Koffler Centre of the Arts

Award-winning writer Larissa Lai launches her new book inspired by the tumultuous history of Hong Kong, in an online conversation with writer and performer Kai Cheng Thom.

The Koffler’s Books & Ideas series is proud to present award-winning writer Larissa Lai and her new book, Iron Goddess of Mercy. Inspired by the tumultuous history of Hong Kong, from the Japanese and British occupations to the ongoing pro-democracy protests, the long poem interrogates the complicated notion of identity, offering a prism through which the term ‘Asian’ can be understood to make sense of a complex set of relations.

Larissa Lai will appear in an online conversation with writer, performer, and cultural worker, Kai Cheng Thom (I Hope We Choose Love: A Trans Girl’s Notes at the End of the World).

Personalized copies of Iron Goddess of Mercy can be purchased at Glad Day Bookshop.

WATCH THE TALK ON YOUTUBE:

LISTEN TO THE TALK ON SOUNDCLOUD:

Koffler Centre of the Arts · Larissa Lai with Kai Cheng Thom

The conversation has been transcribed for accessibility purposes. Please click here to view.

LARISSA LAI has written eight books, including Salt Fish Girl, The Tiger Flu, and Iron Goddess of Mercy, just released by Arsenal Pulp Press. Recipient of the Jim Duggins Mid-Career Novelist's Prize, the Lambda Literary Award, the Astraea Award, and finalist for the Dorothy Livesay Poetry Prize, the Books in Canada First Novel Award and seven more, she's been involved in cultural organizing, experimental poetry and speculative fiction communities since the late 1980s. She feels at home in both Vancouver and Calgary, and holds a Canada Research Chair at the University of Calgary where she directs The Insurgent Architects' House for Creative Writing.

KAI CHENG THOM is a writer, performance artist, and community healer in Toronto. She is the author of the novel Fierce Femmes and Notorious Liars: A Dangerous Trans Girl's Confabulous Memoir (Metonymy Press), the poetry collection a place called No Homeland (an American Library Association Stonewall Honor Book in 2018), and the children's picture book From the Stars in the Sky to the Fish in the Sea, illustrated by Kai Yun Ching and Wai-Yant Li. Her latest book is the essay collection I Hope We Choose Love: A Trans Girl's Notes at the End of the World, an American Library Association Stonewall Honor Book in 2020. Kai Cheng won the Writers' Trust of Canada's Dayne Ogilvie Prize for LGBTQ Emerging Writers in 2017.

Thanks to Arsenal Pulp Press, and to event bookseller, Glad Day Bookshop.

The Koffler Centre of the Arts is dedicated to accessibility. CART will be provided at this event, and a transcript and video/audio recording will be available afterwards on the Koffler website. This Zoom event is in webinar format, meaning all event attendees will be off camera. We will do our best to accommodate additional access needs; if you have questions or concerns, please contact our access point person, Francis, at ftomkins@kofflerarts.org.

Books & Ideas

Our year-round Books & Ideas series spotlights provocative writers, novelists and thinkers, celebrating literary excellence and fostering critical dialogue through compelling book launches, author talks and in-depth interviews. This winter, Books & Ideas highlights the female voice, women’s histories, decolonial and anti-authoritarian movements, and experimental literature, presenting a series of virtual events on our online platform.

Books & Ideas was launched with the generous support of Dorothy Shoichet & Family and the Estate of Joseph Koenig.

Larissa Lai with Kai Cheng Thom

Photos