Annual Downtown Eastside Writers Festival supports local scribes and their heart-centred activism
Gilles Cyrenne
Journalist, Writer
“Five Years: One Community” is the theme for this year’s Downtown Eastside Writers Festival, a five-day celebration that runs from May 20-24, reflecting the unity created by writing and the arts.
The festival emerged from 35 years of the Carnegie Newsletter, 10 years of Thursdays Writing Collective, a dozen years of Firewriters, five years of Downtown Eastside Writers Collective, and several publications from the Carnegie Learning Centre — including Invisible Heroes.
Hundreds of Downtown Eastside (DTES) writers and artists have appeared in the pages of the Carnegie Newsletter, anthologies, books and chapbooks. This DTES Writers Festival gathers together a wider Vancouver community that supports local scribes and their creative activism. Grassroots writers are the heart of the city, acting as its conscience and its authentic voice.
Support from the City of Vancouver, Carnegie Community Centre Association, Vancouver Public Library, DTES Literacy Round Table, Simon Fraser University, Capilano University and the UBC Humanities Program activates this gathering. Professor Carrie Jenkins from Capilano University also shared a grant she received to help support the festival.
Highlights this year include national best-selling author Angela Sterritt reading from her best-selling memoir, Unbroken: My Fight for Survival, Hope, and Justice for Indigenous Women and Girls, and engaging in a discussion.
As in previous years, Fiona Tinwei Lam, former Vancouver Poet Laureate, and me (Gilles Cyrenne) will create spontaneous poetry from your prompts.
In a move to and from embodiment, Lance Lim and Naomi Brand will explore how movement, breath and body awareness can unlock powerful stories. With Lynda Sing, an expressive arts therapist, participants will explore using art, music and the body to inform their writing.
Angela Grey, whose writing centres on the impact of colonization on children of the African/Caribbean diaspora who have been adopted into white homes, invites participants to explore their writing practice using visual art as a writing prompt. Participants will be encouraged to use visual art tools to engage with their writing in a supportive and encouraging space. Supplies provided.
In an adults-only workshop, Maureen “Maury” Teahan, author of Love For Sale, will read from her book and lead listeners into exploring plot devices. Again, participants will together compose a community poem.
Typewriter Tales, paula luther’s project, brings a typewriter to Carnegie’s main floor lobby for folks to compose, one line at a time, a poem, which will be read at the closing party.
Thursday evening brings the return of Ghia Aweida’s open mic poetry cabaret.
On Friday night, there will be a screening of Unarmed Verzses, a documentary that presents a portrait of a community facing displacement.
Saturday evening, RC Weslowski regales the audience with his poetry slam event, complete with judges and cash prizes. On Sunday afternoon—that’s a wrap, with a party at Oppenheimer Park.
Over the festival’s five days, there will be almost 40 events. It promises to be a to a super busy, fun, engaging festival that flies with DTES soul and creativity.
The 2026 DTES Writers Festival runs from May 20-24 at the Carnegie Community Centre, 401 Main St. Admission and participation are free.
Gilles Cyrenne
Journalist, Writer
Gilles Cyrenne is a retired journeyman carpenter, now writing full-time. He has a collection of poetry ready for publication, a batch of short stories he is presently editing and a novel in the outline stage. He is the president of the Carnegie Community Centre Association and has been involved at the centre for more than a decade with various writing groups and projects, including the annual Downtown Eastside Writers’ Festival. Gilles is a member of The Shift peer newsroom.
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