Myrna Kostash
Encyclopedia
Myrna Kostash is a Canadian
writer and journalist. She has written for many Canadian magazines including Chatelaine
. She has also written a number of non-fiction books. She was born in Edmonton, Alberta
and educated at the University of Alberta
, the University of Washington
, and the University of Toronto
. She currently resides in Edmonton, Alberta.
A founding member of The Periodical Writers' Association of Canada and of the Writers' Guild of Alberta, she served as president of the WGA (1989–90) and as chair of The Writers' Union of Canada (1993–94). She served as Alberta representative to the Board of Governors of the Canadian Conference of the Arts (1996–2000).She is a member of the Writers’ Union of Canada, the Writers’ Guild of Alberta, the Saskatchewan Writers’ Guild and PEN. She is a founding member of the Creative Nonfiction Collective, and served as its president 2006-9. She has also for several years been an executive member of the Board of Directors of the Parkland Institute, an organization dedicated to social research and located at the University of Alberta.
Kostash is the recipient of several Canada Council, Alberta Foundation for the Literary Arts and Secretary of State (Multiculturalism) grants. In 1985, she was awarded a Silver citation in the National Magazine Awards and was short-listed in 1997. In 1999 she was a finalist in the Western Magazine awards. In 1988, her book, No KIdding: Inside the World of Teenage Girls, received the Alberta Culture and Writers' Guild of Alberta prizes for Best Non-Fiction. In 1994 she was awarded the same prize for her book, Bloodlines: A Journey Into Eastern Europe. In 1993 she was a participant in the Maclean-Hunter Arts Journalism Seminar, the Banff Centre for the Arts, under the direction of Alberto Manguel. In 2001, her book, The Next Canada: In Search of the Future Nation, was a finalist for the Writers’ Trust of Canada’s Shaughnessy Cohen Prize for Political Writing. In 2006, Reading the River: A Traveller’s Companion to the North Saskatchewan was a prizewinner at the Saskatchewan Book Awards.
Kostash is a recipient of the Alberta Achievement Award (1988) and of the Alberta Council of Ukrainian Arts “Excellence in Artistry” Award, 2001, the Canadian Conference of the Arts Honourary Life Member award, 2002, the Queen’s Jubilee Award, 2002, the Alberta Centennial Medal, 2005, the City of Edmonton’s 2006 Citation Award, “Salute to Excellence,” and the Writers Guild of Alberta Golden Pen Award for lifetime achievement, 2008. She was the 2010 recipient of the Matt Cohen Award : In Celebration of a Writing Life, from the Writers'Trust of Canada, the first writer of creative non-fiction to win the award.
Her work has appeared in:
Still Ain't Satisfied, Toronto, Women's Press, 1982
Women Against Censorship, Vancouver, Douglas & McIntyre, 1985
The Morningside Papers, Toronto, McClelland & Stewart, 1985
Competition: A Feminist Taboo?, New York, The Feminist Press, 1987
Ethnicity in a Technological Age, Edmonton, Canadian Institute of Ukrainian Studies, 1988
Out of Place, Regina, Coteau, 1991
The Thinking Heart: Best Canadian Essays, Kingston, Quarry, 1991
Twist and Shout: A Decade of Feminist Writing in This Magazine, Toronto, Second Story, 1992
Kitchen Talk: Contemporary Women's Prose and Poetry, Red Deer, Red Deer College Press, 1992
Twenty Years of Multiculturalism, ed. Stella Hryniuk
, Winnipeg, St. John's College Press, 1992
Pens of Many Colours: A Canadian Reader, Toronto, Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1993
Writing Away: The PEN Canada Travel Anthology, Toronto, McClelland & Stewart, 1994
Imagining Ourselves: Classics of Canadian Non-Fiction, Vancouver, Arsenal Pulp Press
, 1994
Let the Earth Take Note: Anthology of the Milton Acorn Festival, ed. James Deahl, Charlottetown, Milton Acorn Festival Publishing, 1994
Eating Apples: Knowing Women’s Lives. Eds. Caterina Edwards and Kay Stewart, Edmonton, NeWest Press, 1994
Why Are You Telling Me This? Eleven Acts of Intimate Journalism, eds. Barbara Moon and Don Obe, Banff, Banff Centre Press, 1997
Ann Harbuz: Inside Community, Outside Convention, ed. Joan Borsa, Regina, Dunlop Art Gallery, 1997
Fresh Tracks: Writing From Western Landscape, ed. Pamela Banting, Vancouver, Polestar Press, 1998
Open Letter: De:Scribing Albertas (Part 1), Tenth Series #2, Spring 1998
Two Lands New Visions: Stories From Canada and Ukraine, eds. Janice Kulyk Keefer and Solomea Pavlychko, Regina, Coteau Books, 1998
Literary Pluralities, ed. Christl Verduyn
, Peterborough, Broadview Press, 1998
Arousing Sensation: A Case Study of Controversy Surrounding Art and the Erotic, ed. Sylvie Gilbert, Banff, Banff Centre Press, 1999
Threshold: An Anthology of Contemporary Writing from Alberta, ed. Srdja Pavlovic, Edmonton, University of Alberta Press, 1999
Jon Whyte: Mind Over Mountains, ed. Harry Vandervlist, Red Deer, Red Deer Press, 2000
edge/wise: part II, Canadian Women’s Writing at Century’s End, Winnipeg, Contemporary Verse 2, Vol. 23, No. 1, Summer 2000
Going Some Place: Creative Non-fiction Across Canada, ed. Lynne Van Luven, Regina, Coteau Books, 2000
Wrestling with the Angel: Women Reclaiming Their Lives, eds. Caterina Edwards & Kay Stewart, Red Deer, Red Deer Press, 2000
The Vintage Book of Canadian Memoirs, ed. George Fetherling, Toronto, Vintage Canada, 2001
Canada & September 11, ed. George Melnyk, Calgary, Detselig Press, 2002
AWOL:Tales for Travel-Inspired Minds, eds. Jennifer Barclay and Amy Logan, Toronto, Vintage Canada, 2003
Listening with the Ear of the Heart: Writers at St Peter’s, eds. Dave Margoshes & Shelley Sopher, Muenster, St Peter’s Press, 2003
The Wild Rose Anthology of Alberta Prose, eds. George Melnyk & Tamara Palmer Seiler, University of Calgary Press, 2003
Postcolonial Subjects: Canadian and Australian Perspectives, ed. Miroslawa Buchholtz, Nicholas Copernicus UP, Cracow 2004
Edmonton on Location: River City Chronicles, ed. Heather Zwicker, NeWest Press, 2005.
Place and memory in Canada: Global Perspectives, Proceedings of the 3rd Congress of Polish Association for Canadian Studies, Polska Akademia Umiejetnosci, Cracow, 2005.
Big Enough Dreams, ed. Debbie Marshall, Learning Community Press, 2006
Zeitschrift fur Kanada-Studien, Gesellschaft fur Kanada-Studien, Augsburg, 2006
Desire: Women Write About Wanting, ed. Lisa Solod, Seal Press, 2007
She has written for film (notably Teach Me to Dance, NFB, 1978) and for stage: 1985, Edmonton, Workshop West, 1982; No Kidding, Vancouver, Green Thumb, 1988; After the Fall: The Erotic Life of the Left, Edmonton, Catalyst "Write on the Edge" cabaret, 1992; File #3168, Edmonton, Catalyst, 1993. In 1985 she wrote a television drama, Where is Rosa?, for the University of Alberta Drama Lab. Her "Letters From Greece" were broadcast on CBC network, Morningside, in 1984.
Reunion, a radio play, was produced by John Juliani in 1984 for CBC "Saturday Stereo Theatre"; Gregory Sinclair produced The Collaborators for CBC's "Speaking Volumes" in 1989; Kathleen Flaherty produced Within the Copper Mountain (1997), History 605 (1998), The Masked Man in Warsaw (1999), Edith Stein: Whose Saint Was She? (2000), Pursuing Demetrius (2001) Voices from Frog Lake (2005) and Six Things You Need to Know About Byzantium (2007) for CBC radio Ideas.
Canada
Canada is a North American country consisting of ten provinces and three territories. Located in the northern part of the continent, it extends from the Atlantic Ocean in the east to the Pacific Ocean in the west, and northward into the Arctic Ocean...
writer and journalist. She has written for many Canadian magazines including Chatelaine
Chatelaine
Châtelaine has the following meanings:*Châtelaine, a woman who owns or controls a large house ....
. She has also written a number of non-fiction books. She was born in Edmonton, Alberta
Edmonton
Edmonton is the capital of the Canadian province of Alberta and is the province's second-largest city. Edmonton is located on the North Saskatchewan River and is the centre of the Edmonton Capital Region, which is surrounded by the central region of the province.The city and its census...
and educated at the University of Alberta
University of Alberta
The University of Alberta is a public research university located in Edmonton, Alberta, Canada. Founded in 1908 by Alexander Cameron Rutherford, the first premier of Alberta and Henry Marshall Tory, its first president, it is widely recognized as one of the best universities in Canada...
, the University of Washington
University of Washington
University of Washington is a public research university, founded in 1861 in Seattle, Washington, United States. The UW is the largest university in the Northwest and the oldest public university on the West Coast. The university has three campuses, with its largest campus in the University...
, and the University of Toronto
University of Toronto
The University of Toronto is a public research university in Toronto, Ontario, Canada, situated on the grounds that surround Queen's Park. It was founded by royal charter in 1827 as King's College, the first institution of higher learning in Upper Canada...
. She currently resides in Edmonton, Alberta.
A founding member of The Periodical Writers' Association of Canada and of the Writers' Guild of Alberta, she served as president of the WGA (1989–90) and as chair of The Writers' Union of Canada (1993–94). She served as Alberta representative to the Board of Governors of the Canadian Conference of the Arts (1996–2000).She is a member of the Writers’ Union of Canada, the Writers’ Guild of Alberta, the Saskatchewan Writers’ Guild and PEN. She is a founding member of the Creative Nonfiction Collective, and served as its president 2006-9. She has also for several years been an executive member of the Board of Directors of the Parkland Institute, an organization dedicated to social research and located at the University of Alberta.
Kostash is the recipient of several Canada Council, Alberta Foundation for the Literary Arts and Secretary of State (Multiculturalism) grants. In 1985, she was awarded a Silver citation in the National Magazine Awards and was short-listed in 1997. In 1999 she was a finalist in the Western Magazine awards. In 1988, her book, No KIdding: Inside the World of Teenage Girls, received the Alberta Culture and Writers' Guild of Alberta prizes for Best Non-Fiction. In 1994 she was awarded the same prize for her book, Bloodlines: A Journey Into Eastern Europe. In 1993 she was a participant in the Maclean-Hunter Arts Journalism Seminar, the Banff Centre for the Arts, under the direction of Alberto Manguel. In 2001, her book, The Next Canada: In Search of the Future Nation, was a finalist for the Writers’ Trust of Canada’s Shaughnessy Cohen Prize for Political Writing. In 2006, Reading the River: A Traveller’s Companion to the North Saskatchewan was a prizewinner at the Saskatchewan Book Awards.
Kostash is a recipient of the Alberta Achievement Award (1988) and of the Alberta Council of Ukrainian Arts “Excellence in Artistry” Award, 2001, the Canadian Conference of the Arts Honourary Life Member award, 2002, the Queen’s Jubilee Award, 2002, the Alberta Centennial Medal, 2005, the City of Edmonton’s 2006 Citation Award, “Salute to Excellence,” and the Writers Guild of Alberta Golden Pen Award for lifetime achievement, 2008. She was the 2010 recipient of the Matt Cohen Award : In Celebration of a Writing Life, from the Writers'Trust of Canada, the first writer of creative non-fiction to win the award.
Works
- Her Own Woman (contributor) - 1975
- Long Way From Home: The Story of the Sixties Generation in Canada - 1980
- All of Baba's Children - 1987
- No Kidding: Inside the World of Teenage Girls - 1989
- The Road Home (contributor) - 1992
- Bloodlines: A Journey into Eastern Europe - 1993
- The Doomed Bridegroom: A Memoir - 1998
- The Next Canada: In Search of Our Future Canada - 2000
- Reading the River: A Traveller’s Companion to the North Saskatchewan - 2006
- Frog Lake Reader - 2009
- Prodigal Daughter: A Journey to Byzantium - 2011
Her work has appeared in:
Still Ain't Satisfied, Toronto, Women's Press, 1982
Women Against Censorship, Vancouver, Douglas & McIntyre, 1985
The Morningside Papers, Toronto, McClelland & Stewart, 1985
Competition: A Feminist Taboo?, New York, The Feminist Press, 1987
Ethnicity in a Technological Age, Edmonton, Canadian Institute of Ukrainian Studies, 1988
Out of Place, Regina, Coteau, 1991
The Thinking Heart: Best Canadian Essays, Kingston, Quarry, 1991
Twist and Shout: A Decade of Feminist Writing in This Magazine, Toronto, Second Story, 1992
Kitchen Talk: Contemporary Women's Prose and Poetry, Red Deer, Red Deer College Press, 1992
Twenty Years of Multiculturalism, ed. Stella Hryniuk
Stella Hryniuk
Stella Hryniuk is a professor of History at the University of Manitoba. Her academic research in Ukraine and her work in the Ukrainian community greatly enhanced the studies of the Ukrainian Canadian experience....
, Winnipeg, St. John's College Press, 1992
Pens of Many Colours: A Canadian Reader, Toronto, Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1993
Writing Away: The PEN Canada Travel Anthology, Toronto, McClelland & Stewart, 1994
Imagining Ourselves: Classics of Canadian Non-Fiction, Vancouver, Arsenal Pulp Press
Arsenal Pulp Press
Arsenal Pulp Press is a Canadian independent book publishing company, based in Vancouver, British Columbia. The company publishes a broad range of titles in both fiction and non-fiction, and is noted for founding the annual Three-Day Novel Contest .Authors who have been published by Arsenal Pulp ...
, 1994
Let the Earth Take Note: Anthology of the Milton Acorn Festival, ed. James Deahl, Charlottetown, Milton Acorn Festival Publishing, 1994
Eating Apples: Knowing Women’s Lives. Eds. Caterina Edwards and Kay Stewart, Edmonton, NeWest Press, 1994
Why Are You Telling Me This? Eleven Acts of Intimate Journalism, eds. Barbara Moon and Don Obe, Banff, Banff Centre Press, 1997
Ann Harbuz: Inside Community, Outside Convention, ed. Joan Borsa, Regina, Dunlop Art Gallery, 1997
Fresh Tracks: Writing From Western Landscape, ed. Pamela Banting, Vancouver, Polestar Press, 1998
Open Letter: De:Scribing Albertas (Part 1), Tenth Series #2, Spring 1998
Two Lands New Visions: Stories From Canada and Ukraine, eds. Janice Kulyk Keefer and Solomea Pavlychko, Regina, Coteau Books, 1998
Literary Pluralities, ed. Christl Verduyn
Christl Verduyn
Dr. Christl Verduyn is Professor of English Literature and Canadian Studies at Mount Allison University. She is the 2006 recipient of the Governor General's International Award for Canadian Studies, awarded by the International Council for Canadian Studies...
, Peterborough, Broadview Press, 1998
Arousing Sensation: A Case Study of Controversy Surrounding Art and the Erotic, ed. Sylvie Gilbert, Banff, Banff Centre Press, 1999
Threshold: An Anthology of Contemporary Writing from Alberta, ed. Srdja Pavlovic, Edmonton, University of Alberta Press, 1999
Jon Whyte: Mind Over Mountains, ed. Harry Vandervlist, Red Deer, Red Deer Press, 2000
edge/wise: part II, Canadian Women’s Writing at Century’s End, Winnipeg, Contemporary Verse 2, Vol. 23, No. 1, Summer 2000
Going Some Place: Creative Non-fiction Across Canada, ed. Lynne Van Luven, Regina, Coteau Books, 2000
Wrestling with the Angel: Women Reclaiming Their Lives, eds. Caterina Edwards & Kay Stewart, Red Deer, Red Deer Press, 2000
The Vintage Book of Canadian Memoirs, ed. George Fetherling, Toronto, Vintage Canada, 2001
Canada & September 11, ed. George Melnyk, Calgary, Detselig Press, 2002
AWOL:Tales for Travel-Inspired Minds, eds. Jennifer Barclay and Amy Logan, Toronto, Vintage Canada, 2003
Listening with the Ear of the Heart: Writers at St Peter’s, eds. Dave Margoshes & Shelley Sopher, Muenster, St Peter’s Press, 2003
The Wild Rose Anthology of Alberta Prose, eds. George Melnyk & Tamara Palmer Seiler, University of Calgary Press, 2003
Postcolonial Subjects: Canadian and Australian Perspectives, ed. Miroslawa Buchholtz, Nicholas Copernicus UP, Cracow 2004
Edmonton on Location: River City Chronicles, ed. Heather Zwicker, NeWest Press, 2005.
Place and memory in Canada: Global Perspectives, Proceedings of the 3rd Congress of Polish Association for Canadian Studies, Polska Akademia Umiejetnosci, Cracow, 2005.
Big Enough Dreams, ed. Debbie Marshall, Learning Community Press, 2006
Zeitschrift fur Kanada-Studien, Gesellschaft fur Kanada-Studien, Augsburg, 2006
Desire: Women Write About Wanting, ed. Lisa Solod, Seal Press, 2007
She has written for film (notably Teach Me to Dance, NFB, 1978) and for stage: 1985, Edmonton, Workshop West, 1982; No Kidding, Vancouver, Green Thumb, 1988; After the Fall: The Erotic Life of the Left, Edmonton, Catalyst "Write on the Edge" cabaret, 1992; File #3168, Edmonton, Catalyst, 1993. In 1985 she wrote a television drama, Where is Rosa?, for the University of Alberta Drama Lab. Her "Letters From Greece" were broadcast on CBC network, Morningside, in 1984.
Reunion, a radio play, was produced by John Juliani in 1984 for CBC "Saturday Stereo Theatre"; Gregory Sinclair produced The Collaborators for CBC's "Speaking Volumes" in 1989; Kathleen Flaherty produced Within the Copper Mountain (1997), History 605 (1998), The Masked Man in Warsaw (1999), Edith Stein: Whose Saint Was She? (2000), Pursuing Demetrius (2001) Voices from Frog Lake (2005) and Six Things You Need to Know About Byzantium (2007) for CBC radio Ideas.