Notes on a World Class City: Vancouver's Poet Laureate Explains Why He Declined to Participate in Olympic Celebrations

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"While the Cultural Olympiad is surely impressive: of the 193 events listed on the VANOC website only 6 of them are labeled literary events and only two of them actually are literary events that include local writers: The Vancouver International Writers Festival’s Spoken World and Candahar, a recreation of a Belfast pub that will host readings and performances as curated by Michael Turner, and may turn out to be one of the most inspired creations of the Olympiad.

There are Canadian writers involved in a few of the other 193 listed events but when it comes to the celebration stages our writers are not just neglected, they are totally ignored. As Poet Laureate I was offered time on one of the celebration stages where I would be allowed to read poems that corresponded to themes as provided to me by an Olympic bureaucrat."

Brad Cran