Speech delivered on stage in Salle Ludger-Duvernay at Monument-National, March 21, 2025

gd evening, hi, bonsoir, howdy do, hail up, big ups, greetings… i am glad to be here in-person at the national theatre school. 

before speechifying about receiving this reward, i just want to give a bit of backgrounding of how i got here. 

i like to call myself a child of the dark diaspora; and was willing plucked from the island nation of jamaica over 50 years ago: yes that’s how far before i’m going, but i’m not dwelling there.

i grew into adulthood in the flourishing and still expanding city of toronto. coming of age in toronto means i got to know its streets even better than i knew downtown kingston (the city where i was born).

in toronto i grew with the changing demographics, and moved with the flow of ever-arriving new/immigrant faces; as we carved out living alongside each other in neighbouring homes & streets & schools & work places defined and identifiable by the talk & foods & ways of walking & other unique customs we each brought & fought to retain… fighting to retain them as without them we wd have been lost. see, our connection to home, no matter how tenuous or obscure, and even when it’s fading was and still remains the one constant between where we from and where we are. the nature of immigrating is always to cross a bridge which divided there and here, home and away, out and in, the me/or we and the others!

but i got to dream between the divide of the caribbean and my new canada… and got to re-imagine ways to settle into and draw warmth from the often cold clime, ways to shine in crowds of multi-coloured faces (most of whom were labelled as invisible minorities), ways to refine and become the me that was destined even while i used to climb topside the hilly ways to my grannie’s house, or splashed in the rivers which flowed from country to town, or that me which first got excited at 13 by one of our best poets/son: claude mckay.  

and i grew into the artist of now. from living and working and dreaming my caribbean me in toronto canada. innovating styles of poetry & performance art which cd only have issued from a daughter of the caribbean who by force or desire held fast to the filling up, the nurturing i got from home/here mongst the sea and home/in the trenches of the dark diaspora! 

this almost duplicitous (but more like forked) nurturing is what i carry with me now… in my life and in my work.  after 45+ years of mixing up independent theatre and poetry, recording, performing, directing, founding & running a theatre company for 23 of those years where other young and seasoned artists alike came to drink in the training and exciting collaborations and innovative arts experiences which were and will continue to be hallmarks of b current performing arts; i am out in the world… so to speak.

i spent my early years as a poet throwing my fist and heart up in the air at political rallies; writing poems in physics lectures while studying biology then psychology and linguistics at university; and fortuitously accepted an invitation to join the young company at black theatre canada in the late 70’s. but later finding independent work as a black theatre artist in dem days was like trudging thru thick mud or quicksand sometimes. so i opted to ‘go back home’ and lived for near two years. there, in jamaica again in the early 80’s i wrote and acted in a few shows, stage-managed the annual “national pantomime”, taught dance and playmaking, toured thru the caribbean, workshopped in varying art disciplines, and learnt that i loved directing. i returned ‘home’ to the toronto i knew so well to further build my career. not knowing that artistic mentoring and nurturing was to be a huge part of this journey.

from 1985 to 2016: if you are/were a young black artist emerging or growing or taking root in live performance – and specifically live theatre in toronto and beyond – u passed thru my hands… meaning that the work i did as a poet, or an independent creator or as stage director or dramaturge or as the artistic director at b current performing arts; the gamut of work during my artistic career directly or quietly influenced and shaped your artistic career especially in its early stage. and for many of these artists way beyond into their maturing work. 

i hold this truth in my hands today as i witness the flourishing of many of these artists into their maturing work. i hold this truth as many of these artists mirror writing forms i’ve innovated; like dub theatre. or they mirror my nurturing styles which was the bedrock of b current arts. or thru the years into now, many younger artists come to me to formally and informally express their thanx and acknowledge the exchange: their growth and my own.

and in accepting this prize i have to acknowledge a massive ambivalence; in fact my acceptance of this gascon-thomas career award from the national theatre school of canada brought forward much more than ambivalence. 

when i said yes and agreed to travel to montreal again (something i’ve been doing since my own emergence as a young artist in the 1970’s) i was excited by the fact that current young artists-in-training here at the school chose me. artists-in-training who had not met me and may not have even known of my work before this encounter. later, when thinking about what to include in a ‘speech’, my excitement around being chosen for this award brought forward feelings of my first trip to montreal: as an invited guest at a first canadian black arts conference here in 1980. yes, i was and am excited to be here again. but i almost didn’t come. 

yes folx, i almost did not come to this auspicious event honouring my career’s work. in fact, i may have never come to the school again as i was reminded of the first time i entered (step foot) in the main building of the national theatre school. on a cool saturday afternoon in the fall of 2017.

i was passing thru montreal, not long after wrapping rehearsals for that year’s confederation centre’ national young company production in charlottetown… (ironically titled “dream catchers”)
 

anyway, alisa palmer was a.d. for the acting program then, and she wanted me to meet some students and see the space as i was considering her request for me to work with a cohort of students on a collective creation cycle. well, on that cool saturday afternoon i walked into the nts main building and was technically ‘arrested’ by one of the workers hired to provide security… apparently (according to that worker) i resembled a young visitor who had recently caused a ruckus in the building. long and short of this story is: the security guard went thru a series of retraining and transfer to someplace else, i worked with the school on a first project which got side-swiped but not badly injured by the recent pandemic. happy to relate that all 13 of my covid cohorts graduated and many are now working on art of their choosing.

i tell about my first coming to nts because i didn’t realize that trauma (from that encounter then) still lives in my body. seems i was holding body memory that surfaced with a vengeance last week: my body (and mind) and a bit of my heart felt broken all last week into this week. 

i actually considered not coming here again; sending a heartfelt apology and the like. but i also knew moving past traumatic experiences don’t quite work in the way we want. i figured that successfully working here would be redemptive (and it has been) but working here and even talking about my encounter has not erased or ‘fixed’ my first day on the campus.

i have worked on many projects in montreal including a few at the school since that first day here… and all because i pushed thru, into where i thot i wanted to be; i continued bringing me and the art i created or channeled, or on which i collaborated or advised or just speculated.

and i think this is my message for u here at nts, now: 

my intent was literally to push beyond some or any constricting ideals and notions which can and often batten our work into corners where our art is no longer a living experience: reflecting everyday, past/present/future/dreams and desires, hopes and achievements; each time a living experience which lifts us out of the mundane, makes us laugh/cry/grieve/celebrate in mas and en masse… cos when we share in art experience we are consciously and unconsciously and by all means viscerally/each time invoking that sometimes elusive bond which connects us all. and more importantly that which keeps us wanting to connect!

here at nts i saw not only the younger folks i may influence with original & familiar exploration ideas thru the training work planned, but also the seasoned artists with whom i would collaborate. thruout my career i have mined art engagements, especially my collaboration projects as ever-learning experiences on our collective continuing paths.

my own constant quest as an artist is my core urging to for you: have and  appreciate new experiences. ones which will fold into my your as you jump in headlong, eyes wide, and searching in the way we forever do as artists. 

and even as i may say to myself in these mature years: i’m working on a few swan song projects before retiring from my artistic career, i am really just continuing the work which has made me never regret the fact that art grabbed me at an early age and claimed me as a worker for the cause. the cause of illuminating the darkness, making light of the mundane, lifting our world a little with each art experience.

thanx to the students here and the nts machinery for opening this door to honour my career work. thanx for welcoming me into the building!!!

ahdri zina mandiela