Halfmoon Bay author Joe Denham has been short-listed for the Governor General’s Literary Award in the poetry category for his third collection, Regeneration Machine (Nightwood Editions, 2015).
Regeneration Machine (reviewed in Coast Reporter, Nov. 13, 2015) is a 100-stanza, 9,000-word letter-in-verse written to the ghost of Nevin Sample, Denham’s close friend who tragically ended his life over 20 years ago. The book is a moving requiem, elegy, lament – a sort of flailing attempt to make sense of the nonsensically violent way that a non-violent, caring, intelligent young man chose to end his life.
It has been described as “a huge poem of great integrity” and “muscular and searing.” The book also won the Canadian Authors Association Award for Poetry earlier this year.
Founded in 1936, the Governor General’s Literary Award honours the best in Canadian literature, with seven different categories for both English- and French-language authors. All finalists receive $1,000, and the winners, who will be revealed on Oct. 25, will each receive $25,000.
Denham is the author of two other poetry collections, Flux (2003) and Windstorm (2009), and the novel The Year of Broken Glass (2011). His work has appeared in numerous magazines and anthologies including Breathing Fire 2: Canada’s New Poets (2004). He is currently at work on a sequel to Windstorm and is preparing to release his first album of songs, Lost at Sea, in the spring of 2017.
