Latest news with #HouseofAnansiPress
CBC
08-04-2025
- CBC
Wellwater by Karen Solie
The poems in Wellwater, Karen Solie's sixth collection, explore the intersection of cultural, economic, and personal ideas of "value," addressing housing, economic and environmental crisis, and aging and its incumbent losses. In an era of accelerating inequality, places many of us thought of as home have become unaffordable. In "Basement Suite," the faux-utopian economy of Airbnb suggests people with property "share" it with us and, presumably, we should be grateful. In "Parables of the Rat" the speaker feels affinity with scavengers while also wanting the rats gone. Having grown up in Saskatchewan on a small family farm, Solie sees the economic and environmental crises as inseparable. Climate change has made small farming increasingly untenable, allowing overbearing corporate control of food production. But hope, Solie argues, is as necessary to addressing the crises of our time as bearing witness, in poems that celebrate wonder and persistence in the non-human world. Tamarack forests in Newfoundland that grow inches over hundreds of years, the suddenly thriving pronghorn antelope, or a new, unidentified and ineradicable climbing vine, all hint at renewal, and a way to move forward. (From House of Anansi Press) Wellwater is available in April 2025. Karen Solie is the author of several poetry collections, including Short Haul Engine, Modern and Normal, Pigeon, The Road In Is Not the Same Road Out and The Caiplie Caves. She has received many awards, such as the Trillium Poetry Prize and the Griffin Prize, and has been shortlisted for the Derek Walcott Prize and the T.S. Eliot Prize. She teaches half-time in Scotland at the University of St. Andrews and spends the remainder of the year in Canada.
CBC
08-04-2025
- Entertainment
- CBC
The Seated Woman by Clémence Dumas-Côté, translated by E.S. Taillon
THE POEMS You fell asleep on the tiles, a translucent peacock loomed, your sex opened and let out a very blue, very high flame. You wore a split veil, that morning. Silent, nailed to her chair, the seated woman writes. She cracks. The poems fidget, slip their fingers: they seek to enter. Perched on her shoulder, the poems whisper in her ear. She captures their messages: "I love the sacred contortions you offer me." The poems protest: "You're squeezing us too hard: careful, pet." More than descriptors, the words behave as commands or moves in a game—and the voice of the seated woman rises to play. (From House of Anansi Press) The Seated Woman is available in March 2025. Clémence Dumas-Côté is the author of the novel Glu and poetry books L'alphabet du don and La femme assise. She studied acting at the National Theatre School of Canada and holds a master's degree in creative writing. She was born in Montreal. E.S. Taillon is a queer and neurodivergent writer whose writing has appeared in publications such as déraciné, filling Station and Agur Magazine. Their first literary translation, Scenes from the Underground, was shortlisted for the Dayne Ogilvie Prize for LGBTQ2S+ Emerging Writers. They are the former managing editor of Prism International magazine and holds a master's degree in French literature from the University of Toronto, as well as an MFA in creative writing from the University of British Columbia.
CBC
08-04-2025
- Entertainment
- CBC
Myth by Terese Mason Pierre
Myth, the much-anticipated debut collection from the multi-talented Terese Mason Pierre, weaves between worlds ('real' and 'imaginary') unearthing the unsettling: our jaded and joyful relationships to land, ancestry, trauma, self, and future. In three movements and two interludes, the poems in Myth move symphonically from tropical islands to barren cities, from lucid dreams to the mysteries of reality, from the sea to the cosmos. A dynamic mix of speculative poetry and ecstatic lyricism, the otherworldly and the sublime, Pierre's poems never stray too long or too far from the spell of unspoiled nature: "The palm trees nod / at the ocean / the ocean does / what it always does / trusts the moon completely." Friends 'with benefits' tour the wonders of Grenada's landscapes; extraterrestrials visit the Caribbean and the locals don't seem phased; red birds "saunter airily like tourists," La Diablesse lures helpless suitors to their dooms. This collection asks: How can myths manifest themselves in our daily lives? What do we actually mean when we say we love ourselves and others? And how do we pursue/create futures that honour our truths, histories and legacies? (From House of Anansi Press) Myth is available in April 2025.
CBC
03-04-2025
- Entertainment
- CBC
Procession by katherena vermette
Procession: a line of people moving in the same direction; a formal ceremony or celebration, as in a wedding, a funeral, a religious parade. Bestseller and Governor General's Awardwinner Katherena Vermette's third collection presents a series of poems reaching into what it means to be at once a descendant and a future ancestor, exploring the connections we have with one another and ourselves, amongst friends, and within families and Nations. In frank, heartfelt poems that move through body sovereignty and ancestral dreams, and from '80s childhood nostalgia to welcoming one's own babies, Vermette unreels the story of a child, a parent, and soon, an elder, living in a prairie place that has always existed, though looks much different to her now. This book is about being one small part of a large genealogy. A lineage is a line, and the procession, whether in celebration or in mourning, is ongoing. Procession delves into what it means to make poems and to be an artist, to be born into a body, to carry it all, and, if you're very lucky, age. (From House of Anansi Press) katherena vermette is a Michif (Red River Métis) writer from Winnipeg. Her books include the novels real ones, The Break, The Strangers and The Circle, poetry collections North End Love Songs and river woman and the four-book graphic novel series A Girl Called Echo. North End Love Songs won the Governor General's Literary Award for poetry. The Break was a finalist for the Rogers Writers' Trust Fiction Prize and the Governor General's Literary Award for fiction. It was defended by Candy Palmater on Canada Reads 2017. The Strangers won the 2021 Atwood Gibson Writers' Trust Fiction Prize and was longlisted for the 2021 Scotiabank Giller Prize. real ones was also longlisted for the 2024 Giller Prize. She is also a senior editor at Simon & Schuster Canada.
CBC
03-04-2025
- Entertainment
- CBC
katherena vermette has a new poetry collection out in fall 2025 — read an excerpt now
katherena vermette is back with her third poetry collection, Procession. In this book, she explores what it means to be at once a descendent and a future ancestor. Procession is a grouping of frank and heartfelt poems that examines ancestral dreams, 1980s nostalgia, prairie life and how it changes as a child, parent and future elder. "For me, poetry is intensely personal," said vermette in an email ot CBC Books. "It moves slow, and lives in and among all the other things." "These poems are inspired by many things, or maybe everything that's happened since the last book, which was published in 2018 — lifetimes ago! Since then, I've said hello to new humans and goodbye to others. This is very much about the in-between." If you're interested in poetry, the 2025 CBC Poetry Prize is currently accepting submissions. You can submit an original, unpublished poem or collection of poems from April 1-June 1. vermette is a Michif (Red River Métis) writer from Winnipeg. Her books include the novels real ones, The Break, The Strangers and The Circle, poetry collections North End Love Songs and river woman and the four-book graphic novel series A Girl Called Echo. grimoire before you were this you were the dream of a hundred martyrs you were a wish the sort that lingers under young girl whispers into young girl ears a spark in a loving eye prayer floating in wind you were as light as the seeds sprinkled about this wide red earth now you are a ridge brief plateau on the mountain of revolution one the ancestors looked up to and said one day your birth has taken centuries a labour that nearly killed them all you are now and you have so much magick in you stories that have waited lifetimes to be told Excerpted from Procession by Katherena Vermette ©2025 Katherena Vermette. Published by House of Anansi Press.
