Thunder Pride Literary Evening

Poet Jayal Chung read  "A Poem for my Imaginary Daughter"

The   Thunder Bay Art Gallery hosted this year's Thunder Pride Literary Evening of wonderful readings, and book signings to an appreciative audience. But beyond the conviviality was a shadow, the massacre in Orlando, which host Susan Goldberg addressed in her opening remarks:

"I'm not scared about tonight. Maybe I'm overly optimistic, or maybe I'm just in denial, but I feel that the art gallery, in this city, is and will be a safe space for us. What I am is sad, and pissed off.

"Sad for the murders of 49 people who could have been any of the people who will gather tonight. It could have been me and my friends, dancing till 2 AM At Buddies in Bad Times Theatre, like we did. Sad like I get teary at random moments throughout the day trying to process this.

"And pissed off that we still can't gather 90+ happy, arts-oriented, peaceful people into a beautiful space without it being an act of risk, an act of defiance, an act of supreme hope and confidence. I'm pissed off that as an organizer, host, executive committee member, friend, parent, teacher and mentor that I am creating and promoting an event the sole purpose of which should be joy but that carries an undertone of risk. And that, implicitly and explicitly, my job is to ask you now to manage that risk with me.

"Showing up and reading poetry, memoir, prose: it's a brave, beautiful, radical and angry act. "

Sarah Brennan read her poem "Somewhere Over the Rainbow."

So many highlights. A stunning reading by guest speaker, Hiromi Goto, from her memoir. She spoke about a room of her own, linking her life to that of Virginia Woolf, two lives very different. She spoke of the need for a life of the mind, that strange and somehow old fashioned phrase, but so necessary for women and writers. 

Hiromi Goto

Ma-nee Chacaby spoke of her life as a two spirited woman. She talked about violence and sexual abuse in her past and continual harassment in the present. And she made the audience laugh too. She stressed the need for women to write their own memoirs to pass on to the young generation. "Don't worry if you think you are not educated enough. Just tell your story to someone smarter than you and get her to write it down for you."

The Authors at Thunder Pride Literary Evening