1982 letter to Bill HIgginson re early Haiku Society of Canada meeting

 Oct. 29/82

Bill Higginson
From Here Press
Box 219
Fanwood, N.J.
07023 USA

Dear Bill,

              Delighted to hear from you!   Yes, it must be over a decade since
we corresponded, and it sounds as if a lot of water has passed under
both our bridges . . . hopefully our experiences can be incorporated
into our haiku and other poetry . . .

            It's funny but I never met a real, live haiku poet (other
than the occasional wanderer I pressed into authorship in my hippie
years) until 1979, when just for the hell of it I decided to attend
a meeting of "The Haiku Society of Canada" at Eric Amman's (sic) house.
I arrived with some trepidation and a 6-pack of beer, and surprise!
everyone present was a real, live writing haiku poet & even more
astounding - fairly normal human beings. I don't know if you have
ever met Eric, but he is a shy, self-effacing guy, sort of a
gnomish Woody Allen without the forced humour. George Swede was
a larger version of a hobbit (not as elfin as Eric - he's since
shaved his beard) - Margaret Saunders is everyone's aunt and granny
in one, Marshall Hryciuk is a big-bearded, big-bellied laughing
Buddha (too much acid? -) etc.  A very congenial group, esp. after
we polished off the beer, some saki, a few bottles of wine, etc.
Serious discourse was forced to give way to a round-robin haiku
reading, which eventually 'degenerated' into good natured bantering
about each other's occasional misadventures at authorship. No
blood was shed, the highest accolade I can give. Subsequent
meetings of the HSC and the more recent Toronto Haiku Workshop
have followed pretty well in this tradition.
               Anyway, a toast, welcome back to Haiku (for both of us)!

              The enclosed collections will  update you better (I hope)
than a long and boring letter about my life. Unfortunately, the most
recent work in the collections is about 2 years old, so as soon
as I gain access to a photocopier, I will inundate you with some
more current writing. If you have any available collections of your
work, let's swap!

            At his point I was dragged off to a Halloween Party in
my housing co-op - 3 or 4 beers and several hours later I'm back . .
you are of course most welcome to use any of my haiku in any projects
you have in mind .... I'll send you some more recent stuff here as well -
Thanks for the compliments about my haiku (you may have the only
extant copy of "Guest in a Garden", by the way) . . and thanks for the
offer to visit - it's inevitable that we meet - not sure of my status
regarding border crossings (haven't been in the States since '69) . .
I'll try to correspond more frequently than every decade in the future . .

POETRY POWER!!

Chris

no signature available on this carbon copy

rare Eric Amann autobiography off to Haiku Canada archives

Hi Vicki and Katherine,

I'm sending my next package of donations to the HC archives today. The two books include Eric Amann's autobiography, The House on Fountain Street. This is an extremely rare book which tells the story of Eric's arrival in Canada as a refugee/displaced person after World War Two at the age of thirteen. Interestingly, I don't remember the book even mentioning haiku, although Eric was the godfather of Haiku Canada.

Eric inscribed this copy to me:

Jan. 29, 2009
Dear Chris:
Thanks for your book Zen River - beautiful & memorable pieces of poetry and prose.
with all best wishes,
Eric   

The other book is Milkweed: A Gathering of Haiku edited by Marshall Hryciuk and published with his Nietzche's Brolly Press in 1987. It is also inscribed to me and signed by Marshall.

The inscription is difficult to read, but I believe it reads:

An edition for the editor*
Chris forever
cheers
Marshall Hryciuk

 *I had previously published Marshall's chapbook this is hilarious with my Unfinished Monument Press


In my first packet I forgot to include my mailing address:

Chris Faiers
12 Main St.
Marmora, ON
K0K 2M0

                                                                   ~    ~    ~

reply to Vicki's request for some more info on Eric's book:
 

By the time I'd decided which books to send next, and prepping the mailing envelope (and lots more reminiscing), I didn't take the time to add the details on Eric's autobiog. Sorry. It's a professionally produced and quite short book, I'm guessing around 100 pages or less. You can read it in a couple of hours. I don't think the packet will reach the UofVic library by tomorrow when you visit, but I hope you have the chance to read it one day. Eric had a much rougher and harder life than most people would imagine, and it's quite amazing that he not only  survived the turmoil and difficult circumstances but managed to become a medical doctor!  

The several times I met Eric in Toronto at haiku get togethers he was very quiet, modest and somewhat self-effacing. I don't know if it was his modesty or shyness, but as I remember his book doesn't go into any details of his involvement with haiku and the major role he played with developing a modern English language haiku form and community. Curious.

Eric and I exchanged books in 2009 (per the dedication) but I believe he'd self-published his auto-biog. in the early  2000s.

Over the decades I've known a number of people who have donated papers to various archives, myself included. From what I gather donated papers are often just placed in small boxes and left for the curious and researchers to dig through. I don't think librarians, or HC archive committee members, would be expected to catalogue or otherwise delineate materials.

Good luck with your meeting tomorrow with the UofVic Special Collections chief librarians. Hanging out in libraries with librarians is always fun  :  )-