• 2022 Short Story Competition

    The Conversation

    one phone call, unexpected. two faces, mama and dada. three questions, and i am thinking– where is the line between keeping myself whole and stringing out pieces to tie me to my parents? how much do these bindings hold us, how much will i pay for them, what is the cost?  it all happens so quickly that when i look back, i remember only the little pebbles that got caught in my tight throat, triggering an earthquake in my voice. a slight tremor and it’s all do you know who you are yet? my father says he cannot look me in the eye, he says why are you getting defensive,…

  • 2022 Short Story Competition

    The 1

    A slice of cake flew across the room. It was absolute chaos. This was supposed to be a simple rehearsal dinner for Kate and Ryan’s wedding, and it only took one comment about Kate’s short, off-white dress from Ryan’s mom to prompt an argument from Kate’s mom, which then became a full-blown war. Someone pulled someone’s hair, someone tripped someone else, and that’s when the first cookie was chucked across the room like a frisbee, hitting the maid of honour. Kate’s anxiety engulfed her, leaving her a mess in the corner of the room where Ryan had left her to separate the two parties. Kate’s body was tense and felt…

  • 2022 Short Story Competition

    Big Brother Bends the Universe

             Christmas is generally a joyous, festive time, if somewhat stressful and chaotic. But for those of us who lost loved ones this year, or were separated from family due to Covid-19, or have traumatic holiday memories or negative family relationships or for a million other reasons, the holidays can be a very challenging time.          I’ve had my fair share of terrible Christmases, but this was simultaneously the worst, and strangely, the best, in my 22 years of life so far (given the circumstances).          A bit of backstory: I’m the youngest sibling in a very large, branching, complicated family. I grew up with seven siblings, but for the…

  • 2022 Short Story Competition

    In Fair Verona

    I find myself in the same interrogation room I had been before. Hands cuffed, in an orange jumpsuit, waiting for my one and only visitor. I recite to myself what has now become a comfort poem by Bob Kaufman, Someone whom I am is no one. / Something I have done is nothing. / Someplace I have been is nowhere. / I am not me. Enter Carlos Williams. He’s become older since the last time I saw him. He takes the seat across of me, taking his time, making me wait. He motions for the guard to go, a gesture I have seen him perform a dozen times before and…

  • 2022 Short Story Competition

    Exotic Fish

    It is a starved town. Bone-white houses pave the beach like conches and oysters, although these oysters are bereft of pearls. Towards the edge of the town most distant from the beach, a thin train track etches its way through the sand to a run-down station and a dosing ticket-taker. The metal rails of the track are faded and frail, like the ribs of cattle skeletons that warn of a desert’s heat. Trains pass by the town infrequently, billowing out waves of smoke and silt which mix with the sand and vanish in minutes. Boats lie, grounded, anywhere between the beach and the station, some boarded up and full of…

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    “The old way of love seemed a dreadful bondage”: Homoromanticism and Identity in D.H Lawrence’s Women in Love

    “‘You can’t have two kinds of love. Why should you!’ ‘It seems as if I can’t,’ he said. ‘Yet I wanted it.’” (Lawrence 481) D. H. Lawrence’s Women in Love tells the story of love and tragedy between two women struggling with their own circumstantial love affairs. However, separate from the changing values of modernist heterosexual romance, Lawrence’s classic novel, lauded for its portrayal of modernist attitudes as one of the best works of literature in the 20th century, explores a complicated homosexual love affair between Birkin and Gerald. The two male leads are contrasted against one another and in intimate duality with each other, breaching an ascension beyond the…

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    5 Comforting & Encouraging Book Recommendations

    “I wish it need not have happened in my time,” said Frodo. “So do I,” said Gandalf, “and so do all who live to see such times. But that is not for them to decide. All we have to decide is what to do with the time that is given us.”  —J.R.R. Tolkien, The Fellowship of the Ring “Hello. How are you doing?” As days turned into weeks, and weeks turned into months, these words were the ones I found myself repeating over and over to friends, family, and classmates. If lockdown has taught me anything, it has taught me the importance of communication—not only in relation to the spread…

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    Destiny and Free Will: The Wicked Day of Chance

      Death closes all: but something ere the end, Some work of noble note, may yet be done, Not unbecoming men that strove with Gods. — Lord Alfred Tennyson, “Ulysses”   Fate’s threads entangle all in an infinite web, unbeknownst to the players of the tragedy. What happens when a character is aware of his fate and acts towards preventing it? Can destiny, with all its predetermined points in time, be altered? Mary Stewart’s The Wicked Day (2003) tells the story of Mordred, as he struggles to fight against the prophecy of King Arthur’s death by his hands. Mordred’s life begins and ends with Arthur. Oblivious to their family connection,…

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    Halloween Books to Kickoff Your Halloween Week

    The origins of Halloween date back to a Celtic tradition marking the end of the harvest season. Later, this pagan celebration was given Christian connotations by the Church, and the term “Halloween” translates to “All Saints” (“History of Halloween” Radford, B.). The modern celebration of Halloween proves to be far more removed from its origins, and nowadays Halloween is typically associated with candy, haunted houses, pumpkin spice lattes, and carving jack-o-lanterns. As the weather cools and Halloween approaches, here are some spooky books you can curl up with to embrace the Halloween spirit.     1. “Frankenstein” by Mary Shelley   “Beware; for I am fearless, and therefore powerful” –…

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    Separating Art from Artist

    Some of the most renowned authors have been horribly problematic people. Salinger was an adulterer and has been accused of pedophilia. Anne Perry murdered her mother. T.S. Eliot was a raging anti-Semite – as were Virginia Woolf, Ezra Pound, and Ernest Hemingway. So why is it that we study these author’s texts with such fervent admiration in our English classes, fawn over their prose in our book clubs, and read their works on our own time? The simple answer is that bad people sometimes create great art. Yet the problem with putting so much importance on works by problematic people is that the things they’ve done and said become forgotten…

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    A Novel In Verse: My Take on Eugene Onegin

    As someone who is very interested in Russian History, culture, and literature, I love to explore different Russian texts in translation. One of my current favourites is the novel written in verse, Eugene Onegin. Written by Pushkin in 1825, this novel is short, witty, and engaging, with an unexpected twist at the end. It is an easy book to enjoy while juggling schoolwork and readings. Beware, spoilers ahead! Eugene Onegin follows the story of the young aristocrat, Eugene Onegin, as he slowly becomes bored with the debonair life he has been living and withdraws to the countryside. Once there, he quickly forms a friendship with his neighbour, Vladimir Lensky. Lensky…

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    Top 10 Places to Read on Campus

    If you’re like me and enjoy reading above and beyond the requirements set by class, you have probably already scouted the campus for private and quiet places to enjoy a few chapters during the school day. So, without further ado, here is my definitive list of the best places to catch a few paragraphs before your next class begins. 10. In your lecture I do not condone reading during lectures, but during syllabus week it can be so hard to stay focused in class. I won’t blame you if you whip out your book and read a few lines while your professor reads the printed out syllabus sheet word for…

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    How I Chose My Pen Name: On Racialized Names and the English Literary Canon

    Hello, my name is Charmaine Anne Li. That is my full legal name on all my documents, and everyone calls me “Charmaine.” However, I sign off on all my literary pieces as “Li Charmaine Anne.” Truth is, I’ve always been a little sensitive as to how “Asian-sounding” my name is. “Li,” after all, is the most common surname in the world, and is almost iconically Chinese. Growing up, the books I read and the movies I saw with Asian names attached to them were almost always exclusively about “Asian issues.” This gave me the impression that Asian writers can only ever write about Asian Issues and nothing else: no medieval adventure…

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    A Comment on How Lists Shape the Mind

    I love lists. Lists are important; they tell you exactly what you need to get done, and then maybe you’ll pat yourself on the back after checking off a task. They help you out when you’re grocery shopping or when you’re idly skimming through your newsfeed. Tables of contents, glossaries, and indexes wouldn’t exist without them. And like everything else, lists can be used to promote, deliberately or not, certain ideas and attitudes. Growing up loving books, I’ve always wanted to finish a “100 books to read before you die” list (still pending), for a variety of reasons that range from fueling my consumption for words, to wanting to be…