Columns

Cities in Six—Luxembourg City, Luxembourg

Luxembourg is the capital city of the Grand Duchy of Luxembourg, a small country wedged between Belgium, France, and Germany.  The city is in the south of the country, at the confluence of the Alzette and Pétrusse rivers. Luxembourg’s site on a plateau has given it strategic importance since Roman times.  The city has, at… Read more »

Beyond Literary Landscapes—2023 Bestsellers in Canada

From my early beginnings as a young introvert, the public library has always been a bit of a refuge.  Years later, not much has changed, albeit with an additional affinity for endless hours spent scouring second-hand bookstores to add to my ever-growing “to-read” pile. From one bookworm to another, this column will be underscoring and… Read more »

Fly on the Wall—Thar Blows The White Whale: The White Male?

Whether it’s blameless tragedies, like ice cream faceplanted onto pavement, or injurious words offending a visible minority, unfairness is rife in this world of ours.  It takes a noble spirit to face the forces of darkness and disappointment, a stance augmented by post-secondary education where we learn the reasons and details for assorted social maladies. … Read more »

Beyond Literary Landscapes—Robert Munsch

From my early beginnings as a young introvert, the public library has always been a bit of a refuge.  Years later, not much has changed, albeit with an additional affinity for endless hours spent scouring second-hand bookstores to add to my ever-growing “to-read” pile. From one bookworm to another, this column will be underscoring and… Read more »

Cities in Six—Strasbourg, France

Strasbourg is a city in the Alsace region of eastern France, about 400 kilometres east of Paris.  The Ill River, a tributary of the Rhine, runs through the centre of Strasbourg, and the Rhine itself forms the eastern boundary of the city (with the German city of Kehl across the river.) The city’s first historical… Read more »

No Place to Go

Recently, I was out for a walk in my Winnipeg neighborhood and came across a structure, a translucent plexiglass cube, known as the Little Red Library.  This had been one of the many architecturally designed warming hut structures that had once graced the surface of the frozen Red and Assiniboine rivers during winters when the… Read more »

High Summer

Ah, the dog days of summer.  There are certain perennial, evocative smells inseparable from this time of year.  Cut grass and sunscreen, for example.  Barbecue coals, melting tarmac, bug spray, and sweat.  To these, I would sadly now add wildfire smoke. Some days, leaving one’s air-conditioned climes and venturing outdoors, even if only so far… Read more »

Beyond Literary Landscapes—Gabrielle Roy

From my early beginnings as a young introvert, the public library has always been a bit of a refuge.  Years later, not much has changed, albeit with an additional affinity for endless hours spent scouring second-hand bookstores to add to my ever-growing “to-read” pile. From one bookworm to another, this column will be underscoring and… Read more »