Vivek Shraya - Next Time Theres a Pandemic

Published by

University of Alberta Press

116 Rutherford Library South

11204 89 Avenue NW

Edmonton, Alberta, Canada T6G 2J4

Amiskwacwskahican | Treaty 6 | Mtis Territory

uap.ualberta.ca

and

Canadian Literature Centre / Centre de littrature canadienne

35 Humanities Centre

University of Alberta

Edmonton, Alberta, Canada T6G 2E5

www.abclc.ca

Copyright 2022 Vivek Shraya

Afterword 2022 Vivek Shraya and J. R. Carpenter

LIBRARY AND ARCHIVES CANADA CATALOGUING IN PUBLICATION

Title: Next time theres a pandemic / Vivek Shraya.

Names: Shraya, Vivek, 1981 author. | Canadian Literature Centre, issuing body.

Series: Henry Kreisel lecture series.

Description: Series statement: CLC Kreisel lecture series

Identifiers: Canadiana (print) 20210347554 | Canadiana (ebook) 20210347570 | ISBN 9781772126051 (softcover) | ISBN 9781772126082 ( EPUB ) | ISBN 9781772126099 ( PDF )

Subjects: LCSH : Shraya, Vivek, 1981 | LCSH : COVID-19 Pandemic, 2020 Anecdotes. | LCGFT : Creative nonfiction.

Classification: LCC PS8637.H73 N49 2022 | DDC C818/.603 dc

First edition, rst printing, 2022 .

First electronic edition, 2022 .

Digital conversion by Transforma Pvt. Ltd.

Copyediting and proofreading by Joanne Muzak.

Cover design by Tim Singleton.

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be produced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise) without prior written consent. Contact University of Alberta Press for further details.

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The Canadian Literature Centre acknowledges the support of Dr. Eric Schloss and the Faculty of Arts for the CLC Kreisel Lecture delivered by Vivek Shraya in March 2021 online through the University of Alberta.

University of Alberta Press gratefully acknowledges the support received for its publishing program from the Government of Canada, the Canada Council for the Arts, and the Government of Alberta through the Alberta Media Fund.

To the lives lost to the HIV/AIDS pandemic.

FOREWORD

The CLC Kreisel Lecture Series

THE CANADIAN LITERATURE CENTRE (CLC) was established in 2006 , thanks to the leadership gift of noted Edmontonian bibliophile Dr. Eric Schloss. The Kreisel Lecture Series is an annual event dedicated to nurturing public as well as scholarly engagement with the pressing concerns of writers in Canada. This series was established in honour of Professor Henry Kreisel. Author, University Professor, and Officer of the Order of Canada, Kreisel was born into a Jewish family in Vienna in 1922 . He left his homeland for England in 1938 and was interned in Canada for eighteen months during the Second World War. After studying at the University of Toronto, he was hired in 1947 to teach at the University of Alberta, where he served as Chair of English from 1961 to 1970 . He served as Vice-President (Academic) from 1970 to 1975 , when he was named University Professor, the highest scholarly award bestowed on its faculty members by the University of Alberta. An inspiring and beloved teacher who taught generations of students to love literature, Professor Kreisel was among the first to champion Canadian literature in university classrooms and to bring the experience of immigrants to modern Canadian literature. His works include two novels, The Rich Man ( 1948 ) and The Betrayal ( 1964 ), and a collection of short stories, The Almost Meeting ( 1981 ). His internment diary, alongside critical essays on his writing, appears in Another Country: Writings by and about Henry Kreisel ( 1985 ). He died in Edmonton in 1991 . The generosity and foresight of Professor Kreisels teaching at the University of Alberta continues to inspire the CLC in its research pursuits, public outreach, and continued commitment to the ever-growing richness, complexity, and diversity of literatures in Canada.

The Kreisel Lectures showcase how writers help us understand the textures of life in this country. Each year, an established author is invited to speak about an issue that is important to them, whether because it is close to their heart, foundational to their experience, or pressing and of-the-moment; often, it is all of these things at once. The series includes lectures about Indigenous resurgence, oppression and social justice, cultural identity, place and displacement, the spoils of history, storytelling, censorship, language, reading in a digital age, literary history, personal memory, and, now, the necessity of art during a pandemic. Usually delivered to a live audience on the University of Alberta campus, located on Treaty 6 Territory and Region 4 of the Mtis Nation of Alberta, the Kreisel Lectures frequently also air to audiences across Canada as episodes on CBC Radios Ideas . All of the lectures become books like this one, published in partnership with University of Alberta Press.

During the COVID-19 pandemic, nothing at the CLC could happen in the usual way. We were tremendously lucky to have the innovative and talented Vivek Shraya as the 2021 Kreisel Lecturer. Shraya is a prolific multimedia artist and writer as well as an important community leader and mentor. The founder of the publishing imprint VS. Books, through which she offers mentorship and publishing opportunities to Indigenous and Black writers and writers of colour in Canada, she is also a director on the board of the Tegan and Sara Foundation, whose mission is to improve the lives of LGBTQ+ women and girls. Her award-winning work ranges across literature, film, and music, frequently combining all three in arresting ways.

Artists like Shraya remind us of the importance of play. Artists and writers are creators: experimenting at the boundaries of genre, testing the limits of form, defying and exceeding our expectations, they give expression to a very human need for playfulness that expands the worlds we inhabit. Breaking up the habitual was precisely what many of us needed after more than a year of living under pandemic restrictions. When it became clear that, for the first time ever, the Kreisel Lecture would have to take place online, Shraya harnessed all of her creative and collaborative energy to produce something truly unique and special. This book expands on the innovative filmed lecture (which can still be viewed on the CLC s website), which reflects on the constraints of living in the pandemic and what she would do differently next time. Next Time Theres a Pandemic demonstrates why, as Shraya insists, art is essential.

Shrayas online Kreisel Lecture was presented in March 2021 with an interactive introduction with J. R. Carpenter, an award-winning artist, writer, and researcher working across performance, print, and digital media, and the University of Albertas 20202021 Writer in Residence. Their conversation has also been expanded here as an Afterword.