Annal:2002 Griffin Poetry Prize – Canadian
From AwardAnnals
Results of the Griffin Poetry Prize in the year 2002. For a ranked list of books, try an honor roll:
- 2002 Griffin Canadian winner
- Score: 10.52
“Eunoia” which means “beautiful thinking” is the shortest English word to contain all five vowels. This book also contains them all, except that each one appears by itself in its own chapter. A unique personality for each vowel soon emerges: the courtly A, the elegiac E, the lyrical I, the jocular O, and the obscene U. A triumphant feat, seven years in the making, this uncanny work of avant-garde literature promises to be one of the most important books of the decade.
Sheep's Vigil by a Fervent Person: A Translation
- 2002 Griffin Canadian shortlist
- Score: 6.52
A temporary move to Toronto in the winter of 2000, a twisted ankle, an empty house-all inspired Mouré as she read Alberto Caeiro and Fernando Pessoa’s classic long poem “O Guardador de Rebanhos”. For fun, she started to translate, altering tones and vocabularies. From the Portuguese countryside and roaming sheep of 1914, a 21st century Toronto emerged, its neighborhoods still echoing the 1950s, their dips and hollows, hordes of wild cats, paved creeks. Her poem became a translation, the jubilant and irrepressible vigil of a fervent person.
“Suddenly,” says…
- 2002 Griffin Canadian shortlist
- Score: 6.52
Karen Solie takes risks with perception and language, risks that pay off in such startling ways that it’s hard to believe this is a first book. Short Haul Engine is one great twist of fate and fury after another. The writing is clear, striking and open to all sorts of possibilities. Even at their most playful, these poems dive much deeper than initially expected. There’s a remarkably dark sense of humour at work here, but tempered with a haunting vulnerability that makes even the sharpest lines tremble.
…Too delicate for these dog-days,
small,…
