Erin Mouré: another fab Canadian poet

Erin Mouré is a poet who I felt I had Discovered, long ago, in my intellectual journey through university. She's based in Montréal, and I went to McGill, where I was introduced to her West South West, published in 1989 by Montréal based publisher Véhicule. Only after I had enthusiastically mentioned her a few times did someone point out that, if fact, Mouré was quite well known by that time. Sigh. So much for my burgeoning career as a literary scout! Since then she's published many books of her own, as well as translations from French, Spanish, Galician and Portugese -- imagine being that talented. She has won oodles of awards of all kinds. Truthfully, I haven't read much of her recent work; after leaving university and that total immersion in language and theory and such, my comprehension of Mouré's avant-garde works has diminished. I think -- hope -- that if I spend some time with her texts they will reward me for it, so next up, I think I'll pick up her latest book, O Cadoiro, or maybe her translation, with Robert Majzels, of Nicole Brossard's Notebook of Roses and Civilization. For now, take a listen to this bilingual reading of an amazing poem, Soft Link 3, by Brossard and her two translators, recorded at the Griffin Poetry Prize awards.






And what is she working on next? Well, a new collection is coming out in 2010, and according to her recent interview in the National Post's Afterword, she's also working on a book of poems set in Ukraine called The Unmemntioable (Yes, she assures us, that's spelled wrong on purpose). Can not wait to see that!