CREDIT: LUCAS STENNING
The second annual WordsFest will bring together artists and other creative minds from across the city.

After many attempts over the years to run a literary festival in London, the second annual Words- Fest is shaping up to be a great event for London’s creative crowd. Though London has cultivated some of our country’s most inspirational writers and intellectuals, the city has yet to create an outlet for the new generation of creative voices within the community.

Western University’s director of public humanities Josh Lambier is the artistic director of the three-day event and said that London’s history of producing literary and other creative talent is what inspired him to put the festival together.

“You can think of past talent: James Reaney Sr. who was one of the biggest names of Canadian literature. Alice Munroe… the first Canadian woman to win the Nobel prize who was a student at Western and was one of Western’s writers in residence and lived for a long time not too far from here in south western Ontario… Even in the present you think of Paul Haggis who wrote the Oscar winning movie Crash, or David Shore who created the show House, or even actors like Ryan Gosling who have come from this community and gone on to do pretty big things.”

Some talent from other parts of the province and the country will be present for interview panels, including Miriam Toews, a Governor General’s award winner for literature from Manitoba who will be interviewed by James Reaney of the London Free Press.

Interview panels will also include Toronto author Russel Smith who was recently long-listed for the Giller prize, who will interviewed by professors from Western.

Phoebe Gloeckner of Michigan will be present at a screening of the film adapted from her 2002 graphic novel Diary of a Teenage Girl being held at the Hyland Cinema. The film contains big names such as Kristen Wiig, Alexander Skarsgaard and Christopher Meloni, despite being an independent film.

The majority of the other events will be held inside Museum London, but a local authors’ book fair will be taking place in the mezzanine of Covent Garden Market and Lambier said something known as Guerrilla Poetry will be taking place on Dundas Street.

“It’s getting volunteers, people who want to read poetry and basically turning Dundas Street from Covent Garden to Museum London into a poetry zone, and reading poems people enjoy. So there are different things that take place.”

He added that there will be a night that the open mic poetry group in London takes over the fireplace room at the Marienbad Restaurant.

Lambier hopes that the Fanshawe community will come out to experience and get involved in the festival and that it will give students a chance to explore the museum and other creative spaces in the city that they haven’t seen yet.

For more information on the festival and its individual events, visit wordsfest.ca