Brockton Writers Series 10.01.24: Michael Mirolla

Michael Mirolla has published close to twenty books of poetry and fiction. His novella The Last News Vendor won the 2020 Hamilton Literary Award for fiction. A symposium on Michael’s writing was held in Toronto on May 25, 2023. He makes his home near Gananoque in the Thousand Islands area.

Of Atheists & Interruptions: Unconnected Yuletide Thoughts

(Originally written and published during my three-month writers’ residency in the Historic Joy Kogawa House, Vancouver, 2019)

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I read recently where an atheist group calling itself a church, the Church of Atheism of Central Canada, was denied charitable status under Canada’s Income Tax Act because it lacked a “belief system.” Be that as it may, while being pummelled by Christmas music during the holiday season, it occurred to me that this Church of Atheism might have an opening to make itself more palatable. How, you ask? Well, rather than arguing for a belief system (which is very difficult when you don’t believe in a higher being or entity), perhaps it might be a better idea to dedicate their time and efforts to creating/modifying carols and hymns to try to get their message of non-belief across. With that in mind, I’ll start it off with: “O Come All Ye Faithless.”

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Being far, far away from family this Yuletide season and missing them immensely, I thought it a good time to resurrect something written almost a decade ago for a Montreal website called Rover Arts, which sadly is no more:

You know the joke about “Interrupting Cow.” Here comes Interrupting Christmas.

Don’t get me wrong. I like Christmas (or whatever the latest politically correct designation might be). I just don’t appreciate the fact it gets in the way when it comes to being productive. Difficult to put in sixteen-hour days with people waving bottles of fine wine, single malt, and five-star cognac under your nose. Even more difficult to keep up the jollity when you know you’re slipping further and further into the quagmire known as “the deadline” or “the pit of postmodern time.”

Take, for instance, the time it is taking me to write this piece. Here I am, complaining about quagmire slippage, when I’m putting aside a string of to-be-done-yesterday tasks in order to wax negative about one of Christianity’s (and Walmart’s) most cherished festivals. It’s a bit like interrupting the earning of wages in order to attack the wage-earning system. But, being humans (rather than Rumi’s fish), we can’t seem to help it.

In truth, I have always looked upon the season as an interruption. At one time, in that surreal period called childhood, it was a pleasant interruption — from school tasks, family obligations, the day-to-day routine that quietly slipped into boredom. It also helped you escape for a few days from the ongoing slashing and clashing that filtered down from the adult games going on around you.

Of course, there also was an oblivion factor involved: amid the shouting and laughter, amid the hints and glimpses of paradise, all we were aware of was the constant flow of dishes to and from the table, the endless bottles of homemade wine, the once-a-year melt-in-your-mouth treats. What we didn’t realize was that, like all notions of paradise, Christmas was flawed at its very heart by an uneven division of labour: some were having the fun; others sweating to produce it.

Perhaps the redeeming factor (“redeeming,” now there’s an interesting word) was that, as children, we still believed. We still felt the tug of the mystery. We still ran towards the light without assuming it was an oncoming train known as mortality. Perhaps that’s what made Christmas a pleasant interruption.

Today, however, there is little that is pleasant about the interruption. We talk about shutting things down for a few days (as if we were automatons) in order to celebrate. Or we talk about moving at half-speed (as if that somehow is going to regenerate us or allow us to tack the other “half of the speed” onto the end of the process when we know full well we are going to have to go at one-and-a-half-speed simply to catch up). Or we decide we’re not going to answer those text messages … with equally disastrous results (not to mention the stress and anxiety it creates for our thumbs).

But … family … you say … surely, if nothing else, that is worth the interruption. Well, let me see: although living in the same house, Jane hasn’t seen John (aside possibly from some path-crossing at breakfast) for more than a few minutes throughout the year. So now, they are going to gather around the Christmas dinner table to … ah, share some memories … exchange O Henry gifts (mine was two days’ work while I see yours is only one day’s) … and be merry.

When it comes to family, unless we take the time to make each day of the year as warm and memorable as we pretend Christmas is, it’s not worth the effort. Cleaning out the Augean stables once a year of the neglect, inattention, relational sloppiness, and general laxness built up for 364 days makes little sense. And, if someone were to tell me that they are respectful, attentive, cherishing, and nurturing all year long, then what’s the point of interrupting that with Christmas?

So, now that I’ve finished writing this piece and pissing some people off, can I get back to my sixteen-hour day? Unless, that is, someone is willing to pass an uncorked bottle of Lagavulin under my nose. That interrupts me every time — Christmas or not.

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So what can atheists give each other for Christmas? May I suggest the Atheist Christmas Coloring Book, subtitled “Celebrate Reason for the Season.” It’s by Rick Marazanni who says: “[W]e are raising our kids as cradle atheists. No ghosts, or demons, gods, or angels except in fairy tales. But we love the spirit of Christmas.” [Interview on “The Tentative Apologist,” November 15, 2018, https://randalrauser.com/2018/11/atheism-and-christmas-an-interview-with-rick-marazzani/%5D You can download the coloring book at: http://atheistchristmas.org/

For those atheists who like to curl up with a fun book over the holidays, there’s How To Be A Good Atheist by Nick Harding. Here’s part of the sell pitch: “Fed up of religion telling you it has all the answers when it doesn’t? Tired of hearing about divine mysteries when there aren’t any? Irritated by the pious evangelistas telling you you’re going to hell when you’re obviously not? Exhausted by creationists … for simply being creationists? Want to know more about the so-called atheist conspiracy? Then this book is for you.”

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Famous atheists you might know: Isaac Asimov, Bjork, George Carlin, Marlene Dietrich, Jodie Foster, Katherine Hepburn, Nehru, Salman Rushdie, Mark Twain, Frank Zappa. And me.

Brockton Writers Series 10.01.24: Camille Hernández-Ramdwar

Camille Hernández-Ramdwar is an author, scholar, and independent consultant. Her debut collection of short stories Suite as Sugar was published by Rare Machines/Dundurn Press in 2023. She is currently working on a novel of historical fiction and magical realism spanning multiple continents and eras. Camille divides her time between Toronto and Trinidad.

Camille Herández-Ramdwar — Suite as Sugar

The author interviews herself

What caused you to write Suite As Sugar?

I have deep concerns about several issues and injustices affecting, firstly, Caribbean communities, and secondly, the larger global community. I wanted to tell some of our stories not in a scholarly way, as I had been doing in front of classrooms of students, but through literary fiction instead. It is the inability of us as Caribbean people to heal from generational trauma that has preoccupied me for some time — I see it in my own life, my family, and friends, in the men I have had relationships with, in my communities, in everything that we as Caribbean people do. So I have wanted to bring attention and light to these issues in whatever way possible in the hopes that if we can address these realities, and stop trying to ignore or deny them, maybe we can then have the courage to heal from our past and stop doing the things that harm us. Stop the violence, the dysfunctionality, the passing on of dangerous and detrimental traits generation after generation. Maybe we can heal ourselves as nations and communities and societies and choose better leadership. Maybe we can re-claim our agency as valuable subjects.

What has been the reception of your book?

Mixed! Some people have read it and absolutely loved it, connecting with it on multiple and deep levels, and some for whom it was a challenging but rewarding read. Then others said they “could not relate” to it. Side note — you don’t have to be of Caribbean descent to enjoy or engage with my book. I see several non-mainstream books written by Black authors or Indigenous authors that are being celebrated by mainstream readers, that are winning awards etc., but these are often books marketed directly to mainstream audiences, and so they get a different response.

This brings me to my qualms about the Canadian literary scene, the publishing industry, and the media. What diverse writers do mainstream readers even get to hear about, and why? Who decides that? What books are considered valuable to funders/corporations? How often is success determined by the industry connections an author has, or the size of their social media following? How much space is allocated to “diverse” writers and what kind of diversity is considered acceptable/popular, and which kind isn’t? The “gatekeepers” in the Canadian publishing industry are very powerful. This is a very competitive industry, and although you may think your book is quality writing and worthy of being “seen,” the reality is that unless it gets reviewed in the “right” publications, unless it is listed for prestigious awards, unless it sells “well” in the marketplace, it may sink into oblivion. And vice versa. Just because a book won multiple awards or garnered rave reviews or is a “bestseller” doesn’t necessarily mean it is great writing! Many writers such as I, who have already surmounted numerous hurdles just to get published can feel discouraged by this. So ultimately, we must decide why we are writing, and if we are okay with writing and not receiving significant professional recognition.

Who did you write this book for?

Ultimately, I write for myself. I follow Toni Morrison’s excellent advice: “If there is a book that you want to read, but it hasn’t been written yet, then you must write it.” Therefore, my writing doesn’t follow a formula or a business model! It is a catch-22 in that if I write the book that I want to read, who is to say that an editor or agent or publisher will feel this book deserves to extend beyond my purview? As writers, we are taking a chance. But what is the alternative? Unless I, as a creative, write from the heart and not the rational left brain, strategizing how to position myself as a “bestselling author,” unless I write from that source (and in my case that extends to the spiritual and the “voices in my head” which are probably the ancestors and the dead), if I am not the conduit for this source, then how can I feel that my writing has purpose? I often feel that I am transcribing the messages and stories that I receive from other entities. I know Edwidge Danticat has said the same, and I know exactly what she is talking about. Sometimes I just laugh out loud as I am writing because a character has revealed a plot twist to me that I could never have invented, and they are showing themselves to me on the page and it is like they are sharing a joke: “You see what I did there?”. It is glorious and life-affirming and I feel so blessed and gifted to be able to do this work.

Can you tell us about your next project?

My next book is quite a departure from Suite as Sugar. Firstly, it’s a novel that takes place in the past and present, and secondly, I am including a wide cast of characters that extend beyond the Caribbean and its diaspora. I also think this is a much more Canadian book. Many of the themes I am grappling with — colonialism, post-colonialism, race, injustice, and genocide — are similar to Suite as Sugar, but the way that I am approaching these themes is through a series of intertwining characters and stories spanning six centuries and three continents. It is a tapestry and I feel like a weaver working the skein and figuring out which thread of what story goes where, under or over another’s character’s trajectory, and how it all adds up. I have been loving the work and I certainly hope it resonates with many different people. There are numerous love stories in this book, and there is hope, however grim it may be wrought, which I think differs from Suite as Sugar, in that many of the short stories in the latter were left unresolved and open-ended, which upset some people! But that is the reality of life… We don’t always know how things are going to end up.

Brockton Writers Series 10.01.24: Phoebe Barton

Phoebe Barton is a queer, trans science-fiction writer. Her short fiction has appeared in Analog, Lightspeed, and Kaleidotrope, and her story “The Mathematics of Fairyland” won the Aurora Award for Best Short Story in 2022. She lives with her family, a robot, and multiple typewriters in Hamilton, Ontario. Find her online at www.phoebebartonsf.com

Small Steps Not Taken: Science Fiction and Moon Landings Before Apollo

By Phoebe Barton

It’s been fifty years since the first footprints were left on Luna, but until then people had been dreaming about some version of that day for generations without end. In this case, the biggest problem was the most obvious: how do you get to the moon, anyway? Starting in the late 1930s, there is a small sub-genre of stories about first flights to the moon, but most are utterly forgettable and forgotten today.

It wasn’t just stories looking at this, either. One of the earliest serious examinations of a lunar flight came from the British Interplanetary Society (BIS). In the late 1930s, the BIS designed a spaceship using known, proven methods, which boiled down to hundreds of solid rocket boosters in a six-stage array. Due to legal restrictions and a lack of money, the rocket never took shape. Given ’30s tech, that’s probably for the best.

Eighty years ago, lunar flights were still for the distant future. The September 1935 issue of Wonder Stories references an interview with Dr. Heber P. Curtis, then-director of the University of Michigan’s observatory, who believed that a vessel “powered by trinitrotolual” — TNT — “will make the round trip to the moon.” When did he see this trip occurring? “In the next two centuries, sometime.”

In the 1951 short story “Reaching for the Moon” by S.A. Lombino, Dr. Saunders has spent eight years solving all the technical problems facing creating a lunar rocket, and now all he has to do is find the money to build the thing. He takes his case to “the richest men on Earth,” who shoot down his claim that a lunar flight “would probably end all hostilities on Earth” and “galvanize humanity into constructive action” with the simple, timeless “where’s the money in it?” They refuse to finance it, but acknowledge that things might be different sometime in the future, “but now, unthinkable.” Of course, since ’50s stories loved their twists, the punchline is that it’s set in 3951.

This leads into a common theme for these stories: the idea that the first lunar flight would be the result of a Determined, Clear-Eyed, Resourceful Industrialist, with the US government (and it’s always the US government) peripherally involved if not actively hostile. This came across strongly in the 1950 film Destination Moon, with a lunar rocket financed entirely by the private sector and launched ahead of an official attempt to shut it down. In the 1947 story “All Aboard for the Moon” by Harold M. Sherman, the lunar rocket is carrying experimental technology borrowed from the US Army but is itself entirely privately-funded by yet another Determined 1940s Industrialist.

They aren’t all like that, though. William Oberfeld’s 1951 story “They Reached for the Moon” anticipated the first flights to be military, but they did not quite end as expected, and Hergé’s 1950 Destination Moon depicted a civilian, governmental program. Hergé’s is the only example I found that came from outside the Anglosphere, which may be a factor.

While pre-spaceflight stories didn’t envision a project with the scope of the Apollo program, they didn’t envision a flight like it, either. The Apollo missions used a dedicated lunar lander, but for authors looking to make a giant leap, there’s another method that science fiction writers were in love with: direct ascent. Here, the entire ship — the stories I’ve found include one rocket “twenty stories high,” and another with an airlock forty feet off the ground — takes off from Earth in one piece, lands on Luna in one piece, then returns to Earth in one piece.

There are a few reasons why writers would like this. For one, it’s simple and direct. It also brings in a sense of wonder, because rockets capable of direct ascent missions are not small. In fact, in order to do it you’d need an engine far more capable than the chemical rockets that were used on the Saturn V: a nuclear engine. This is how it was done in both Destination Moons (Destinations Moon?). Sherman’s “All Aboard for the Moon” uses this architecture as well, though his nuclear rocket gets its power by “extract[ing] the energy from a pound of gasoline.” Plus, nuclear rockets are beefy enough that they can accelerate continuously at 1 g for the entire mission. This takes flight time down from Apollo‘s three days to about seven hours, which lets the plot stay taut.

Now, once those astronauts get to the surface, what are they getting up to? This is where stories tend to diverge: some murder their partner to get the glory of being the First Man on the Moon, some hornswoggle their partners into unintentionally becoming the First Man on the Moon, but many of them explicitly claim it on behalf of the United States. At this point in the Cold War, when it was starting to dawn on people that the moon Really Is A Place After All, there was the worry that whoever got to the moon first would have an unassailable fortress from which to bombard Earth with nuclear weapons. Things didn’t end up working like that, but preventing this is explicitly called out as a motivation in more than one of these stories.

Still, these stories did get one thing very frequently right — in that they predicted the first landers would be American, white, and male. The only two exceptions I encountered were in Sherman’s “All Aboard for the Moon,” where an unintentional early launch sees a parachute jumper and hopeful actress included in the crew, and in The Amazing Criswell’s 1955 prediction of the first moon flight, which included in its crew Mae West. President Mae West. In 1965.

It’s instructive to remember that the way it happened isn’t the way it had to happen.

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Thanks to the Merril Collection of Science Fiction, Speculation, and Fantasy at the Toronto Public Library, where I was able to access most of the sources I used in this article.

Wednesday, January 10th, 2024—6:30 p.m.

Brockton Writers Series presents readings by:

Shakkoi Hibbert

Michael Mirolla

Camille Hernández-Ramdwar

Phoebe Barton

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Special note: As we adapt with current social distancing regulations, we’re happy to announce our event will be hosted in-person at the Glad Day Bookshop, located at 499 Church St., Toronto. We will also live stream the event on the Brockton Writers Series YouTube channel! The event starts at 6:30 p.m.

The reading is PWYC (suggested $3-$5) and features a Q&A with the writers afterward. Books are available for sale.

 If you’d like to donate, please do so here.

Many thanks to the Ontario Arts Council for their support.

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GUEST SPEAKER

Robert Rotenberg

“Creating Characters, Compelling Story Lines, and the Importance of Fiction in our Modern World”

Robert Rotenberg is the bestselling author of six novels set in contemporary Toronto. His books have been translated into nine languages. He’s also been a criminal lawyer for more than 30 years and is an experienced writing teacher. His new novel What We Buried will be out February 27, 2024.

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READERS

Shakkoi Hibbert aka Need Some Koi is an art practitioner, a three-time author, spoken word activist, and movement instructor. Through performance, facilitation, and community engagement, she possesses a remarkable ability to transcend experiences of power and pain through the mediums of poetry, dance, and speech. With a wealth of experiences to share, everyone Needs Some Koi in their lives!

Michael Mirolla has published close to twenty books of poetry and fiction. His novella The Last News Vendor won the 2020 Hamilton Literary Award for fiction. A symposium on Michael’s writing was held in Toronto on May 25, 2023. He makes his home near Gananoque in the Thousand Islands area.

Camille Hernández-Ramdwar is an author, scholar, and independent consultant. Her debut collection of short stories Suite as Sugar was published by Rare Machines/Dundurn Press in 2023. She is currently working on a novel of historical fiction and magical realism spanning multiple continents and eras. Camille divides her time between Toronto and Trinidad.

Phoebe Barton is a queer, trans science-fiction writer. Her short fiction has appeared in Analog, Lightspeed, and Kaleidotrope, and her story “The Mathematics of Fairyland” won the Aurora Award for Best Short Story in 2022. She lives with her family, a robot, and multiple typewriters in Hamilton, Ontario. Find her online at www.phoebebartonsf.com