Guelph is hosting the Candian Festival of Spoken Word for a second straight year.
The festival runs between Oct. 13 to Oct. 19 at locations across the city and will feature poetry slams, a community feast, games, open mics, stories and more.
The rare opportunity to host the festival twice in a row comes after organizers put forward a pilot proposal to see if the format works for the event.
“We thought ‘wow, you do all this skill-building and new relationship-building to do an event once, it would be nice for the efficiency of the work put behind it to be able to host the event two years in a row,’” says founder of Guelph Spoken Word Beth Anne Ellipsis.
Ellipsis says with the success of the Guelph Spoken Word which will soon enter its 11th year, many have been introduced to the fringe art form over the years and know what to expect from the Canadian Festival of Spoken Word.
“Now people know what the art form is. They’ve seen it before. They want to engage with it,” says Ellipsis.
With poets and slam teams coming from all across Canada, Ellipsis says there will be an infusion of artists and community organizers.
“People will be coming from the prairies, people will be coming from the mountains, from the east coast. It’s a really interesting opportunity for Guelph to host this festival,” says Ellipsis.
“This festival is pretty unique. One of the unique aspects of it is that it's nomadic. So this festival has been happening for 16 years so the festival has its own following of artists. So no matter where it is, there are people who go to it every year which is part of the magic of the festival.”
Ellipsis says people typically tend to reflect what is happening in their lives through their poetry which becomes especially interesting when people all over the country engage and share their emotions and political conversations they're engaged in.
With slam teams across the country present at the event, Ellipsis says the audience is able to engage in discourse and dialogue through art that is a national representation as opposed to a local representation.
Guelph’s local poetry slam team will be participating in the slam tournament with teams across the country.
She says the opportunity to host this event is unlikely to come for a number of years because of its a nomadic festival.
“Typically if you want to see another artist, you have to pay for them to come, whereas these slam poets, they're registered and they're coming on their own to be here,” says Ellipsis.
“Come out and support local slam team and cheer for our local poets,” says Ellipsis.
The final tournament will take place on Oct. 19 at the River Run Centre at 7 p.m. A list of the festival program can be seen here.
