Simmers won the $6,000 grand prize for her poetry collection, Spell World Backwards
CBC Books, CBC’s online home for literary content, together with its partners the Canada Council for the Arts and Banff Centre for Arts and Creativity, today announced Bren Simmers of Charlottetown as the winner of the 2022 CBC Poetry Prize. Simmers’ poetry collection, Spell World Backwards, was selected from more than 2,200 entries.
As the grand-prize winner, Simmers will receive $6,000 from the Canada Council for the Arts and her poetry collection has been published on CBC Books. She will also receive a two-week writing residency at Banff Centre for Arts and Creativity.
The 2022 CBC Poetry jurors Armand Garnet Ruffo, Megan Gail Coles and Hoa Nguyen, said this about Simmers’ poems:
"Spell World Backwards is a moving sequence of poems that unflinchingly addresses the complexities of dementia, kinship, and grief, and reaches the core of our common humanity. Told in a set of incomplete block-shaped stanzas with deliberate textual omissions, the sequence sets into motion a narrative that draws upon themes of mother and child, love and separation, memory and forgetting."
Bren Simmers said, “I am incredulous and so grateful! I’ve always wanted to win the CBC Poetry Prize, but never thought it would happen. I know my mom would be proud too. She used to carry my poems in her purse and show them to people in the grocery store.”
The four runners-up for the 2022 CBC Poetry Prize, who will each receive $1,000 from the Canada Council for the Arts, are: Rachel Lachmansingh of Toronto for From the Mouth; Brad Aaron Modlin of Guelph, Ont. for To the Astronaut Who Hopes Life on Another Planet Will Be More Bearable; Luka Poljak of Vancouver for Mouth Prayers; and Kerry Ryan of Winnipeg for Grief white.
CBC Books also announced Philippe Labarre as the winner of the French grand prize for Scènes de la vie poreuse. More information is available at ICI.Radio-canada.ca/icionlit.
For more information on the CBC Literary Prizes, please visit CBCBooks.ca.
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About CBC Books
Home to Canada Reads, Writers & Company with Eleanor Wachtel, The Next Chapter with Shelagh Rogers, Canada Writes and the CBC Literary Prizes, CBC Books connects Canadians with books, encouraging a shared love of reading and writing. For book news, writing challenges, reading lists, book recommendations and more, visit cbc.ca/books.
About CBC/Radio-Canada
CBC/Radio-Canada is Canada’s national public broadcaster. Through our mandate to inform, enlighten and entertain, we play a central role in strengthening Canadian culture. As Canada’s trusted news source, we offer a uniquely Canadian perspective on news, current affairs and world affairs. Our distinctively homegrown entertainment programming draws audiences from across the country. Deeply rooted in communities, CBC/Radio-Canada offers diverse content in English, French and eight Indigenous languages. We also deliver content in Spanish, Arabic, Chinese, Punjabi and Tagalog, as well as both official languages, through Radio Canada International (RCI). We are leading the transformation to meet the needs of Canadians in a digital world.
About Canada Council for the Arts
The Canada Council for the Arts is Canada’s public arts funder, with a mandate to "foster and promote the study and enjoyment of, and the production of works in, the arts."
The Council’s grants, services, initiatives, prizes, and payments contribute to the vibrancy of a creative and diverse arts and literary scene and support its presence across Canada and abroad. The Council’s investments foster greater engagement in the arts among Canadians and international audiences.
The Council’s Public Lending Right (PLR) program makes annual payments to creators whose works are held in Canadian public libraries.
About Banff Centre for Arts and Creativity
Founded in 1933, Banff Centre for Arts and Creativity is a learning organization built upon an extraordinary legacy of excellence in artistic and creative development. What started as a single course in drama has grown to become the global organization leading in arts, culture, and creativity across dozens of disciplines. From our home in the stunning Canadian Rocky Mountains, Banff Centre for Arts and Creativity aims to inspire everyone who attends our campus – artists, leaders, and thinkers – to unleash their creative potential and realize their unique contribution to society through cross-disciplinary learning opportunities, world-class performances, and public outreach.
For further information, contact:
Astoria Luzzi
CBC PR
astoria.luzzi@cbc.ca
416-779-6612
Diane Hargrave
DHPR Communications Inc.
dhprbks@interlog.com
416-467-9954
