The Republic of East Vancouver may never be published again

It's a newspaper, sure, but we tend to think of it as an honourary magazine, if only because its editor and publisher, Kevin Potvin, was one of the best friends a newsstand magazine ever had. Now, apparently, after almost 10 years of serving the east side of Vancouver, The Republic of East Vancouver is going on hiatus...and the paper may never be published again.

Regular readers of this blog will recall we lamented the disappearance in April last year of the Magpie Gallery, one of the best independent magazine stores in Canada.

The lynchpin of that operation was Potvin, who had run the place for 15 years. He blamed changing public habits (staring off into space on the bus with iPods in their ears, rather than reading books, using laptops in coffee shops, staying home and surfing the web)and the consolidation of the distribution industry.

Parallel to, or in lockstep with, the Magpie, Potvin published The Republic of East Vancouver, a fortnightly paper as quirky and unusual as him and his late store. Now, he has written a note to his readers saying he is taking the summer off and may not come back. In part, he said:

There are a number of reasons. The chief one is, I can’t find anything to say with conviction anymore. I’ve lost the thrill, I guess. I certainly wouldn’t claim to have said everything that needs saying, but for the time being, I would claim to have at least said everything I am able to say.

I’m exhausted. In the nine-and-a-half years The Republic has been publishing, as near as I can figure I’ve written and published 2 million words. That’s the equivalent of 25 average-sized books. I’ve also printed and distributed 1 million copies of the paper. Another round number emerges: stacked up, the pile would reach pretty much exactly 1 mile high.

(Running out of gas may be understandable, given what Potvin has gone through in the past few years. At one point, he was planning to stand for the Green Party in 2007 against renegade Liberal David Emerson, but criticism of an article he wrote in The Republic in 19922002 about 9/11 accused him of celebrating the attacks as a deserved outcome of American imperialism. Potvin denied it, but a national storm of controversy blew up and the spooked leader of the Greens, Elizabeth May, refused to sign his nomination papers. His short electoral career was over.)