Oh, the seemingly endless toil and frustration of being an underpublished and underappreciated writer. There's the mailbox full of polite, predictable rejections and the depressing rite of passage otherwise known as "open mic night." When you finally emerge from it all, it's certainly time to rejoice. Thankfully Pages Books & Magazines’ This Is Not A Reading Series has stepped up to celebrate some of the lesser-known but soon-to-be-well-known players in Toronto’s vibrant literary scene.......

Lit lovers should head over to Church Street today for the Writing Outside The Margins festival of queer literature, the first of its kind in Toronto. The Gay Village stretch of Church Street will be closed from 11:00 a.m. to 7 p.m. to accommodate stands selling everything from children's books, fiction and poetry to sci-fi, erotica and comic arts. There will also be two stages for readings and performances, where you'll get to participate......

If last week’s key word on the literary scene was “big,” as in prizes, galas, festivals, sold-out readings, visiting writers, and BookExpo, we get back to normal-ish this week. In fact, we’ve not had such a low-key stretch since March. Fear not. The Scream Literary Festival is adding more information to their website every week. On July 3rd, the festival kicks off with readings by Dennis Lee and Souvankham Thammavongsa, films by Shapour Shahidi, and......

March 8th marks International Women's Day each year, though it's sadly not yet a national holiday in Canada, as it is in a few countries. But official holiday or not, there are still a tonne of events happening in Toronto to mark the occasion. Here are some of Torontoist's best bets for celebrating feminism this week: Today The National Film Board and Amnesty International present a free screening of Killer's Paradise, a documentary about the......

Every two weeks "What's The Frequency, Campus?" will highlight some of the intriguing shows and special programming happening on Toronto's campus and community radio stations. One of the main mandates of campus and community radio is to give a voice to views and people who are underrepresented in mainstream media outlets. The fifth annual Homelessness Marathon will do precisely that when it takes to the airwaves tonight at 8 p.m. for 14 hours of radio......

Everyone sufficiently recovered from Word on the Street? Over 200,000 people braved the wind and rain and descended upon Queen’s Park for a celebration of books. I have a book hangover, thus the lateness of this week’s listings. Tomorrow night, This Is Not A Reading Series goes Hollywood! Journalist and filmmaker Bruce Yaccato launches Screen Legends, a chronicle of the “Canadian film pioneers who helped build the Hollywood we know today.” Joining Bruce will be......

Put Up Your Dukes Before I get to this week’s listings, here’s an upcoming event that might interest some of you. First it was German director Uwe Boll challenging movie critics to fight him in Vancouver, now author Craig Davidson (author of last year’s criminally underrated collection, Rust and Bone) will fight willing pugilists at the Toronto launch of his forthcoming novel, The Fighter. The date of the bout is yet to be determined,......