Al Purdy

A bundle of Laurier Poetry books for course use that includes Fierce Departures (Dionne Brand); Sonosyntactics (Paul Dutton); The More Easily Kept Illusions (Al Purdy); False Laws of Narrative (Fred Wah0; and Sohkeyihta (Louise Bernice Halfe).

Laurier Poetry Pack #4 consists of 5 volumes from the Laurier Poetry series. Volumes contained in Laurier Poetry Pack #4: 9780889204904 The More Easily Kept Illusions; 9781554580385 Fierce Departures; 9781771121323 Sonosyntactics; 9781554580460 The False Laws of Narrative; 9781771124119 Social Poesis.

Originally published by Contact Press in 1962, then later by House of Anansi in 1967, and again in a revised, expanded edition in 1972, Poems for All the Annettes stands as one of the essential documents of the great Al Purdy’s career. So many beloved poems are here?" At Roblin Lake," "At the Quinte Hotel"?but also so many undiscovered gems and treasures. It is at once the perfect introduction to this remarkable poet’s work and a collection rich and deep enough to satisfy even the experienced Purdy fan. This edition reproduces the final, expanded text of the 1972 edition, and features a brilliant new introduction by poet and novelist Steven Heighton, who knew Purdy well.

Much-loved, cantankerous, and brilliant, Al Purdy galloped across the Canadian literary landscape for decades, grandly embodying the self-taught and hard-living image of the 1960s and '70s poet. The More Easily Kept Illusions: The Poetry of Al Purdy is a selection of thirty-five poems that includes some of his best-loved and unearths lost and ignored treasures. Robert Budde introduces the collection with an overview of Purdy's tumultuous life of letters, his legendary personality, his outrageous antics, his peers, his influences, and the history of his publishing career. Reorganizing Purdy's body of work, this collection also re-interprets the chronological and thematic development of his writing. Choosing poems for a book like this is necessarily an act of literary criticism and Budde takes care to balance the various critical attentions that have structured the historical responses to Purdy's work. The selected poems will mix lesser-known gems with Purdy's greatest hits. Teachers, poetry-lovers, students, and writers will rediscover Purdy's unique voice. Those who are new to his work will get a full and rich sense of the man some have called the last Canadian poet. Also includes an Afterword by Russell Morton Brown.

In this fascinating and funny collection of correspondence, Canada's greatest poet lets it all hang out in spirited private exchanges with Pierre Trudeau, Carol Shields, Earle Birney, Anna Porter, Charles Bukowski, Margaret Laurence, Margaret Atwood, Michael Ondaatje, Gwendolyn MacEwan, Jack McClelland, Northrup Frye, William Golding, Darryl Sittler, Alistair MacLeod, Susan Musgrave, Irving Layton, Lynn Crosbie, George Bowering, Anthony Burgess, Joseph Brodsky and many other notables. Yours, Al is an uncensored, intimate glimpse into the life of Canada's most celebrated poet. Al Purdy's personal letters present the Can-lit scene as an ongoing conversation between members of a tight, supportive community spanning generations of talented writers. From generous encouragement to brash, unsparing insults -- it's all here, with responses from many recipients of his letters. Encompassing more than fifty years, the letters show Purdy at his best -- and his worst.

By the time Al Purdy succumbed to lung cancer at his waterfront home in Sidney BC on April 21, 2000, he was universally acknowledged to be one of the greatest writers Canada has produced. In five decades as a published author he had produced over forty books and received innumerable distinctions, including two Governor General's Awards and the Order of Canada. A hands-on writer who delighted in co-producing specialty publications and small press titles in addition to his major collections with leading publishers, Purdy left a massive and diverse body of work, much of it long unavailable to the public. The Collected Poems, edited by Purdy critic Sam Solecki with the full participation of the author, for the first time brings all of Purdy's poetic writings together in one volume, including all his later books, work previously uncollected from earlier periods as well as several excellent new poems he completed in the months before his death. It is, as he said, everything he wished to be remembered for.

With introductions, commentary and five new poems derived from Donne's elegies by Doug Beardsley and Al Purdy. In 1998, the poets Al Purdy and Doug Beardsley spent many hours in Victoria's Waddling Dog Pub discussing the often-neglected poetry of D. H. Lawrence. The result was No One Else is Lawrence , acclaimed by readers across the country. This time the two turn their attention to John Donne, the Renaissance poet whose work has fascinated students and lovers of poetry for centuries. The Man Who Outlived Himself is an engaging rassle with some wonderful poems-must reading for Donne fans everywhere and an intimate look at the tastes and sensibilities of two important contemporary Canadian poets. Their commentary, lying somewhere between criticism and conversation, invites enthusiasm for the strangest English language poet. Born in London in 1572, the third of six children, Donne was both intellectual and eccentric: he slept in his own coffin, wore his own shroud, and sired eleven children in fourteen years, all while serving as Dean of St. Paul's. The Man Who Outlived Himself includes a selection of Donne's poems, with commentary, plus five Donne elegies, each followed by an "interpretive and transformative" new poem by Purdy and Beardsley. The last pages contain two poems to Ann Donne by Purdy and Beardsley.

Al Purdy' s final volume of poems includes some of the best work of his half-century of writing.

"A hundred years from now, one of the few Canadian poets whose work will still be read is Al Purdy" -"Maclean' s"

Long known to insiders as one of the most unique personalities in Canadian letters, the celebrated poet Al Purdy begins this story of his life by noting that just as he was about to be born his hometown of Trenton was flattened by a historic explosion as the local munitions factory, "no doubt accounting for any oddity and eccentricity in my character." By the time the readers realize just how much there is to account for, they may be forgiven for wondering if the Trenton Blast was big enough to do the job. "Reaching for the Beaufort Sea" is one of the most engaging and revealing autobiographies ever undertaken by a leading Canadian author. Writing in a relaxed, conversational style with ribald humour never far below the surface, Purdy shows himself no mercy as he exposes what surely must be one of the most unlikely literary apprenticeships ever served. He is equally merciless when it comes to providing uncensored glimpses of writers like Margaret Atwood, Margaret Laurence, F. R. Scott, Earle Birney, Louis Dudek, Irving Layton, Hugh MacLennan, Leonard Cohen, and John Newlove, who worked, loved and brawled alongside Purdy during Canadian literature's coming of age. Gossipy and lighthearted as it is at times, "Reaching for the Beaufort Sea" nevertheless makes an important contribution to the understanding of modern Canadian letters, and is essential reading for anyone hoping to appreciate fully a writer Dennis Lee has called "one of the substantial poets in English of the century."