Their jobs sound like an oxymoron in Canada’s present political climate; arts professionals earn about half the average national income per year, a large chunk of which comes from grants. That public funding is in danger since Stephen Harper made it perfectly clear he doesn’t consider the arts a priority. Given that the main agenda […] More »

Tell someone you like science fiction, fantasy or horror films and you might get “the look.” A look that says, “Are you silly, immature or, worse, pervy?” Fans of genre cinema—the term applies to many different categories of film but is most commonly applied to sci-fi, fantasy and horror—have long had a bad rep as […] More »

Jillian Tamaki found that literary juries are still learning how to read graphic novels Last year, on October 21, Jillian Tamaki got a phone call from her cousin, the Toronto-based writer-performer Mariko Tamaki. Their muchloved co-creation Skim had made history by becoming the first graphic novel nominated for a Governor General’s Award, in the Children’s […] More »