BENGAL-CANADA LITERARY BONDS SHOWCASED

A Bengali-Canadian literary festival was held at St Paul’s United Church of Scarborough in July.

Three former poet laureates of Toronto, Anne Michaels, A F Moritz and George Elliott Clarke graced the event along with a good number of Bengali authors from Vancouver, Halifax, Montreal, Ottawa, Kingston and Waterloo and the Greater Toronto Area and its adjacent cities. Current Toronto Poet laureate of Toronto Lillian Allen sent a video message wishing the event a success.

At the six-hour event was emceed by Samina Chowdhury, Subrata Kumar Das, the initiator of Canada Journal, explained the objectives of the event.

“Making a bridge between mainstream Canadian writers and Bengali writers living in Canada is the foremost,” he said.

Shahidul Islam Mintu gave a speech on behalf of media partners. BanglaMail published a 56-page special issue focusing on the different aspects of Canada with contributions from 27 Bengali writers. Guest editor Das expressed the hope that this special issue would help thousands of Bangladeshi newcomers learn about life in Canada and the system in the new country.

The poet laureates were introduced and interviewed by Sujit Kusum Paul, Momo Kazi and Tasmina Khan and readings by them were conducted by translator Sreyoshi Bose.

Dr. Jharna Chatterjee, Sudhir Saha, Hasan Mahmud, Syed Iqbal and Atonu Das Gupa participated in the session on nonfiction which was chaired by Akbar Hossain.

Shekhor E Gomes led the session on poetry in which Shahana Akter Mohua, Kazi Helal, Rakeeb Hassan and Sultana Shirin Shazi were panellists.

The session on fiction, chaired by Salma Bani, was joined by Nahar Monica, Jakaria Muhammad Moyen Uddin and Sushil Podder.

A quiz competition for teens and youths on the literature, culture and heritage of Bengal was conducted by Souradrita Bhowmik and Sourodeep Bhowmik. Noted Barrister Omar Hasan Al Zahid distributed prizes among the winners with a short speech.

The participants expressed their solidarity with the recent student killing in Bangladesh by standing for one minute in silence on Das’s call.