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Stan Persky RIP
I was sorry to hear last week about the death of Stan Persky in Berlin, where he had been living for several years. (Appreciations here and here) For many years Persky was one of BC’s finest writers: humane, intelligent, witty, tolerant; a voice so unlike those that fill the media these days. The Globe and Mail called him a “Marxist intellectual”, which he may have been, but that suggests someone who was doctrinaire and difficult, and I always found him to be neither.
We met on only one occasion so I cannot claim to have known him but our paths crossed several times in different ways over the years. First of all, in an introductory philosophy course at UBC in 1966. It was taught by the legendary Bob Rowan (well, legendary to me and to many students who were exposed to his informal, probing style of teaching). Stan was also in the course. A bit older than the rest of us, he sat in the front row and conducted what amounted to a semester-long philosophical dialogue with Prof. Rowan which the rest of us were lucky enough to listen in on.
Later, in the 70s and early 80s, while I was living in Ottawa I used to listen to CBC radio while I worked. That was when another legend, Peter Gzowski, hosted his morning show, This Country in the Morning, later Morningside. As I recall, Gzowski convened weekly panels from different regions of the country to discuss what was going on in their neck of the woods. (This was when the CBC still thought it was its job to try to explain Canada to itself.) The BC panel included Stan (I’ve forgotten the other two contributors) and I listened religiously to find out what was happening in my native province. As a homesick wet-coaster living in exile, it was Stan, poking fun at the pompous right-wing politicos who ran the province at the time, who kept me connected to the politics and culture of the place.
After I moved back to BC in 1987 we shared a platform once. He was promoting one of his books and I one of mine. We spoke briefly and I sensed that he was not much interested in the thing that interested me, Canadian history. But I didn’t hold that against him. On other topics, especially when he drew on his long experience as a teacher to write about education, I found his writing to be approachable, lucid and smart. As I say, his voice will be missed.
Stan Persky was 83.
White Riot, a walking tour/book by artist Henry Tsang (previously mentioned here), has won this year's City of Vancouver Book Award.
Congratulations to the author, and to Arsenal Pulp Press for producing...
My pal Steve Osborne, co-founder of Geist magazine (with his partner Mary Schendlinger), is publishing a new collection of essays this fall with Arsenal Pulp Press. The launch is Thursday, October 10, at the People's Co-op Bookstore on Commercial Drive.
The festivities kick off at 7 p.m.
One of the nice things about autumn is that it means the Vancouver Historical Society will resume its series of monthly lectures.
This season's inaugural session is on Thursday evening, Sept. 26, and features artist Henry Tsang talking about his book/walking tour/interactive art event White Riot 1907 about racial disturbances in the city.
The presentation kicks off at 7 p.m...
The award-winning cultural historian and biographer, Maria Tippett, died last week at her home on Pender Island. She was 79 years old.
Anyone interested in the cultural history of Canada, and particularly British Columbia, owes a huge debt to Ms Tippett. Her 1979 biography of Emily Carr (above, my well-worn copy) won a Governor General's Award and her 1998 biography of Fred Varley, ...
Commercial Drive is Vancouver's favourite bohemian hotspot and for many years "The Drive's" most energetic chronicler has been Jak King, who sadly passed away last week.
I did not know him but I did know his three books on the Grandview neighbourhood, as well as his blog, Jak's View, where...