The Literary Storefront: The Glory Years (Vancouver's Literary Centre 1978-1985) by Trevor Carolan (Mother Tongue 2015). Book launch at Seymour Art Gallery, Saturday, Nov. 14 at 2 p.m. For more information visit seymourartgallery.com.
Back in the day Tom Ilves, future president of Estonia, hung out at the Literary Storefront in Gastown. So did the likes of Margaret Atwood, Michael Ondaatje and Carol Shields. If you were a writer, or had aspirations of being one, the Literary Storefront was the place to be.
Poet Mona Fertig modelled her literary salon after Shakespeare and Company, the legendary bookshop that Sylvia Beach opened in Paris in 1919. Other bookstores such as City Lights in San Francisco also served as an inspiration when it opened in May, 1978.
The Literary Storefront was meant to be a one-stop meeting place. As a community centre its doors were open to everyone and served as a focal point for literary activity in Vancouver for writers and their readers during the late '70s and early '80s.
Fertig tells Trevor Carolan: "It wasn't just about showcasing well-known or famous writers, I wanted the inexperienced writers, women writers, the closet writers all mingling - inspiring real ferment for ideas and action. Sylvia Beach opened a small bookshop, and then she's publishing James Joyce and Ulysses; I wanted things like that to happen. A sociological/literary combustion. Salon-style. Grassroots."
Several North Shore writers participated in Fertig's salon. The poetry of Pat Lowther was featured and North Vancouver writer Blanche Howard met her lifelong friend Carol Shields at the Literary Storefront. Carole Itter also gave her first live performance with her shaman partner Al Neil there. At one point throwing hundreds of glass shards collected from Dollarton beach across the floor as they read a passage in tandem.
Carolan, a Deep Cove resident himself, gave the first public reading of his poetry at the salon on an open mic night. In page after page he recounts the history of the Literary Storefront through personal interviews with some of the participants and archival photographs of the time.
Originally situated on the second floor at 131 Water Street, it moved to 314 West Cordova after the second year of operation. During its existence the Gastown salon played host to hundreds of readings and workshops and acted as a liaison for other organizations. The B.C. branch of the Writers Union of Canada set up shop there. As did the League of Canadian Poets, The Periodical Writers Association of Canada and the Federation of British Columbia Writers. The Literary Storefront welcomed one and all.
In the later years Fertig moved on and gave control to other people but her vision of a communal meeting place remained intact.
