Poetic Attention
In the spirit of conversation and collaborative thinking, Poetry Matters is pleased to host a free event, April 18-19, at McGill University’s Thomson House (space accessible) on the topic of poetic attention, leading from the work of Lucy Alford (Forms of Poetic Attention, Columbia UP, 2020). Bringing together academic and poetic communities, the event explores the enigmatic concept of “poetic attention.” From different standpoints, we consider what this idea might mean and achieve in our days of the attention economy.
All are welcome! For further specifics on the program, please stay tuned on our website and FB page (scroll down for more detail). Click here to register.
Segments on Friday, April 19 will include
==a panel discussion on poetic attention with Poetry Matters and McGill’s Laboratory for Attention and Social Cognition;
==a keynote lecture from Sarah Wylie Krotz, Director of the Centre for Literatures in Canada at the University of Alberta, On slowness and symbiosis: following lichens;
==readings from poets Louise Dupré, Joel A. Harris, Lee Kathryn Hodge, Chad Norman, and Derek Webster
==work from Montréal-based visual artist Kevin Jenne
== workshops in creative practice and attention;
Louise Dupré, born in Québec, has published more than twenty books, which have received many awards and been translated into several languages. Her books Plus haut que les flammes (Beyond the flames) and La main hantée (The Haunted Hand) received the Governor General’s Award. Dupré is a member of the Academy of Letters of Quebec and of The Royal Society of Canada, and in 2014 was appointed to the Order of Canada for her contributions to Quebec literature as a poet, novelist, playwright, essayist, and professor.
Trinidadian poet and artist Joel Anthony Harris was recently shortlisted for Into the Void’s Poetry Prize. Harris’ work has appeared in publications such as The Heavy Feather Review, PRISM, the Berkeley Poetry Review, and Anthropocene. He has also contributed to two books, The Alpha Barrier of North South Dialogue and The Twilight of America's Omnipresence.
Lee Kathryn Hodge is visual artist and writer whose work has appeared in Granta, Black Warrior Review, Thrush, Heavy Feather Review, Euphony, Heartwood, The William & Mary Review, Oberon, Clinch Mountain, After Hours, Mouth and The Tulane Review. She has received support from the de Kooning Foundation, the Ragdale Colony, the Wisconsin Fellowship of Poets, and Luminarts where she was named a 2023 Creative Writing Fellow. Her second chapbook We Make Shapes From Shapes is available from Bent Paddle Press.
Kevin Jenne has exhibited paintings across Canada and internationally at sites such as New York, Chicago, and Bejing, and developed work for a number of charitable organizations in Montréal, including the Montréal Children’s Hospital, the Cummings Centre, and Art for Healing.
Chad Norman lives and writes in Truro, Nova Scotia. In 1992 he was awarded the Gwendolyn MacEwen Memorial Award for Poetry. His poetry has appeared in journals, magazines, and anthologies around the world, and his new book, Parental Forest, will appear in Spring 2024 (AOS Publishing Montreal). Norman’s poem, “The Shoulds” will be included in the Lunar Vagabond Collection, part of a time capsule scheduled for a Lunar Codex lift-off to the moon this coming November.
Derek Webster’s new collection of poems, National Animal will be published by Signal Editions (Véhicule Press), April 2024. Mockingbird (2015) was a finalist for the Gerald Lampert Award for best first book of poems in Canada. Webster received an MFA from Washington University in St. Louis, and is the founding editor of Maisonneuve magazine. He lives in Montréal and Toronto.
We look forward to seeing you!
Poetry Matters
https://www.mcgill.ca/poetrymatters/
Click here to register.
We can be reached at pm.mcgill [at] mcgill.ca
Poetry Matters at McGill University works on unceded land which has long served as a site of meeting and exchange amongst Indigenous peoples, including the Haudenosaunee and Anishinabeg nations. We honour their longstanding stewardship of the lands and waters on which we gather, and we respect the continued connections with the past, present and future in our ongoing relationships with Indigenous and other peoples within the community of Tiohtià:ke (Montréal).