Eckhart Tolle
Spiritual Communicator
Contemporary spiritual author Eckhart Tolle has lived in Vancouver BC since 1995. Known for his best seller The Power of Now (1999), he has inspired people all over the world with his spiritual philosophies. He is recognized as both a writer and spiritual teacher, who shares his ideas on leading a happier, more 'in the now' life. Eckhart Tolle gives uplifting speeches in English, German and Spanish internationally. His writings are influenced by a number of spiritual leaders and religious practices including the Bible, Zen Buddhism, mystical Islam, Meister Eckhart and Advaita Venanta.
Video: Interview July 2009 - Eckhart Tolle - "The current economy"
Douglas Coupland
Technology & Pop Culture Writer
Douglas Coupland is a successful visual artist and author who lives and works in Vancouver. Known for his work as a fiction and non-fiction writer, Douglas Coupland's recurring themes include reflections on popular and visual culture. His first international best seller was his 1991 fiction Generation X: Tales for an Accelerated Culture. Eight years later, his science-fiction novel Generation A (1991) was published. Coupland's most famous non-fiction book is entitled City of Glass (2000), which describes the popular history and culture of Vancouver's people and places. Douglas Coupland is also a script writer - his most notable work was his comedy Everything's Gone Green, which won the award for best Canadian feature film at the 2006
Vancouver International Film Festival.
Video: Douglas Coupland explains why he loves living in Vancouver BC.
Bill Reid
Northwest Coast Native Writer First, Artist Second !
Well known for his visual work as a Haida artist, Bill Reid (1920-1988) began his career as an author, script writer, poet and book illustrator. A large collection of Reid's written works are published in the book Solitary Raven- The Essential Writing of Bill Reid (2009). In the 1950's, Bill Reid worked for the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, where he wrote two television program scripts entitled People of the Potlatch and Totems. Reid co-wrote a
Haida legend called The Raven Steals the Light (2003) with Robert Brinhurst, and he is the author of many poems compiled in Out of Silence (1971). He describes the intricacies of
Northwest Coast Native art with co-author Bill Holm in Form and Freedom: A Dialogue on Northwest Coast Indian Art (1975). Reid also illustrated Raven's Cry (1992) in which the author, Christie Harris describes the complex ethnohistory of the Haida of the Northwest coast.
Video: A profile of Haida artist Bill Reid and his work.
David Chariandy
Vancouver Contemporary Fiction Writer
This Ontario-born author of Caribbean ancestry now lectures, writes and works in Vancouver. An English Professor at
Simon Fraser University, David Chariandy is an up-and-coming Canadian contemporary fiction writer. He was nominated for the Governor General's Award as well as longlisted for the Canadian Scotiabank Giller Prize for his 2007 debut novel Soucouyant. An active member of the Vancouver literary community, Chariandy has shared his work at the
Vancouver International Writers and Readers Festival. He is the co-founder of Commodore Books, which is the first black-owned press in Western Canada.
Video: Author David Chariandy discusses his book entitled "Soucouyant"
Timothy Taylor
Toronto Banker Turned West Coast Writer
Novelist and short story writer Timothy Taylor has taken a different path of most published writers. He started his career as a banker in Toronto and then moved back to his hometown of Vancouver to become a professional writer. Working from his Vancouver office, Taylor writes articles for leading Canadian literary magazines and periodicals including The Vancouver Sun, The Wall Street Journal and the Vancouver Review. His 2007 debut novel
Stanley Park, which vividly describes
Vancouver's culinary scene and homelessness, was nominated for a Giller Prize and Ethel Wilson Award for fiction. He is also the only writer to have published 3 short stories in a single edition of the annual Canadian publication, The Journey Prize Anthology. His 2002 published work Silent Cruise includes eight short stories and one novella .
Nancy Lee
A Young Vancouver Writer with Limitless Potential
A relatively new writer on the block, Nancy Lee was selected by Margaret Atwood as one of seven writers to be interviewed on a special CBC radio feature on new writers to watch for. Nancy Lee lives in Vancouver, where she is working on her first novel and teaching for the Writing and Publishing Program at Simon Fraser University. In 2003, she was praised for her short stories in Dead Girls, which earned her Now Magazine's Book of the Year, and the nomination of finalist for the Ethel Wilson Fiction Prize and Danuta Gleed Literary Award. Nancy Lee is also Associate Director of the Booming Ground Writers Community- an online writing studio created by the Creative Writing Program at the University of British Columbia.