 1497) is really a delight. The freshness of the seabreeze permeates even the architecture; everyone is friendly. More to report on the scene here in days to come; for the moment we are going to fall fast, fast asleep (perhaps while watching the Memorial Cup -- gad, why can't the NHL be like this? And why are Ottawa teams a joy to watch in every hockey league?)

And lo & behold, while I've been typing this the fog in St. John's harbour has lifted.


Last stretch of Trans-Canada


[added this evening: known blogger blogging in Port-aux-Basques]

Reached Newfoundland safe and sound late last night (only got in at 11:00pm -- 11:30 in Newfoundland). Judging from what we can see from the parking lot, this is a beautiful province! A thick fog fills the harbour of Port-aux-Basques this morning. We are about to head off into it -- a good long (at least 10-hour) drive through the whole island to reach St. John's.

27 May 2005

On the Ferry to Newfoundland!


[The yawning maw of the ferry to Newfoundland]

So, we are on the ferry for Port-aux-Basques, Newfoundland; amazingly, there is a first-rate internet kiosk here. No pic upload, of course. [Further Update: have now added pics in St. John's.]


[Dave at the ferry terminal in North Sydney]

We set forth yesterday morning from Charlottetown, taking the ferry from the Island to Pictou, NS. It's been raining fairly heavily for the last three days; our current ferry to Newfoundland was delayed four hours for rain and fog. Dave nobly drove from Pictou to Cape Breton, while I snoozed.


[aboard the ferry from PEI to Pictou, NS]

In St. Peter's on Cape Breton (the capital of Richmond county, the bottom quarter of Cape Breton) I performed at the Bras d'Or Lakes Inn; about 10 people in the audience, and about a 35 minute show.


[The Bras d'Or Lakes Inn in St. Peter's, Cape Breton, NS]

People seemed to like it, however, though the sound system gave me a strange falsetto.


[performing in St. Peter's. For the occasion, I used a special extended rhabdos with a light fixture on top]

This performance wasn't part of the "regular scheduled" programme for the Tour, but Mr. Richard McIntosh of St. Peter's had written me such a friendly note, asking if I might stop on the way to Newfoundland, and I've always held Cape Breton in such high regard as a centre of Canadian culture (particularly the musical aspect), that musique obligeait. The wind howled, like the Micmac beasts of legend only, past the window long past the time I fell asleep.

Rose bright and early this morning, and have now read every column inch of today's Globe, waiting in the ferry terminal. This ferry, I must say, is absolutely immense. Few passengers today, but one can guess what it would look like at high season! I am entirely surrounded by charming Newfoundland accents. We will be stopping tonight in Corner Brook, to cut down on the long drive tomorrow. How exciting to finally see the Rock after all these years!

----

Update
: We're now about halfway to Newfoundland, and I'm reading Lieutenant Hornblower so as to profit from these nautical surroundings. This is certainly as far out on the briny deep as I've ever been -- I'm starting to see what they mean when they talk about "swells," for instance. But it's really quite calm, even for an Ontario stomach. I just had a full conversation with a gentleman from Newfoundland -- very friendly, but I have to admit I only figured out what we were talking about at the end of the conversation. But we were standing out on deck with the wind whipping by, so I don't feel too bad.

I guess we have now reached our sixth time zone! (Newfoundland is 3 1/2 hours behind GMT.)

25 May 2005

New Toronto show confirmed


It's been confirmed that I'll be performing the poem once more in Toronto this year, on June 30th at 7pm or just after, at The Cameron House (408 Queen St. W). If you're a Torontonian who missed the Toronto show this May, or you want to see the poem again, here's your chance!

Yes, Lord Sidious



Palpatine: Ah, there you are, Master Yoda.
Yoda: Morning, it is good, Chancellor.
Palpatine: Now then, Yoda, what's this I hear about young Skywalker?
Yoda: What is it you hear, Chancellor?
Palpatine: That's what I'm asking, Master Yoda. What do you make of it?
Yoda: With respect, Chancellor, what asking are you, I, Jedi Master though I be, uncertain am.
Palpatine: What I'm asking, Yoda, is, is whether you sense a disturbance in the Force this morning.
Yoda: Many are the disturbances in the Force, Chancellor, and many the nondisturbances are. Whether a disturbance is a disturbing disturbance, or whether, balance on, a disturbance, though disturbing, found to be a nondisturbance is, for the Jedi to decide must be.
Palpatine: Thank you, Yoda, I think I'm perfectly capable of deciding whether the Force is disturbed on any given morning, don't you?
Yoda: Of course, Chancellor. That's why you're the Chancellor, and we are the Jedi.
Palpatine: So I am capable of that, we're agreed?
Yoda: We're agreed that you think you are, Chancellor.
Obi-Wan: Anything less would be disturbing.
Palpatine: Thank you, Obi-Wan.
Yoda: You mentioned young Skywalker, Chancellor?
Palpatine: Yes. I want him to serve on the Jedi Council. Be my liason, my eyes-and-ears, you understand. Just to keep me up-to-date.
Yoda: Ah.
Palpatine: Ah?
Yoda: Ah yes, Chancellor, an excellent idea you have. Skywalker on the Council must be. When mature his powers are. When the time ripe is.
Palpatine: No, Master Yoda, I mean today. As of now.
Yoda: In what sense do you mean "now," Chancellor? The Jedi all things, all times must care for. For us, the future, the past, all one are.
Obi-Wan: I don't think the Chancellor means that Skywalker should serve on the Council in the past, do you, Chancellor?
Yoda: Using the word "past" to refer to your own place on the Council are you, Obi-Wan?
Obi-Wan: No, Master Yoda, I only mean that when the Chancellor uses the word "today," he is making a temporal reference, and a temporal reference really takes its meaning with respect to the moment of utterance, so when he says he now wishes Skywalker to serve on the Council, then "today" must refer to today's today, not to a hypothetical today which we, as Jedi, might perceive in the past, nor to a potential today which, though not operative today, might be tomorrow's today, or the day after tomorrow's, bearing in mind that tomorrow must come after today.
Palpatine: Thank you, Obi-Wan, that is exactly what I mean. I want Skywalker to serve on the Council as a Jedi Master. Starting today. This instant, in fact.
Yoda: Really, Chancellor, so certain are you? Untried young Skywalker is. Untested. Unready is he.
Palpatine: Untested? Didn't he just save me from that kidnapping attempt? I didn't see you piloting a flaming starship down to Coruscant, Master Yoda. You were probably testing out this office, just waiting for the Chancellor to go down in flames, is that it?
Yoda: I, Chancellor? Humble Jedi Master am I, not Chancellor. Not wise in the ways of the Senate am I. No desire has the Jedi Council to take over the Republic.

Etc. . . . . . Gotta admit, the resemblance disturbing is.

24 May 2005

Quebec City interview

Just gave another radio interview, this time to CBC in Quebec City. We don't have an audio clip of it, however, as it was live and I only heard I was going to do it a few hours ago. This makes six radio interviews all told! What invaluable people publicists (like Moira Johnson) are -- everyone should have a publicist.


[introducing poem & period before the performance at Bluefield. Note exquisite hand-drawn map]

Today I performed at Bluefield High School in PEI. What an intelligent bunch of students -- a Grade 12 History class no less, so they were very much on the same page as I was. I have to confess it was particularly nice to perform for older students, essentially adults.



[performing at Bluefield]

It had not occured to me, but of course the students, as Grade 12's, were in University-contemplation mode, and I fielded lots of questions about Classics. I could truthfully say that Classics is an excellent field of study in this modern world of ours, because it develops an understanding of language. One needn't have poetical ambitions to benefit from that; in fact, as the general level of literacy declines, there is more and more demand for people who can both write well and read very carefully, which is essentially what the intensive study of classical texts teaches. It's analogous to my own efforts in epic, actually. I recall having dinner with Egbert Bakker and a friend of his one evening, and at one point (it must have been 2am, after much wine) I began remarking that there wasn't much appreciation for performance-based verbal art these days. Bakker, with a sensible Netherlandish eye for the bottom line, commented that neither was there much performance-based verbal art being produced, and I might feel glad at the low supply and consequent high demand. I must admit that he was right!

By popular demand, in fact, I've added a show to the Tour and will do two more performances after St. John's. The first will be on Thursday evening in Cape Breton, at the Bras D'Or Lakes Inn at 7:30pm. It's not a very long drive (max 4.5 hours, including ferry) from Charlottetown to St. Peter's (the town where the Inn stands), so it seems well enough to try performing on a driving day (which I have not done so far).

Of the post-St. John's shows, the first will be in Quebec City (I was in part pitching this on the interview just now), either on 3 June or 4 June (haven't quite figured it out yet). This is great because I had been feeling fairly guilty that the Tour would not include Quebec City; as soon as I know more I will add time&date to the schedule and to the entry at the bottom of the welcome page of the website. The second post-Tour show will likely be in Toronto on 30 June -- details TBA. In the meantime, I will perform at Stanford University on 9 June, in the Terrace room in Margaret Jacks Hall (the English dept. building). I had to turn down a further invite for Quebec City for 2 June -- "I've got 1000 Ontario high school students coming on Thursday," the guy said. Alas, we can't, geographically speaking, make it to Quebec from St. John's in two days. It never rains but it pours, as they say quite often in Vancouver.



[PEI countryside]

I should add a word in praise of PEI; this will be superfluous for anyone who's ever been here. Basically, everything is exactly the right size. There are rolling hills, but they don't roll too much or too far. There are beautiful country houses, but they are neither too elegant nor too utilitarian. The people are friendly, but they don't want to be your best friend before they've learned your name. The sky is blue, but not oppressively so. The only extreme is the colour of the soil, which lends a seriously surreal edge to everything: the rich dark red of it brings all the other hues towards the front of the spectrum.


[the rich red earth of PEI]

Of course, the Island struggles with a sort of curse, which is the Anne of Green Gables legacy. This attacts tourists from every corner of the earth -- most of all from Japan, where the Anne books have a major cult following -- and brings in untold billions every summer. For unquaint economic reasons, therefore, large sectors of the Island economy must embrace quaintness.



[Gable-free house in PEI]

Myself, I have never found the Island quaint. It is not living in the past. You can go for the Gable here, of course, if you feel so inclined; but most of all the natural scenery, and the experience of a society which, though modern, has not been super-sized, is a wonderful balm for the spirit.


[Trees and field]

I don't know if that's much of an encomium; obviously I could deploy adjective after adjective in praise of the vistas, etc., or indulge in cliche/. But Gorgiasm and cliche/ alike are profoundly alien to the Island sensibility, as I've observed it. It will be sad to leave, as on Thursday we must. In the meantime, tonight we're going to grab a lobster roll and see (at last!) the new Star Wars movie. The suspense is intense: will Anakin embrace the Dark Side, or will the Dark Side embrace him? Will Yoda embrace someone? Will all 1,100 unresolved questions about the saga plot be gathered into a single skein? And what exactly does the best lobster taste like?

23 May 2005

Charlottetown show

Just got back from the Charlottetown show. There must be a Harley rally going on -- either that or per capita Harley ownership is enormous here on the Island. We must have passed five or six on the way back to the hotel. No sign of the tourists yet: The Season is yet to begin.)

(This is really the ideal hotel, incidentally. Affordable, tasteful, free (and good) breakfast,
reliable Internet access, hot water. What more could one ask?)

Right, the show. For starters, I performed inside what is arguably Canada's most historic building, Province House, where the Fathers of Confederation met back in 1864. A web pic:



[Province House in Charlottetown. It looked just like this today, with half as much sunshine, some cloud, and fewer flowers]

One naturally wonders if Confederation would be in better shape these days if our
patres conscripti (and matres conscriptae) had continued to meet beneath virtuous Doric instead of laviscious Gothic.

The show went quite well, though turnout was modest. I may have gone slightly overboard in the "song tones," though Dave assures me all was well. My voice began to give out towards the end; I'm still recovering from my Saint John cold.



[folding brochures prior to the Charlottetown show. Everyone gets a brochure]

I need to start thinking of how, eventually, to perform other segments of the 1758-1760 cycle of material I've developed. I presume that the main focus of popular interest will continue to be the Battle of the Plains of Abraham, since that's by far the most famous event before Confederation. But perhaps I can someday collect a large enough group of fans that I could try a two- or three-day series of performances. Or should the Tour Episode be extended significantly? One presumes that this is how the Achilles story, which is the main plot of the Iliad, was filled out to 14 000 verses: people just wanted more and more Achilles, and what had been one incident among many at the Siege of Troy gradually usurped the whole cycle, gobbling up minor incidents as it grew.


[simile in PEI]

The similes went particularly well tonight -- that is, I could feel the audience enjoying them. Funny how some like them and some don't, for no discoverable reason. Interesting, too, that I feel more of a bond with audiences now than when I began the Tour, not less, despite the fact that I really have a set text memorised by now, from which I depart only at will. (Though lately I have been bungling the burial of Montcalm in various ways; there must be some internal illogic to the sequence of details there which my subconscious keeps coughing up -- I shall have to review it.)



We have, alas, accidentally deleted the pics from St. Paul's in Halifax; to make a long story short, Spektakl' imyel bolshoy uspekh.

Congrats to my good friend Don Lavigne, who just hours ago defended his doctoral thesis at Stanford! Don is an expert the anti-epic poetry of Archilochus and Hipponax, and will be professor next year at Texas Tech. Io doctorem!

22 May 2005

Charlottetown reached

Well, as noted below, it was one heck of a storm swept through the Maritimes today. But if we had to drive through the rain, at least it was driving rain, eh? Eh?

We have reached idyllic PEI, after a mini-Tour of part of Acadia. Foreign readers may not be familiar with the Acadian flag, which flies proudly throughout the region: it's the French tricolour with a gold star in the top-left corner.


[Acadian flag (below Maple Leaf) on a stormy day in Memramcook]

Acadia is really one of the most beautiful, and most civilised, areas of Canada. Of course, it's been under cultivation for longer than anywhere else (vanished Iroquoian cities apart) -- it was first settled in the mid-17th century. But the whole region is beautifully tended, on a house-by-house, field-by-field basis. Few areas or towns would look good in weather like today's, but Acadia looked great. It's a tribute to the inner spirit of its inhabitants that they take pride in outward form.


[view from our friends' Nick and Elodie's place, looking towards the village of Pre-d'en-Haut; the vast Petitcodiac river to the left]

We stopped in at our friends' Nick and Elodie's place for a splendid lunch; and also saw (briefly) Sackville, NB. Besides being my birthplace, it's also the birthplace of the Tour Episode (the segment of the larger cycle of material I have), as I composed the first version of it in the bohemian Bridge Street Cafe there, back in 2000. We had a quick cup of coffee to commemorate that manic 9-hour burst of inspiration.


[Bridge Street Cafe in Sackville, NB]

It's a slightly complicated story, but I had stopped in Sackville on my bike when I first was going East -- just to see the town I was born in, which I had only visited once (when I was 9) since my first months alive. Eventually I found myself in Louisbourg, NS (which we will soon visit again on this Tour), where I camped under the shade of a single tree for four days, hoping I could work the material I had into a useable, performable chunk. There I realised that my initial idea, which had been to start the story at the beginning of the Siege of 1759 (in June of that year, with the arrival of the British taskforce), was unworkable. So I sat trying to square the circle under my tree, until (under the strain?) I lost a contact lens. The pain, I recall, was brutal. My parents had sent me some more lenses, however; but they were sitting back in Sackville, many hours' ride away from Louisbourg. Not entirely daunted, I rode out to Sackville, claimed the lenses, camped in the rain, and that morning found myself drinking coffee at the Bridge Street Cafe. For whatever reason, the stars aligned and I generated the first version of this Tour Episode sitting there all day til closing.

To get back, though, we're now in Charlottetown, having crossed the enormous, 13-km long Confederation Bridge, which joins Prince Edward Island to the mainland and is now the main artery for on-Island, off-Island traffic.


[Dave filming the Confederation Bridge (on the PEI side). Only a very small part of the bridge is visible, of course. Note the red soil of PEI.]

The experience of driving onto the bridge from the mainland side is one of the most vivid memories I have of the 2000 tour: the highway appears to vanish somewhere in the clouds, and you just keep going up and up and up for about 4km. It's a little less breathtaking in a car, where you're lower down and can't see above the traffic so well; but still a great experience.

Now we're in Charlottetown. I will save description of PEI for later: we're here for three days, with the public show tomorrow at Province House Theatre (7pm). Speaking of public shows, I see I promised pics & desc of last night's Halifax performance in St. Paul's Church; but the sinews are weakening, the fingernails brittle with fatigue. I must sleep the happy sleep of a Prince Edward Islander.

Farewell to Halifax / Dartmouth


[took this picture (looking across the harbour from Dartmouth to Halifax) minutes after blogging the below: note whitecaps. Incredibly, 9000 people were running a marathon in Halifax today]

Just about to hit the road -- shall blog last night's Halifax show this evening -- through what looks, from our window, like the Great Halifax Wind & Rain Storm of 2005. The wind is positively screaming past our window.

Dave: "Jesus! Look at the rain! It's horizontal!"

Visited the spot of the first ever performance of the poem last night, on the Halifax docks; and lo & behold there was a lone busker there, playing the accordion. Finding we were from Ottawa, she inquired if there were many squeeze-box virtuosos there in the summer, and basically decided then and there she would move her operation West. An eerie repeat of my own busking experience as epic poet on that spot.

Dave: "A suggestion? Let's do the Drive Through at Tim Horton's. Let's not get out of the car."

We are indeed sad to be leaving the Tim-Horton's-rich enviornment of Halifax. We had breakfast at one down the road here in Dartmouth, walking a record four blocks before we found one. Only to discover later on that there is one actually on our block. This is indeed Timmie's Eternal City; Nova Scotia his Papal States. The Dominion Institute may be sponsoring this Tour, but the Tour is sponsoring Tim Horton's rather heavily. (Question at one of the Halifax West shows on Thursday: "How many times have you rolled up the rim?" Answer: "As may are the grains of sand in the Libyan desert . . .")