Okanagan College Media Release

One of Canada’s most renowned writers, Gary Geddes, will take up residency in The Mackie House as the 2008 Writer-in-Residence this September.

Geddes will give a public reading of some of his work on Monday, Sept. 22 at 7 p.m. in Room D212 at the Kalamalka Campus of Okanagan College. The reading will serve to introduce Geddes to the community as he assumes his role as Writer-in-Residence. The reading is free of charge and members of the community are invited to attend.

As Writer-In-Residence at The Mackie House, Geddes will join the esteemed company of the first six writers who began this tradition with Okanagan College and The Mackie House: Ron Ayling, Dennis Cooley, David Pitt-Brooke and Christine McPhee, Robert Kroetsch and Dawne McCance. Kalamalka Press has published each of these writers and their books can be ordered online by going to www.kalwriters.com.

Geddes’ writing career has spanned four decades of work and, aside from editing two of the most popular poetry anthologies in the country – “20^th Century Poetry & Poetics” and “15 Canadian Poets X 3” -- Geddes has written a powerful and significant body of original work including these books: “Letter Of The Master Of Horse,” “War And Other Measures,” “The Acid Test,” “The Terracotta Army,” “No Easy Exit,” “Sailing Home: A Journey Through Time, Place & Memory,” “The Kingdom Of Ten Thousand Things: An Impossible Journey From Kabul to Chiapas,” and, most recently, “Falseworks,” a book of poems about the collapse of the Second Narrows bridge in 1958, which was short-listed for The George Ryga Award and contributed to Geddes being awarded the 2008 British Columbia Lieutenant Governor’s Award for Literary Excellence.

“George Woodcock once described Geddes as Canada’s best political poet,” said John Lent, Regional Dean of Okanagan College, “and I think that in his own quiet way, alongside the work of Tom Wayman and Milton Acorn, that’s a very accurate statement still.”

Lent went on to say that having Geddes here as Writer-in-Residence will be exciting for writers in Vernon and Kelowna, and especially for students enrolled in Okanagan College’s new two-year Diploma In Writing & Publishing, offered in Vernon at the Kalamalka Campus of Okanagan College.