Mount Royal University Centennial

iCelebrate

Mount Royal University English professor Bill Bunn thinks the essay is a form of writing that can truly make a difference in the world.

He’s one of the driving forces behind The Centennial Reader, an online collection of thoughtful essays that launched on Jan. 20.

He sees it as a place where Canadian readers will find essays on important and relevant issues.

“The essay is slightly endangered, in that there are not a lot of publications that take them,” says Bunn. “That isn’t good for Canadian writers or Canadian thinkers.

“Some of the issues we face these days are not things that fit into 700 words, and discussions of them can’t be simplified.”

Bunn believes The Centennial Reader is a way for academic research to be shared with a wider audience than those reached through academic journals.

Making a difference

“Those ideas should be out there where they can make a difference and change the world,” he says.

Bunn says The Centennial Reader is generating interest for a number of reasons. First, it publishes in-depth, peer-reviewed essays that apply intellectual thought to current issues, which means writers get academic credit for their submissions.

Next, its writers are paid: $100 for short essays (1000 and 2000 words) and $200 for longer essays (2000 and 4000 words).

Finally, because of its digital format, the Reader has potential as a textbook, bringing good Canadian content to students in an affordable format.

For its first issue, the Reader’s editorial board — made up of the Chair of Mount Royal’s Department of English, Lee Easton, as well as English professor Aida Patient and Bunn — has selected eight essays on topics ranging from poetry to Alberta bumble bees to a critique of modern leadership styles.

And, as a salute to Mount Royal’s centennial, each essay in the first issue also contains a reflection on “100,” ranging from what it means to own 100 pairs of shoes, to a deeply personal reflection on living to be 100 years old.

User friendly

Although the essays undergo a rigorous peer review process, they are not written for an academic audience only.

“We want to talk about these ideas, but we just don’t want to talk about them in the way academics do,” Bunn says. “The way we talk about things sometimes kills the fun of any idea and, I think, hides the value of some of the things that people are thinking about.”

Submissions are already being taken for the June issue of the Reader, and are open to all writers — including Mount Royal students.

“Reading and writing are deeply a part of the Mount Royal culture,” Bunn says. “The Centennial Reader is one way to promote and to give voice to some of the things that go on at Mount Royal that really need to be brought to a broader community’s attention.

“Because there really is a lot of good thinking here, and that’s why I love this place so much — you bump into all these great ideas. You bump into people who say the most outrageous things sometimes, and that gets you thinking, you know? And then that leads to ideas.”

The Reader itself was an idea of Bunn’s, and it became a reality thanks to initiatives to celebrate Mount Royal’s centennial.

— Nancy Cope, Feb. 3, 2011