Right now I am working on a feature for a new magazine called Eighteen Bridges. The story is a profile on Ron Murdock, a career hobo who spent most of his like hitching around Western Canada and living in men’s shelters and dive hotels. I had the great pleasure of spending a few days with […]
The Ritual Tourist
posted by Marcello Di Cintio
An essay I wrote appears in the current issue (September/October 2010) of Afar. The magazine is relatively new – this issue marks its first anniversary – and dedicates itself to telling stories of unexpected and ‘genuine’ travel. It is a great magazine to read and I am happy for the opportunity to write for them. […]
July
08
Taxidermy on the Brain
posted by Marcello Di Cintio
My mind has been a perfect storm of taxidermy lately. First, came all the talk about Yann Martel’s new book which uses taxidermy as an allegory for the holocaust. Then I was shown a link to the homepage of the Minnesota Association of Rogue Taxidermists, or MART. Just the term ‘rogue taxidermy’ gets me excited. […]
The Zookeeper
posted by Marcello Di Cintio
My profile about retired Calgary Zoo director and world-renowned zoo keeper Peter Karsten appears in the current issue of Alberta Views magazine. I had the great pleasure of being a guest in Karsten’s home on Denman Island last year. Peter and his wife Margarit are charming hosts. They fed me fried Fanny Bay oysters and […]
Big Night in Forest Lawn
posted by Marcello Di Cintio
My story about the cooking students at Calgary’s Forest Lawn High School appeared in last Friday’s Swerve magazine. The article chronicled “International Cuisine Night,” the climax of the school’s three-year culinary arts program. Seven grade-twelve students divided into three groups and researched an ethnic cuisine of their choice. After weeks of menu research, each group […]
The Cowboy Poetry Gathering at Pincher Creek
posted by Marcello Di Cintio
Last weekend, at the Pincher Creek Cowboy Poetry Gathering, I heard the word ‘genuine’ pronounced gen-u-wine and ‘seed’ used as the past tense of the verb to see. I heard the word ‘cowboy’ used as a verb, as in “you can tell by my lily-white hands that I’ve never cowboyed.” I learned that the grass […]
June
22
Days in Banff
posted by Marcello Di Cintio
I spent my last official week as the Markin-Flanagan Writer-in-Residence in at forest studio at the Banff Centre. This is my third such stint in one of the Centre’s marvelous Leighton Studios and my first in the Evamy Studio which looks like this: I spent the bulk of my studio time working on a story […]
Poetic interlude: Philip Larkin’s “Church Going”
posted by Marcello Di Cintio
As I mentioned in my last post, I am writing a short essay on the unique joys that come from engaging in religious ritual – especially in the rituals of faiths I don’t believe in. During the course of my travels over the last decade or so I’ve had the great pleasure to commune with […]
Two in progress; one under consideration
posted by Marcello Di Cintio
My residency is winding down, the Walls book is simmering in the proverbial bottom-drawer, and I am devoting most of my writing time to magazine projects. I have two pieces in progress now. I will be writing s feature about becoming a first-time father last Fall. The month before my son was was born, I […]
May
03
Christo and Jeanne-Claude’s “Running Fence”
posted by Marcello Di Cintio
In 1976, artists Christo and Jeanne-Claude fulfilled a decades long dream and erected their most fantastic work to date, “Running Fence.” They built a nearly 40-kilometre fabric fence that ran through California ranchland, across rural roads, over hillsides and, eventually, into the Pacific Ocean. The fence itself was about 5.5 metres high and composed of […]
Elsewhere 