Gaspereau Press to hold its TWENTIETH Wayzgoose & Open House

Gaspereau Press to hold its TWENTIETH Wayzgoose & Open House
Submitted

On Saturday October 26, Gaspereau Press will host its 20th annual ‘wayzgoose’ and open house at its printshop in Kentville, Nova Scotia. The day-long public event will feature talks by guest letterpress printers from Minnesota and Ontario, readings by some of the press’s authors, and an afternoon open house at the printshop with demonstrations of various aspects of book production and printing.

This year’s guest printers are Mary Bruno, proprietor of Bruno Press in Saint Joseph, Minnesota, and Larry Thompson, proprietor of The Greyweathers Press in Merrickville, Ontario. Bruno and Thompson will both be giving talks about their work as well as participating in the afternoon open house.

Gaspereau Press authors Bren Simmers (Charlottetown, PEI), Tammy Armstrong (Shag Harbour, NS), and Ryan Turner (Halifax, NS) will be participating in a panel discussion on Saturday morning and Simmers and Armstrong will be reading from their new books on Saturday evening.

Schedule of events
All events take place in Kentville, Nova Scotia, on Saturday October 26, 2019

10:00am: Authors’ Salon with Tammy Armstrong, Bren Simmers, and Ryan Turner. Location: The parlour at Wickwire House, 183 Main Street.

10:00am: Book Arts Talk by Mary Bruno. Location: The upper room at the King’s Arms Pub, 390 Main Street.

1:00–4:30pm: Open House at the printshop featuring guests Mary Bruno and Larry Thompson as well as the Gaspereau Press staff and some of its inky neighbours. Activities being demonstrated are likely to include letterpress printing, offset printing, binding, and typecasting. Location: Gaspereau Press, 47 Church Avenue.

7:00pm: Readings by Tammy Armstrong and Bren Simmers and a Book Arts Talk by Larry Thompson. Location: St. James Anglican Church Hall, 18 Prospect Avenue.

What’s a Wayzgoose?

Traditionally, a wayzgoose was an annual dinner hosted by the proprietors of a printing establishment for their employees. It was usually held in the fall after the feast of St. Bartholomew. Literally, ‘wayz’ refers to the stubble left after harvesting grain, and a ‘wayzgoose’—a goose fed cheaply on this stubble—was often the featured menu item at these printers’ dinners.

In modern times, the term wayzgoose usually refers to a gathering of printers and sometimes craft-fair style exhibitions of their wares. But the Gaspereau Press wayzgoose was envisioned as a broader community event designed to increase awareness about the book arts. The event reunites the usually segmented literary, publishing, and book-arts communities, bringing together the wide range of stakeholders to celebrate and discuss ‘the book.’