Archives
- July 2013 (2)
- June 2013 (2)
- May 2013 (2)
- April 2013 (2)
- March 2013 (2)
- February 2013 (3)
- January 2013 (2)
- December 2012 (2)
- November 2012 (3)
- October 2012 (7)
- September 2012 (2)
- August 2012 (3)
- July 2012 (2)
- June 2012 (3)
- May 2012 (6)
- April 2012 (3)
- March 2012 (6)
- February 2012 (3)
- January 2012 (4)
- December 2011 (2)
- November 2011 (3)
- October 2011 (6)
- September 2011 (4)
- August 2011 (7)
- July 2011 (8)
- June 2011 (4)
- May 2011 (1)
- April 2011 (5)
- March 2011 (5)
- February 2011 (5)
- January 2011 (7)
- December 2010 (4)
- November 2010 (10)
- October 2010 (16)
- September 2010 (4)
Follow me on twitter
- Here and Now | Weekdays 3 p.m. to 6 p.m. | 99.1 FM cbc.ca/1.3979995 3 years ago
- @mattgallowaycbc https://t.co/6LRsTKXMlC 3 years ago
- @mattgallowaycbc https://t.co/FrlAbQyij2 3 years ago
RSS Link
Listen up!
- Alberta
- Antarctica
- architecture
- art
- asylum
- bicycling
- Bob Marley
- bodgers
- cats
- Chinese Canadian
- coffeeshops
- concussion
- coureur du bois
- day-trips
- death
- dogs
- Down syndrome
- Emily Carr
- Ernest Shackleton
- escape
- family
- feminism
- film
- First Nations
- Florida
- funeral home
- furniture
- Ginsberg
- Globe and Mail
- head-tax redress
- history
- hospice
- Hudson New York
- Insanity
- International Women's Day
- literature
- Margaret Laurence
- memorial
- memory
- music
- Native rights
- Nellie McClung
- neurology
- newspaper
- Noreen Shanahan
- Norway
- obituary
- Ontario
- oral history
- Ottawa
- philosopher
- photography
- poetry
- politicians
- publishing
- railway
- red shoes
- Remembrance Day
- rugby
- SPOW
- streetcar
- suicide
- technology
- Toronto
- Toronto Star
- Toto
- travel
- University of Toronto
- Vancouver
- Virginia Woolf
- wilderness
- Wizard of Oz
- women
- World War II
- writer
Tag Archives: memorial
How funny is death? SPOW Conference Part Two
Or is that really the question I want to ask? I am forever niggled by something having to do with writing obituaries and it has, partly, to do with the reactions from womenfolk and menfolk, children folk too (although less … Continue reading
Posted in obituaries
Tagged Anne O'Neill, CNN, death, history, humour, memorial, memory, Moscow, Noreen Shanahan, obituary, SPOW, Toronto, World War II
4 Comments
Timbits and dinosaur poop
Writing the lede to a piece of journalism can feel like dangling from a rope over the abyss. I’m there now, puttering up to write another obituary, sitting in a Queen Street coffee shop while rain thunders down, trying to … Continue reading
Posted in obituaries
Tagged coffeeshops, death, dinosaur, Earth science, Hawaii, Kerrich, memorial, Noreen Shanahan, obituary, Saskatchewan, Volcano
Leave a comment
A toast to James Pon’s grandfather
James Pon’s grandfather filled my mind during this rail trip from Montreal to Toronto last month. It was he, along with hundreds of other Chinese workers, who built this railway–although on the other side of the Rocky mountains. Last month, … Continue reading
Posted in obituaries
Tagged Chinese Canadian, CPR, death, head-tax redress, memorial, Noreen Shanahan, obituary, poetry, railway workers, Toronto, Vancouver, VIA
Leave a comment
Loss. Regret.
Writing obituaries sometimes feels like an exercise in loss and regret. The subject has died, of course, and so I lack the opportunity to interview this person. Instead I must gather details of her or his life from colleagues, family, … Continue reading
Posted in obituaries
Tagged Canada, Chinese Canadian, death, Harley Street, head-tax redress, history, John A. MacDonald, memorial, memory, navvies, obituary, oral history, railway worker
Leave a comment
“Let him rest,” says his widow
When I’m writing an obituary, I live among the family. Not literally, of course, but emotionally. It begins with reading the death notice, usually written by one of the deceased’s children, placed in a newspaper at great cost and twigging … Continue reading
Posted in obituaries
Tagged Bergen-Belsen concentration camp, Cambridge, death, Globe and Mail, history, Holocaust, memorial, memory, newspaper, obituary, World War II
3 Comments
Tristan and Isolde
Last weekend I went to see Tristan and Isolde at the magnificent Four Seasons Centre in downtown Toronto, performed by the Canadian Opera Company. My sister Kathleen invited me because her friend wasn’t able to attend. Our orchestra seats were ten rows … Continue reading
Posted in obituaries
Tagged art, Ben Heppner, Canadian Opera Company, death, Four Seasons Centre, memorial, Queen's University, Toronto, Tristan und Isolde, Wagner
1 Comment
I have lost friends, some by death… others through sheer inability to cross the street. In this madly slap-dash way we’re living, with twisted wires limply cascading from our ears and the steady thrum of recorded voice pressing against our … Continue reading
Voices of the “untongued dead”
I recently came across an essay by Matthew Skelton, a teacher of book history in Mainz, Germany. He describes sorting through a collection of old books and papers left by an obscure librarian named Elma Mitchell after her death in … Continue reading
Posted in obituaries
Tagged art, feminism, history, literature, memorial, Noreen Shanahan, obituary, poetry, Ruskin, Seamus Heaney, Sylvia Plath, women
3 Comments
Raymond Souster: Toronto poet and sometime-beatnik
I can tell from the sunlight on the window sill that this day means business. Raymond Souster was sometimes called the Bard of Toronto. Or street-poet-in-residence. One fellow poet called him “Canada’s Homer,” because at the end of his life, … Continue reading
Posted in obituaries
Tagged art, coffeeshops, death, history, memorial, Noreen Shanahan, obituary, poetry, Toronto
1 Comment