Di Brandt, English
Dr. Di Brandt was appointed as Full Professor and Canada Research Chair in the Department of English in 2005. Her areas of expertise are Canadian Literature and Creative Writing. Her CRC project is called "School for Ecopoetic Experiments (SEE)" and involves developing a "post-postmodern" poetic practice that is connected to current environmental issues, cross-cultural and interdisciplinary discourses, and multimedia. She has hosted several symposia at BU, including a National Ecopoetics Symposium for Canadian women poets, a Poetry-Science Symposium for poets and scientists in dialogue on the question, "What is Resonance?" and recently chaired the coordinating committee for the Brandon Aboriginal Literary Festival, featuring 25 Canadian Aboriginal writers.
Canada Research Chairs at Brandon University have a smaller teaching load than other faculty members, so that they may devote more time to their research. Dr. Brandt teaches several courses in the English Department at Brandon University, including (past & current):
Creative Writing: Poetry (30:353)
Ecopoetic Post-Postmodern Readings in Contemporary Canadian Poetry (30:479) Advanced Seminar in Creative Writing (30:459) Elucidata: Multimedia Poetry Workshop (30:367) English Canadian Poetry (30:369)Dr. Brandt has published numerous books of poetry, including the internationally acclaimed titles, questions i asked my mother, Jerusalem, beloved and Now You Care. She has received numerous awards, including the Gerald Lampert Award for "best first book of poetry in Canada," the Canadian Authors Association National Poetry Prize and the McNally Robinson Manitoba Book of the Year Award. Dr. Brandt has also published numerous titles of criticism and creative essays, including Wild Mother Dancing: Maternal Narrative in Canadian Literature. Since arriving at BU two years ago, she has published three books: Re:Generations: Canadian Women Poets in Conversation, co-edited with Barbara Godard (Black Moss, 2005); So this is the world & here I am in it (NeWest Writers as Critics X, ed. Smaro Kamboureli); and Watermelon Syrup, a novel co-written with Annie Jacobsen and Jane Finlay-Young (WLUP). Dr. Brandt travels widely and has given guest lectures, readings and workshops across Canada, the US, Europe, Asia and the Middle East.
With her Chair, Dr. Brandt also received funding from the Canada Foundation for Innovation for setting up a Poetry Video Laboratory, in which to develop multimedia poetry productions, including electronic (website and audio/video), performance and graphic/text productions. The laboratory is housed in Brandon University's Clark Hall.
For more information about Dr. Brandt's literary career and excerpts from her published works, please visit her website at www.dibrandt.ca.
Curriculum Vitae
Dr. Di Brandt
Personal Data
Professor and Canada Research Chair, Department of English, Brandon University, 2005-10 .
Adjunct Professor, Department of English Language, Literature and Creative Writing, University of Windsor, 2005-2007.
Associate Professor (Creative Writing and Canadian Literature), Department of English Language, Literature and Creative Writing, University of Windsor. 1997-2005. Tenured 1998.
SSHRC Research Fellow, Department of English, University of Alberta, 1995-96.
Writer-in-Residence, Department of English, University of Alberta 1995-96.
Lecturer/Assistant Professor, Department of English, University of Winnipeg 1986-95.
Lecturer, Department of English and Women’s Studies, University of Manitoba,1981-95.
HONOURS AND AWARDS:
Canada Research Chair (NSERC), Brandon University, 2005-2010.
University of Windsor Research Excellence Award 2003.
Canadian Authors’ Association National Poetry Prize 1995.
McNally Robinson Manitoba Book of the Year Award 1990.
Gerald Lampert Award for “best first book of poetry in Canada” 1987.
Silver National Magazine Award for Poetry 1995, with The New Quarterly.
SSHRC Postdoctoral Research Fellow, University of Alberta 1996-98.
Finalist, National Magazine , 2007.
Finalist, Griffin Poetry Prize, 2004.
Finalist, Trillium Ontario Book of the Year, 2004.
Finalist, Western Magazine Awards, Prairie Fire Magazine, 2002.
Finalist, Canada Research Chair, University of Windsor for 2002.
Finalist, Governor General’s Award for Poetry 1995.
Finalist, Governor General’s Award for Poetry 1987.
Finalist, Dillons Commonwealth Poetry Prize 1988.
Finalist, Pat Lowther Award for “best book of poetry by a woman in Canada” 2004.
Finalist, Pat Lowther Award for “best book of poetry by a woman in Canada” 1995.
Finalist, Pat Lowther Award for “best book of poetry by a woman in Canada” 1992.
Finalist, McNally Robinson Manitoba Book of the Year Award 1995. ($1000.)
Finalist, McNally Robinson Manitoba Book of the Year Award 1993. ($1000.)
Feature in Let Us Compare Mythologies: Half a Century of Canadian Poetry in English.
Curated by Lorna Knight. Ottawa National Library, 1989.Shortlisted CBC National Literary Competition 1989.
Shortlisted CBC National Literary Competition 1988.
Shortlisted Faculty of Arts and Social Science Service Award, University of Windsor 2001.
Shortlisted Canada Research Chair, University of Windsor 2002.
Listing in:
Encyclopedia of Literature in Canada, ed. William New. Toronto: UTP, 2002 -.
Oxford Companion to Canadian Literature. Toronto: Oxford University Press, 1998 -.
Who’s Who in Canada, 1989 - .
International Who’s Who in Poetry and Poetry Encyclopedia, Cambridge, UK, 1989- .
International Writers and Authors Who’s Who, Cambridge, UK, 1998- .
Who’s Who of Canadian Women, 1995- .
Who’s Who in the League of Canadian Poets, 1988- .
Who’s Who in the Writers’ Union of Canada, 1988- .
Wikipedia, 2003-.
Mentioned as one of the attractions of the University of Windsor in the annual MacLeans Survey, Mcleans Magazine, April 2002.
Voted “#2” (next to Carol Shields) in “Best Local Author” Ruff Guide Reader Survey,
Uptown Magazine, Winnipeg, 1997.
www.cap.ca (Canadian Association of Physics, poetry site), 2003-.
www.griffinprize.ca, 2004-.
www.poetsagainstthewar.ca 2003-.
LIST OF PUBLICATIONS:
Books authored, co-authored:
Watermelon Syrup. Wilfrid Laurier University Press, 2007, with Annie Jacobsen and Jane Finlay-Young. Forward by Finlay-Young, afterword by Di Brandt. Novel. 250 pp.
So this is the world & here I am in it. Edmonton: NeWest Press Writers as Critics series, ed. Smaro Kamboureli, 207. 200 pp. Creative essays.
Speaking of Power: The Poetry of Di Brandt, ed. with introduction by Tanis McDonald; poetry and afterword by Di Brandt. Waterloo: WLUP, 2006.
Now You Care. Toronto: Coach House Press, 2003. 120 pp. Poetry.
Bouquet for St. Mary. London, Ontario: Pendas Productions, 2003. 25 pp. Poetry.
Dancing Naked: Narrative Strategies for Writing Across Centuries. Toronto: Mercury Press, 1996. 168 pp. Creative Essays.
Jerusalem, beloved. Winnipeg: Turnstone Press, 1995. 71 pp. Poetry.
Wild Mother Dancing: Maternal Narrative in Canadian Literature. University of Manitoba Press, 1993. 188 pp. Literary Criticism.
mother, not mother. Toronto: Mercury Press, 1992. 82 pp. Poetry. Agnes in the sky. Winnipeg: Turnstone Press, 1990. 65 pp. Poetry.questions i asked my mother. Winnipeg: Turnstone Press, 1987. 64 pp. Poetry.
The Bridge, or What’s Wrong with Jim McKenzie?. 3-hour opera, libretto by Di Brandt, music by Esther Wiebe. Winnipeg: CMBC Publications, 1973. 256 pp.
Adaptations, Multimedia, Collaborations, Exhibitions, Theatre:
Emily, the Way You Are. Libretto for one hour chamber opera for soprano and six instruments. Score by Jana Skarecky. Soprano Ramona Carmelly. 20 minute excerpt premiered at Haliconian Club, Toronto, November 2007. World premiere at the McMichael Gallery, Kleinburg, Ontario, April 2008 (forthcoming). from Hymns for Detroit. Artcite commemorative poem, on handmade linen paper, with photo imprint. By invitation. Artcite 25th Anniversary Celebration, 2007.Come Live With Me. BU Playwriting Festival, May 2007, hosted by Dale Lakevold. Dramaturged and directed by Brian Richardson, with Sherry Phillips and Mike Bell. 15 min. play.
ELUCIDATA. Premiere exhibition/performance of the premiere BU Poetry Video Lab class, April 2007. Poetry videos, performances, audio recordings, and websites, directed by Di Brandt, and curated with technical assistance by Derek Gunnlaugson and Cory McMurachy.
Poem. Poetry on the Buses. Windsor, 2005-2007.
Poem. Poetry in Transit. Winnipeg, 2005-2007.
Trading Cards. 26 handmade trading cards, with 26 artists from across Canada and Europe. Curated by Sharon Caseburg. 2007. By invitation.
Stone from Cape Breton, for Alistair MacLeod. Commemorative plaque, Art Gallery of Windsor, 2006. Alistair MacLeod Retirement Celebration, University of Windosr and Art Gallery of Windsor. By invitation.
Cats Have Nine Lives, play by Berlin writer Jenny Erpenbeck, trans. Di Brandt. Workshopped by Nightswimming, Toronto, 2002; staged readings by UWindsor Theatre Dept, dir. Lionel Walsh, 2002; UWindsor Theatre Dept, dir. Erica Stevens Abbitt, 2005. Performed at the University of Philadelphia, 2007.
Awakenings. Four way collaboration, featuring poetry by Di Brandt and Dorothy Livesay, and music/performance by Rebecca Campbell and Carol Ann Weaver. Premiered at the conference/festival, Wider Boundaries of Daring: The Modernist Impulse in Canadian Women's Poetry, University of Windsor, October 2001. CD Recording, 2003.
Bouquet for St. Mary. CD, audio-recording, performed by Di Brandt. Pendas Productions, 2004.
Green and Gold, by Jana Skarecky, musical setting of poems by P.K. Page, commissioned by the Wider Boundaries New Music Collective (Di Brandt and Paul McIntyre), for the Wider Boundaries conference/festival New Music Recital of compositions set to Canadian women's poetry, coordinated by Paul McIntyre and performed by Melinda Enns and Paul McIntyre at the festival, including "Zone Pomes," by Paul McIntyre, a musical setting of Di Brandt's poetry.
Poetry for the New Millennium: Poetry Symposium, with Peter Stevens, Louise Halfe, Lillian Allen, Di Brandt, Marty Gervais, Anita Hurwitz, and Stephen Pender. Organized and chaired by Di Brandt. University of Windsor, 2000.
“Le Detroit.” Reading, with Gail Scott and Carla Harryman, in conjunction with Stan Douglas’ photographic exhibition, Art Gallery of Windsor, Ontario, 1999.
Festival of Canadian Women Composers, Windsor Symphony Orchestra. Poetry reading, with Penn Kemp and Margaret Christakos, 1999.
Genius Loci (Sacagawea). Musical Composition by James Hickerson, with poetry by James Thomson, Di Brandt, Isaiah, and William Wordsworth. M.A.Thesis, University of Saskatchewan, 1998.
Working in the Dark. Installation by Aganetha Dyck, featuring a poem by Di Brandt, transcribed into Braille and decorated with honeycomb. De Leon White Gallery, November 1997.
“Jerusalem, beloved: A Multimedia Performance.” Poems, photographs, video, music, with Kathy Bergen, La Mama Gallery, New York, May 1997.
“The Other.” Alberta Anthology, 1997. 10 min.
“part of the control.” Improvisational performance, with Cate Friesen (guitar and voice) and Carol Ann Weaver (keyboard and voice). University of Waterloo, November 1997.
Window Installation, using Poetry by Di Brandt, Margaret Atwood, Leonard Cohen, Christopher Dewdney, Lorna Crozier, Al Purdy, and others; by Doreen Balabanoff. Freeport/Grand River Health Centre, Waterloo, Ontario. 1997.
questions i asked my mother. One woman performance based on questions i asked my mother by Di Brandt. Acted by Gabrielle Epstein, produced by Simca Kuper, directed by Brenda McFarlane, of B&G Productions, Toronto. 1996. 1 hour.
“Out of the Quiet.” Four Songs for Soprano and Piano, with poetry by Di Brandt. Composed and performed by Carol Ann Weaver (piano) with Margaret Elligsen Hull (soprano). Daughter of Olapa: The Music of Carol Ann Weaver. Canada: CD Digital Recording, 1996.
Dance of the Fish Brides. Collaborative performance/exhibition with Diana Thorneycroft and Sigrid Dahle. St. Norbert Arts and Cultural Center, July 1996; Floating Gallery, November 1996.
The Quiet in the Land? Three-hour musical theatre performance, using “Four Songs,” lyrics by Di Brandt, musical by Carol Ann Weaver. Premiered at the Quiet in the Land? Conference, Millersville University, Pennsylvania, May 1995. Performed in Waterloo, November 1995.
“Di Brandt Feature Profile.” Poems, interview, workshop clips, music. Produced by Kem Murch Video Productions. Vision TV, October 1995. 15 min.
Untitled. Installation and performance by Dutch artist Arnold Schalks with Di Brandt, based on “since we cannot meet” by Di Brandt, as part of the Bounce>Rotterdam international multidisciplinary exchange exhibition, St. Norbert Arts and Cultural Centre, Winnipeg, May 1995.
“Occupied Territories: A Poetic Dialogue.” With Carol Rose. Poems and interview with music and photographs. Produced by Evelyn Hecht. The Jewish Connection. Videon Television, November 1994. 30 min.
“Poems with photographs and text.” Women’s Television Network, 1994.
Body of Dissent. Bridge Video, 1993. Dir. Cate Friesen, Holly Nattal, Greg Lichty, Gordon Bowness. Introduction with voiceover poetry reading by Di Brandt. 92 min.
“Jerusalem, beloved.” Poems with music and interview by Jacqui Good. Produced by Jacqui Good and Tom Anniko. Speaking Volumes, CBC Radio 1991. Re-produced by Erika Ritter, Aircraft, CBC Radio 1991. 30 min.
“Di Brandt: Canadian writers and how they celebrate Christmas.” Video feature produced by Edith Champagne. Newsmagazine, CBC TV, December 1991. Co-produced by Di Brandt. 5 min.
“Poetry in Collaboration.” With East Indian classical dancer Bishaka Sarkar (of London, England), Association for the study of the New Literatures in English Conference, University of Mannheim, Germany, June 1990.
“Our Silence.” Poems with music. Produced by Tom Anniko. Speaking Volumes, CBFC Radio, 1989. Co-produced by Di Brandt. 30 min.
The Bridge. 3 hr opera, libretto by Di Brandt, music by Esther Wiebe. CMBC Publications. Directed by Liz Coffman. Cast of 30 people, commissioned and produced by Canadian Conference of Mennonites in Manitoba, for the 1972 Centennial Celebrations. Performed at the Winnipeg Centennial Concert Hall, and in Altona, Winkler, and Boissevain.
Books and literary journals and magazines edited, co-edited:
Wider Boundaries of Daring: The Modernist Impulse in Canadian Women’s Poetry, ed. Di Brandt and Barbara Godard. WLUP 2008, forthcoming. Critical essays on Canadian Modernism. 250 pp.
Leave You Breathless, by Elsa Reesor-Taylor. Chapbook of poems, developed in the ManitobaWriters Guild Mentor Program with Di Brandt. Prairie Ink Press, 2007, Di Brandt, editor
and publisher.
Re:Generations: Canadian Women Poets in Conversation, ed. Di Brandt and Barbara Godard.
Windsor, Ont.: Black Moss, 2005. 196 pp. Poetry, Painting reproductions, musical
scores, conversations, testimonials, essays.
Prairie Fire Magazine. Quarterly Literary Magazine. Poetry editor, 1989-93.
Contemporary Verse 2. Quarterly Literary Magazine. Co-editor with Pamela Banting, Jan
Horner, Jane Casey, and Keith Louise Fulton, 1985-88.
HERizons Magazine. Fiction editor, 1985-86. Monthly Journal
(f.)Lip Magazine, Manitoba Rep, 1988-90. Quaraterly Literary newsmagazine.
Canadian Mennonite Bible College Alumni Bulletin. Editor, 1983-86. Quarterly.
Being Brothers and Sisters. General Conference of Mennonites in North America, 1980.
Illustr. Les Brandt. Newton, Kansas: Faith and Life Press, 1983. 115 pp.
Commissioned by the North American Mennonite General Conference Committee on
Education as a Study Guide for adult study groups.
Chapters or creative pieces contributed to books/publications in anthologies:
Poem. White Ink: Poems on Mothers and Motherhood, ed. Rishma Dunlop. Toronto: Demeter Press, 2008. 1 p.
Poems. Sound in the Land: Essays on Mennonites and Music, ed. Maureen Epp. Wilfrid Laurier University Press, 2006. 2 pp.
“My breasts had become eyes.” Mothering and the Muse, ed. Fiona Lam, Cathy Stonehouse, Shannon Cowan and Fiona Tinwei Lam. Toronto: M&S, 2008. 10 pp.
“Souwestoegg on Winnipuzz: James Reaney’s Winnipeg.” The Winnipeg Connection: Writing Lives at Mid-Century, ed. Birk Sproxton. Winnipeg: Prairie Fire Press, 2006. 12 pp. Nom. For the Carol Shields Winnipeg Book Award and the Manitoba Margaret McWilliams Popular History Award.
“So this is the world & here I am in it.” Writing Lives: PEN Canada Anthology, ed. Constance Rooke, M&S, 2007. 12 pp.
“Nine River Ghazals.” Voices from Oodena, ed. Charlene Diehl. Winnipeg International Writers Festival Chapbook, 2006. 3 pp. Also featured on the WWF Website, with audiorecording by Di Brandt.
Poem. 71 Poems for George Bowering, ed Jean Baird. ECW Press, 2006. Festschrift. By invitation.
Poem. radiant danse uv being, ed. A. Rox and J. Pew. Festschrift for bill bissett. Nightwood Editions, 2007.
Poems. The Griffin Poetry Prize Anthology, ed. Phyllis Webb. Toronto: Anansi, 2004, 63-73.
Poems. A Cappella: Mennonite Voices in Poetry, ed. Ann Hostetler. University of Iowa Press, 2003. 78-84.
Poems. A Hundred Poets Against the War, ed. Todd Swift. UK and Australia: SALT, 2003. 3 pp.
Poems. A Hundred Poets Against the War, ed. Todd Swift. Electronic anthology, 2003. www.ahundredpoetsagainstthewar.com 3 pp.
Poems. Canadian Poets Against the War, ed. Stephen Pender, Mark Higgins and Darren Werschler-Henry. Toronto: Three Squares Press. 99-100.
Poem. The Language Hotel. Multimedia anthology, curated by Sheila Butler and Louise W. May, edited by Marie Bouchard, photographs by Sheila Spence and Len Van Roon, Winnipeg: St. Norbert Arts Centre, 2002. 1 p. www.snac.mb.ca
Poem in translation into Plautdietsch, with Heidi Harms and Erica Ens. Poem for Peace in Two Voicse, Vol 2. CD and book, Pendas Productions, 2002. 1 min., 1 p.
Poems. The Poetics of Ethics: Writing in the Feminine in English Canada and Quebec, by
Marie Carriere. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2001. 72-84.
Poem. The Dominion of Love. Ed. Tom Wayman. Polestar Books, 2001. 13.
Poem. The Body and the Book: Writing from a Mennonite Life, by Julia Kasdorf. New York: John Hopkins University Press, 2002. 92-93.
Interview. Defining the Radical, booklength study of contemporary Canadian women's writing, by Pauline Butling and Susan Rudy. Waterloo: Wilfrid Laurier Press, 2003. 4 pp.
Poem. Push It! Young Adults Engage the Bible, Vol. 2. Ed. Sidney D. Fowler. Cleveland, Ohio United Church Press, 2001. 7.
“This land that I love, this wide wide prairie.” Fresh Tracks: Writing the Western Landscape. Victoria: Polestar Books, 1999. 232-38.
“Afterword.” Archive for Our Times: Previously Uncollected and Published Poems by Dorothy Livesay. Arsenal Pulp Press, 1998. 246-249.
Poems. We All Begin in a Little Magazine. Ed. John Barton. Arc and the Promise of Canada’s Poets 1978-98. Arc Twentieth Anniversary Special Issue 40 (Spring 1998): 42-43.
Poems. Uncommon Wealth: Anthology of Poetry in English. Ed. Neil Besner, Deborah Schnitzer and Alden Turner. Toronto: Oxford U. Press, 1997. 752-753.
Poems. Making a Difference: A Multicultural Anthology. Ed. Smaro Kamboureli. Toronto: Oxford U. Press, 1996. 373-376.
Poem. The Wascana Poetry Anthology. Ed. Richard G. Harvey. Regina: Canadian Plains Research Centre, 1996. 234-235.
“Adolescent Desire and Lost Love: Teaching Poetry Writing in High Schools.” Poems in the Classroom. Ed. Betsy Struthers and Sarah Klassen. Pembroke Publishers, 1995. 67-69.
“& what if.” a slow remembering: An exhibition of photographs by Diana Thorneycroft. Floating Gallery 1994: 4-6. Essay, with poems, 3 pp. insert.
“this black ball we carry around inside us.” Women and Violence. The Living Archives Feminist Caucus Panel Proceedings, 1992. Ed. Sarah Klassen. Toronto: League of Canadian Poets, 1994.
Poem and creative essay. Our Fathers: Poetry and Prose by Daughters and Sons from the Prairies. NeWest Press, 1994. 16-17.
Poem. Reader for Adult Literacy. Guelph: Action Read, October 1994. 6-8/
Poem. Drop Out. Winnipeg: Rhinocerotic Press, 1994. 28.
“Introduction.” Awareness III: A Quest for Higher Literacy. Winnipeg: R.B.Russell High School, 1993. Xxiii-xiv.
Poems. Beyond Borders: An Anthology of New Writing from Manitoba, Minnesota, Saskatchewan and the Dakotas. Ed. David Williamson and Mark Vinz. Winnipeg: Turnstone Press, and Minneapolis: Three Rivers Press, 1992. 37-45.
Poems, with German translations by Marion Bittner. Mediating Cultures/Probleme des Kulturtransfers: Beispiele pragmatischer Kulturvermittlung. Ed. Norbert H. Platz. (Hrsg.) Essen, Germany: Die Blaue Eule, 1992. 136-41.
Poems. Section Lines: A Manitoba Anthology. Ed. Mark Duncan. Winnipeg: Turnstone Press, 1992. 41-45.
Fourth International Feminist Book Fair Anthology, with translations into Spanish and Catalan. Barcelona: 1990. 8-16.
“Letting the silence speak.” Language in her Eye: Views on Writing and Gender by Canadian Women Writing in English. Ed. Libby Scheier, Sarah Sheard, and Eleanor Wachtel. Toronto: Coach House Press, 1990. 54-58.
Poem. Healing Voices. Ed. Cheryl Malmo and Toni Ann Laidlaw, et. al. San Fransisco: Jossey Bass, 1990. 229.
Poems. Living the Changes. Ed. Joan Turner. Winnipeg: University of Manitoba Press, 1990. 132-34.
Poems. Mennonite/s Writing in Canada. Ed. Hildi Tiessen. The New Quarterly Special Issue 10/1&2 (Spring/Summer 1990): 290-294.
Poems. Writing Our Lives. Ed. Katie Campbell. London, England: Camden Press, 1989.
“How I got saved.” Why I Am a Mennonite: Essays on Mennonite Identity. Ed. Harry Loewen. Pennsylvania: Herald Press, 1988. 26-33.
“shades of sin.” Liars and Rascals: Mennonite Short Fiction. Ed. Hildi Tiessen. Waterloo: Wilfred Laurier Press, 1988. 174-77.
Poem. Esther Warkov: Recent Drawings. Winnipeg Art Gallery Exhibition Catalogue, 1986. 1.
Guest features:
Interview by Marianne Mays. HERizons, 2006. Photograph.Interview with Betsy Warland. HERizons, 2007. Cover feature. Photograph.
Interview with Miriam Toews. HERizons, 2005. Cover feature. Photograph.
Interview by Tanis MacDonald. Arc, 2006. Feature, with poems.
Interview by Clarise Foster. Contemporary Verse 2. Feature, with images.
Poetry feature, Griffin Poetry Prize Website. 2004.
Poetry feature, Griffin Poetry Prize finalist, Globe and Mail, May – June, 2004.
Poetry feature, Griffin Poetry Prize finalist, London Review of Books, May – June 2004.
Poetry feature, Griffin Poetry Prize finalist, Times Literary Supplement, May – June 2004.
Poetry feature, Griffin Poetry Prize finalist, Toronto Star, May – June 2004.
Poetry feature, Griffin Poetry Prize finalist, New York Times Book Review, May – June 2004.
Poetry feature, Griffin Poetry Prize finalist, Quill & Quire, May - June 2004.
“Notes on A Capella,” ed. Ami Regier. Mennonite Life, 2004. 1 p.
Featured Broadside, Goshen College Broadside Series, October 2004.
Featured Broadside, Goshen College Broadside Series, October 2002.
“from Berlin Notes.” Cover feature, essay and photographs. Prairie Fire (Fall): 8-19.
Poem, with German translation by Ursula Krechel, 100 Canadian Poems, ed. George Bowering, Canadian Poet Laureate website, 2004. www.poets.ca.
Feature poems, photographs and short essay. New Quarterly 85 (2003): 122-129. Foreword by Lesley Elliott, afterword by Susan Gillis.
Feature poems and photographs, including cover photograph. Prairie Fire 23/1 (Spring): 15-24.
Feature interview and poems, Contemporary Verse 2, 26/2 (Spring 2003): 28-33.
Feature poems, story, and dramatic monologue. Contemporary Verse 2, 19/2 (Fall 1996): 47-59.
“that moment, when the bottom falls out – “ Feature essay. Contemporary Verse 2, 19/2 (Fall 1996): 45-6.
“the sound the wind makes.” The New Quarterly 14/2 (Summer 1994): 20-51. * Recipient of the Silver National Magazine Award.
Feature poems and interview with Catherine Hunter. Prairie Fire: Special Issue on McNally Robinson Award Winners 15/1 (Summer 1994): 42-61.
Cover feature, Poetry Canada 14/1 (1994): 18-19.
“”the sound the wind makes: A Sh(e) Mail Interview with Randi Patterson.” The New Quarterly 14/2 (Summer 1994): 20-51.
“Occupied Territories: a poetic argument by Di Brandt and Carol Rose.” Quarry Magazine 42/4 (January 1994): 29-37.
“Creative Conflict in the Family.” Guest Editorial, Crossroads: Mennonite Collegiate Institute Alumni Newsletter 3/3 (Summer 1993): 1-2, 6-7.
“Last Words.” NeWest Review (October/November 1993): 38.
“Ghosts of Christmas Past (Seven Artists Remember ).” The Globe and Mail, December 24, 1993: C1-2.
Publications in professional literary journals:
Poems. Fourth River (US). 2008. 2 pp.Poems. Atlas (UK): Canadian issue, ed. Sudeep Sen. 2007. 3 pp.
Poems. Open Letter, special issue on Eco-spaces, ed. Lola Lemire Tostevin, 2007. 6 pp.
Poems. Rhubarb, ed. Garry Enns,, May 2007. 1 p.
Poems. Rampike 25th Anniversary Edition II, January 2006. 2 pp.
Poems, with interview by Tanis MacDonald. Arc, 2006. Shortlisted for the National Magazine Award, tba June 2007.
Poems. Walrus, July/August 2004. 67.
Poem. Rattle (US) 8/2 ((Winter 2003): 12.
Poems. Six Seasons: South Asian Review 2 (2003): 11-15.
Poems. River King Poetry Supplement (US), guest ed. Glen Sorestad. 9/1 (Spring 2002): 6.
Poems, with "Reflections" by Hildi Tiessen. Conrad Grebel Review 19/3 (Fall 2001): 77-88.
Poems and interview. Contemporary Verse 2 Special Issue on Feminism, ed. Clarise Foster 26/2 (Spring 2002). 28-33.
“Going Global.” ECW Special Millennium Issue on Canadian Literature: Where is Here Now? Ed. Robert Lecker, 71 (2001): 106-113.
“Revisiting Dorothy Livesay’s The Husband.” The Capilano Review 2/32 (2000): 75-89.
“The Happiest Reader in the World.” Prairie Fire Magazine Special Issue on David Arnason, ed. Birk Sproxton. 22/1 (Spring): 61-70.
"Shapeshifting Strategies for the New Millennium." Contemporary Verse 2: edge/wise: Canadian Women's Writing at Century's End, 25th Anniversary Issue 22/4 (2000): 62-68.
“That Crazy Wacky Hoda in Winnipeg; A Brief Honest Attempt at a Pithy Statement about Adele Wiseman’s Crackpot.” Prairie Fire Special Issue on Winnipeg Writing. 20/2 (Summer 1999): 138-157.
“Remembering Paul Hiebert.” Rhubarb 2 (1999): 3 pp.
Poems. Mattoid 52/53 (1998): 148-152. (Australia)
“just like any two people.” Text(e) 1997. 4 pp. (UK)
Poems. Prism International 1997. 6 pp.
“This land that I love, this wide wide prairie.” Borderlines 45 (1997): 41-44.
“The Creator Mother’s Song.” Motherwork 5, Summer 1995. 4-5.
“Houses to Play in.” Other Voices: Special Issue on “Houses.” 7/1 (Spring 1994): 42-44.
“Editorial.” Prairie Fire Magazine: Sparks! Writing by Winnipeg High School Students 13/4 (Winter 1992-93): 2.
“Interrogating Language: The Writing Act.” Prairie Fire 13/4 (Winter 1992-93): 37-40.
Poems. Arc 29 (Autumn 1992): 12-18.
Poems. Moosehead Anthology 13 (1992): 38-39.
“Letter to Patrick.” Prairie Fire: Special Issue on Patrick Friesen, 13/1 (1992): 64.
“The Poetics of Adolescent Desire and Lost Love.” Classmate: The Manitoba Association of Teachers of English Newsletter 23/2 (Winter 1992): 5-6; also in Poets in the Classroom, eds. Sarah Klassen and Betsy Struthers (Toronto: Pembroke Publishers 1995): 67-69.
“Nightmare at Penetang.” NeWest Review (April/May 1991), illustr. Leila Armstrong. 16-18.
Poems. Border Crossings (Winter 1990): 28.
“Beyond patriarchy and wilderness.” Prairie Bookworld (Winter 1990): 20.
“This is how I got here.” (f.)Lip 2/1 (1988): 19-20.
“Questions I asked Dennis Cooley about his Vernacular Muse.” Prairie Fire 9/3 (1988): 94-96.
“Foremothers.” Contemporary Verse 2, 11/1 (March 1988): 50-51.
“Betsy Warland in conversation with Di Brandt.” Contemporary Verse 2, October 1987.
“Editorial.” Contemporary Verse 2, 10/2 (Fall 1986): 5-7.
“Writing the Mother.” Contemporary Verse 2, 9/3&4 (Winter 1986): 87-93.
“hiatus InterViews hiatus.” Prairie Fire 7/3 (Autumn 1986): 110-19.
“Editorial.” Contemporary Verse 2, 9/2 (Fall 1985): 6-7.
Additional poems appeared in the following literary journals (subsequently published in book form): Northern Light, Border Crossings, Contemporary Verse 2, The New Quarterly, The Mennonite Mirror, The Dinosaur Review, Prairie Fire, HERizons. Line, orbis (UK), Prism International, Poetry Canada, Quarry, Tessera, Texts (Germany), Arc, Canadian Forum, Prairie Schooner (U.S), El Ciervo (Spain).
Websites featuring my poetry:
www.dibrandt.cawww.cap.ca (Canadian Association of Physics, under physics poetry)
www.griffinprize.ca
www.poetsagainstthewar.ca
Conference Proceedings:
“je jelieda, je vechieda: Canadian Mennonite (Alter)Identifications.” Canada in the Sign of Migration and Transculturalism, ed. Martin Loeschnigg and Klaus Dieter-Ertler, Peter Lang, 2005. 20 pp.
"The Poet and the Wild City." Keynote Address, Mennonites and the City. Journal of Mennonite Studies, ed. Roydon Loewen, Summer 2002. 20:89-105.
“That Crazy Wacky Hoda in Winnipeg: Prairie Settler Biogeopolitics in Adele Wiseman’s Crackpot.” Canada 2000: Identity and Transformation/Identite et transformation: Central European Perspectives on Canada/Le Canada vu a partir de l'Europe centrale. Ed. Klaus-Dieter Ertler and Martin Loeschnigg. Frankfurt am Main, Berlin, New York, Oxford: Peter Lang: Europaishcher Verlag der Wissenschaften, 2001. 14 pp.
“Putting the Mother back in the Language.” West Coast Line: What Women Are Doing 29/33/2 (Fall 1999): 86-105. Featuring papers presented at Women & Texts & Communities Conference, Leeds University, 1997.
“This land that I love, this wide wide prairie.” Chiba University Canadian Studies Forum 3, 1997-98: Proceedings from The International Conference on Diverse Cultures Interacting within Monolingual and Multicultural Societies. 9-17.
“from The Other.” Chiba University Canadian Studies Forum 3, 1997-98: 18-25.
“This black ball we carry around inside us.” Women and Violence: The Living Archives Feminist Caucus Panel Proceedings, 1992. Ed. Sarah Klassen. Toronto: League of Canadian Poets, 1994.
“The Uses of Poetry: Re-membering the Body.” Contemporary Verse 2: ReVerse/Re:Vision Conference Proceedings 15/4 (Summer 1993): 28-29.
“Dancing Naked: Narrative Strategies for Writing Across Centuries.” The Ethnic Strain: Place and Vernacular Musings. Proceedings from the Second Interdisciplinary Colloquium on Western Canada: Geography, Literature, Ethnicity. University of Trier, Trier, Germany, May 1989. Ed. Wolfgang Klooss and Herbert Zirker. University of Trier: Schriftenreihe des Zentrums fur Kanada-Studien, 1992. 23-32.
“Interview and Readings: Di Brandt and Dennis Cooley.” The Ethnic Strain, 1992. 135-66.
Conferences, symposia and literary series (hosted):
Brandon Aboriginal Literary Festival, Chair of planning committee, with Lorraine Mayer (BU Native Studies), Dale Lakevold (BU Creative Writing), Linda Burridge (BU Librarian), Susan Dupuis (Actor and Theatre Director), and Jill Oman (student). Featuring 25 professional Aboriginal writers from across Canada and 6 student writers. Readings and panel discussions on “Writing and Life (Women),” Writing and Life (Men),” “Seven Porcupines into the Future,” and “The Bawdy of Humour.” Attended by over 200 people from across Canada. Oct 25-27, 2007.
Tri-University English Symposium, with Diana Brydon (CRC, UManitoba) and Mavis Reimer (CRC, UWinnipeg). Featuring panels on several topics such as Imagining the Future, Poetic Thinking, The Function of English as a Discipline, and Global Citizenship. Well attended by graduate students and faculty from all three universities. Enthusiastic presentations by numerous participants. 2007.
What is Resonance? Poetry-Science Symposium, Brandon University. Featuring 14 Poets, Scientists and other Experts in Cross-disciplinary Dialogue. 2007.
National Ecopoetics Symposium, Brandon University, and the Art Gallery of SWManitoba. Featuring 25 Canadian poets in ecopoetic dialogue. 2006.
Wider Boundaries of Daring: The Modernist Impulse in Canadian Women’s Poetry, with Barbara Godard (YorkU). University of Windsor, Art Gallery of Windsor and the Scarab Club, Detroit (as part of Detroit 300). Poetry festival/conference featuring more than 50 poets, musicians, artists, scholars, including the premiere of two new commissioned musical settings of Canadian women’s poetry. 2001.
Black Writers Festival, University of Windsor, with Lillian Allen, Writerin-Residence. Featuring 15 Canadian Black writers in performance and workshop over 2 days, attended by 100 people from Ontario and Detroit. 2000,
Arts Consultant to Spider Women: An Exploration of Creativity and Healing. National interdisciplinary women’s conference on healing and the arts sponsored by Women Healing for Change. Gull Harbour, Hecla Island, April 1995.
Prairie Fire Spring Literary Festival 1995, with Andris Taskans (Editor, Prairie Fire Magazine). Featuring 4 guest writers. Founding event for series which is now the Winnipeg International Writers' Festival, featuring more than 70 writers annually.
Literary Speaker Series, Brandon University. 2005-. Extensive literary speakers series featuring more than 20 Canadian and international writers per year. Budget:
Visiting Speakers Series, University of Windsor, 1997-2005. Extensive literary speakers series featuring more than 12 writers per year.
Writer-in-Residence program, University of Windsor, 1999-. I was instrumental in establishing this program, featuring professional writers in residence for 9 months through the Canada Council for the Arts Writer Residency program, and hosted the first four writers: Lillian Allen, Marilyn Dumont, Daphne Marlatt, and Mansel Robinson.
Visiting Speakers Series, Winnipeg. 1988-1995. Freelance coordinating of extensive literary speakers series in several venues, with various co-hosts, featuring a dozen writers per year.
Book reviews:
Rona Murray, ed. Threshhold. Journal of Canadian Poetry 15 (2001): 147.Marlene Goldman, Paths of Desire: Images of Exploration and Mapping in Canadian Women’s Writing. English Studies in Canada 26/1 (March 2000):107-113.
David Bergen. A Year of Lesser. Prairie Fire 17/4 (Winter 1997): 101-103.
Miriam Toews. Summer of My Amazing Luck. Journal of Mennonite Studies Spring 1977. Reprinted in Prairie Fire 18/2 (Summer 1997): 113-14.
Kristjana Gunnars. Exiles Among You. Tonja Gunvaldsen Klassen. Clay Birds. Elizabeth Phillips. Beyond My Keeping. Canadian Literature (Spring 1997).
Seymour Maine and B. Glen Rotchin, eds. Jerusalem: An Anthology of Jewish Canadian Poetry. Prairie Fire: Special Issue on Jewish-Canadian Writing 17/3 (Autumn 1996): 247-48.
Susan Stewart. Crimes of Writing. Canadian Folklore Canadien (1994): 202-205.
Dorothy Livesay. Awakenings. Community Arts (Winter 1992): 16-17.
Erin Moure. WSW (West South West). Books in Canada (January-February 1990): 42-43.
Des Walsh. Love and Savagery. Journal of Canadian Poetry 6 (for 1989): 135-36.
Jovette Marchessault. Like a Child of the Earth and Mother of the Grass. Books in Canada (June 1989): 23-25.
Daphne Marlatt. Ana Historic. Canadian Forum 68 (March 1989): 38-40.
Richard Harrison. Fathers Never Leave You. Contemporary Verse 2, 1989.
Sheila Watson, ed. The Collected Poems of Miriam Mandel. Longspoon and NeWest Press, 1984. Prairie Fire Magazine 7/3 (1986): 142-4.
Caroline Heath, ed. Double Bond: An Anthology of Prairie Women’s Fictions. Prairie Fire Magazine 7/3 (1986): 56-59.
Patrick Friesen. Unearthly Horses. Contemporary Verse 2, 8/3 (September 1984): 6.
Papers delivered to professional associations/invited addresses to professional organizations:
“Axing the frozen sea in us.” Keynote Address, URegina/USasakatchewan Graduate Students Conference, September 2007.
“School of Grass: Poetry, Eco-theory, Activism.” Guest Lecture, Environmental Studies Workshop Series, York University, September 2007.
“Myth, Fallacy and Media: Prairie Influence Across the Disciplines.” Panel presentation for Plug In Gallery, Winnipeg, moderated by Steve Matijcio, with Di Brandt, Floyd Favel Starr, Rosalie Favel and Rob Kovitz, as part of Scratching the Surface: The Post-Prairie Landscape, accompanying the exhibition.
“So this is the world & here I am in it.” Feature booksigning event, Canada Research Chair Council. Congress for the Social Sciences and Humanities. University of Saskatchewan, 2007.
“Engaging the Post-postmodern.” Keynote Address, Association for Studies of Literature and the Environment (ASLE). Spartanburg, South Carolina, June 2007.
“What is Resonance?” Poetry-Science Symposium, Brandon University, March 2007.
Guest Lectures to undergraduate classes in “What is the Meaning of Life?” and “Peace and Conflict Studies.” University of Waterloo. 2006.
“Post-petroleum Poemics.” National Ecopoetics Symposium, Brandon University, March 2006.
“Writing in Residence.” Feature Panel, for 30th Anniversary of the Writer in Residence Program, University of Alberta, February, 2006.
“Ecopoetic Approaches to the Present.” Quebec Writers Federation, Montreal, 2005.
“Working in the Dark: A Poet’s Journal.” Association for Studies of Literature and the Environment (ASLE). University of Oregon, Eugene, Oregon, 2005.
“What is Poetry For?” Interdisciplinary Panel, Department of Education, University of Windsor, 2004.
“Poetry and Music.” Mennonite Music Conference, University of Waterloo, 2004.
“je jelieda, je vechieda: Canadian Mennonite (Alter)Identifications.” Invited Address. Canada in the sign of Migration and Transculturalism. University of Graz, Austria.
“Poetry, Theory, Activism.” Panel with George Elliott Clarke, Roy Miki and Daphne Marlatt. First Graduate Colloquium, Joint Cultural Studies Ph.Program, University of Guelph and Wilfrid Laurier University, Elora, Ontario, 2002.
“Poetry and Music in Collaboration.” Panel Discussion with Rebecca Campbell and Carol Ann Weaver. University of Waterloo, 2002.
"Writing Jerusalem." Performance and Dialogue with Robert Hostetter, of Chicago. Mennonite Literary Conference, Goshen College, Indiana, October 2002.
"The Poet and the Wild City." Keynote Address, Mennonites and the City. Menno Simons University Annual Conference, University of Winnipeg, December 2001.
"Contexts of Canadian Literature." Centre for Canadian Studies, Karl Franzens Universität, Graz, Austria, 2001.
"Maternal Narrative in Canadian Literature." University of Maribor, Slovenia, 2001.
“Poetry for the New Millennium.” Symposium with Peter Stevens, Louise Halfe, Lillian Allen, Di Brandt, Marty Gervais, Anita Hurwitz, and Stephen Pender. Hosted Di Brandt, University of Windsor, 2000.
"Putting the Mother Back in the Language." Centre for Canadian and American Studies, University of Vienna, 1999.
"& then everything goes bee: a poet's journal." Centre for American Studies, University of Graz, 1999.
“& then everything goes bee: a poet’s journal.” For the Love of Nature? Interdisciplinary Conference on the Environment. Centre for Human Ecology, University of Edinburgh, Scotland, 1999.
“Censorship in the Arts.” Panel with Ross Paul and others. Windsor Arts Council, December 1998. By invitation.
“Revisiting Canadian Literary Feminisms.” Panel with Daphne Marlatt and Gail Scott, moderated by Barbara Godard. ACCUTE, University of Ottawa, May 1998. By invitation.
“This Land that I Love.” Writing the Prairie, University of Manitoba Interdisciplinary Conference, 1998.
“Putting the Mother back in the language.” Women & Texts & Communities. International Canadian Studies Conference for Women, Leeds University, Leeds, UK, 1997.
“Maria Campbell’s Revisionary Biogeography and Margaret Laurence’s The Diviners.” The International Conference on Diverse Cultures Interacting Within Monolingual and Multicultural Societies. Chiba University Canadian Studies Forum, Chiba, Japan, 1997. By invitation.
“Like Children of the Earth: Bio- and Geopolitics in Contemporary Canadian Writing.” Canada and the Nordic Countries in Times of Reorientation. Nordic Association for Canadian Studies, University of Aarhus, Denmark, August 1996. By invitation.
“Listening to Christine: Telepathy, Ambivalence and the Future in ‘The Pegnitz Junction.’” ACCUTE, University of St. Catherines, St. Catherines, Ontario, May 1996.
“Women’s Writes.” Manitoba Writers’ Guild Annual Conference: Fifteenth Anniversary Celebration, Winnipeg, September 1996. By invitation.
“Literary Panel.” With Shirley Cheechoo, Joan Clark, Elin Elgaard, Kristjana Gunnars, Smaro Kamboureli, Heather Spears and Michael Thorpe, moderated by Heidi von Born. Canada and the Nordic Countries in Times of Reorientation. Nordic Countries Canadian Studies Association Triennial Conference, University of Aarhus, Denmark, August 1996. By invitation.
“The Present State of Affairs in Canadian Literary Criticism.” With Smaro Kamboureli, Margery Fee, Lianne Moyes, moderated by Hans Hauge. Canada and the Nordic Countries in Times of Reorientation, Denmark, 1996. By invitation.
“Women Writing Home.” The Quiet in the Land? Women of Anabaptist Traditions in Historical Perspective Conference. Millersville University, Millersville, Pannsylvania, June 1995. By invitation.
“Fashion and Non-Fashion, Mennonite Style.” The Quiet in the Land? Conference, Millersville University, Millersville, Pennsylvania, June 1995. By invitation.
“Why We Keep On Doing It.” Keynote Address. Sage Hill Writing Experience, Saskatchewan, 1995.
“Art from Desire.” Winnipeg Art Gallery Series for Artists, 1995. By invitation.
“The Creator Mother’s Song.” Manitoba Writers Guild Annual Conference, Winnipeg, September 1995. By invitation.
“Symposium,” with Bonnie Burnard, Mark Vinz, Carol Bly, Lorna Crozier, Jay Meek, Ven Begamudre, moderated by Donald Benham. Beyond Borders: A Meeting of Writers from the Canadian Prairies and the American Midwest. Cosponsored by the University of Winnipeg and Red River Community College, Winnipeg, 1994.
“Wild Mother Dancing: Theory and Practice.” Alberta Writers’ Guild Annual Conference, Calgary, Alberta, October 1994. By invitation.
“Roadkill on the Super-E Highway.” Manitoba Library Association Conference, Winnipeg, May 1994. By invitation.
“Catching Each Other Off Guard.” MAWA (Manitoba Artists for Women’s Art), Ace Art Gallery, Winnipeg, June 1994. By invitation.
“Maternal Narrative.” English Faculty Colloquium, University of Winnipeg, 1992.
“Interrogating Language: The Writing Act.” St. John’s Literary Conference, University of Manitoba, 1992.
“The Uses of Poetry: Re-membering the Body.” ReVerse/Re:Vision: A Canadian Feminist Poetry Conference, sponsored by Contemporary Verse 2. Winnipeg, Manitoba, 1992.
“From Idea to Book.” Women’s Writing Institute, University of Alberta, October 1995. By invitation.
“The Poetics of Adolescent Desire and Lost Love.” M.A.T.E. luncheon address at S.A.G. (Special Area Groups of the Manitoba Teachers’ Society) Annual Convention, Winnipeg, September 1992. By invitation.
“Rethinking Gender Issues in the Teaching of Language Arts.” Creative Writing Seminar for High School Teachers of English. S.A.G. Winnipeg, September 1992. By invitation.
“Feminism and Writing.” Weyburn Writers’ Colony, April 1990. By invitation.
“Canadian Writing.” University of North Dakota Literary Conference, Grand Forks, North Dakota, 1991. By invitation.
“Listen to the Voice.” Keynote Address, Waterloo County High School English Awards Banquet, Waterloo, Ontario, 1990.
“’ The Green Word’: Earth Awareness in Prairie Writing.” University of Trier Guest Lecture, Trier, Germany, 1990.
“Dancing Naked: Narrative Strategies for Writing Across Centuries.” The Second Interdisciplinary Colloquium on Western Canada: Geography, Literature, Ethnicity. University of Trier, Trier, Germany, May 1989. 23-32. By invitation.
“Women and Landscape.” Manitoba Writers’ Guild Annual Conference, Winnipeg 1989. By invitation.
“Feminism and Local Writing.” St. John’s Literary Conference, University of Manitoba, March 1988.
Invited addresses to public gatherings/readings:
Reading Circle Discussion of Watermelon Syrup, by Annie Jacobsen with Di Brandt and Jane Finlay-Young (WLUP 2007). Wilfrid Laurier University Library, 2007.
Poems for Bees. Poetry Reading curated by Di Brandt for poets and fans of poetry and bees, at Brandon City Hall and the Manitoba Legislative Building, May 2007. Featured with photograph in the Manitoba Cooperator, the Brandon Sun and CBC National Radio.
Poetry reading. President’s Awards Dinner, Convocation, Brandon University, 2007.
“Poetry after September 11.” Newfoundland Writers’ Alliance, St. Johns, Nfld. 2001.
“Interspecies Collaboration.” De Leon White Gallery, Toronto, at the premiere of Aganetha Dyck’s collaborative installation, Working in the Dark, poetry by Di Brandt, honeycomb sculpture by honeybees.
"Multicultural Literary Contexts in Canadian Prairie Writing." Canadian Embassy, Tokyo, Japan, 1997.
"Aganetha Dyck's Waxworks: A Ten Year Retrospective." Slide lecture, Chapters Mantle Series, Toronto, 1999.
“And yet, and yet, sitting here with you.” Finders/Keepers: A Springtime Gathering of Women. London, Ontario, 1995.
Workshops given and taken:
Brandon Folk Festival Poetry Workshop, Summer 2007. 3 hours.
Playwriting workshop with Tomson Highway, Brandon University, 2007. 3 days.
ManLab Graphics Multimedia Poetry Workshop, Brandon University, 2007. 2 days.
Winnipeg Film Group, Basic Film-making Workshop, Winnipeg, 2006. 2 days.
Subtle Energy Awareness Workshop, with Walter Isaac, Brandon University, 2006. 2 days.
Poetry Workshop, Quebec Writers Federation, 2005.
Poetry Workshop, Goshen College, Indiana, March 2004. 1 day.
Poetry Workshop, Goshen College, Indiana, January 2003. One week.
“Visceral Playwriting.” Three month workshop with Linda Griffiths, Toronto, 2003.
Cats Have Nine Lives. Weekend Theatre workshop and staged reading of Di Brandt’s translation of play by Berlin playwright Jenny Erpenbeck. University of Windsor Drama Department, dir. Lionel Walsh. February 2003.
Cats Have Nine Lives. Weekend Theatre workshop and staged reading by Nightswimming Productions, dir. Brian Quirt and Naomi Campbell, Toronto, 2002.
Creative Writing Workshop, Newfoundland Writers' Alliance, St. Johns, Newfoundland, September 2001.
Ontario Artists in the Schools 2000.
S.A.G. (Special Area Groups, Winnipeg School Division #1) 1993.
Winnipeg School Division #1 Creative Writing Consultant & Writer-in-Residence 1993-94.
Manitoba Artists in the Schools 1998-95.
Writers in Electronic Residence (WIER) Writers’ Development Trust 1991-93.
READINGS AND PERFORMANCES:
Readings at major literary festivals in Canada:
2005. Winnipeg International Writers Festival: Brandon Event, with Stan Dragland.
2005. Winnipeg International Writers Festival Gala Opening Night. Commissioned poem.
2005. Vancouver Poetry Festival. 3 days.
2004. Griffin Poetry Prize Finalists, Toronto.
2004. The Scream Poetry Festival, Main Stage, Toronto.
2004. Art Bar, Toronto.
2004. Elora Literary Festival.
2004. Kingston Literary Festival, Jill Batson, host.
2004. Ontario Art Galleries Association Awards Event, Oakville, Ontario. Presenter of
Awards, and poetry reading.
2004. Toronto Book Expo. Reading and Television interview.
2004. Pat Lowther Award Finalists, League of Canadian Poets AGM, Montreal.
2004. Blue Mountain Literary Festival, Collingwood, Ontario.
Poetry College, Toronto.
2002. Prairie Fire Spring Festival, Winnipeg.
2001. Newfoundland Writers' Alliance AGM, St. John's, Newfoundland.
2001. Art Bar, Toronto.
2000. Winnipeg International Writers Festival, Winnipeg.
1999. Breakfast for Barbarians, Poetry Festival, Regina.
1997. Art Bar, Toronto.
1997. Live Lit, Hamilton.
1996. League of Canadian Poets Rites of Spring, Winnipeg.
1995. Sechelt Literary Festival, B.C.
1993. Eden Mills Literary Festival, Ontario.
1993. Milton Acorn Literary Festival, P.E.I.
1994. Alberta Writers’ Guild Conference, Calgary.
1995. Saskatchewan Writers’ Guild, Saskatoon.
1997, 1996, 1995. Sage Hill Writing Experience, Regina.
1991. Weyburn Writers Colony, Saskatchewan.
1990. Kingston School of Writing, Ontario.
Readings at international conferences and venues:
2006. Mennonite/s Writing. Bluffton College, Ohio.2007. Fundacion Valparaiso, Spain.
2005. Medellin International Poetry Festival, Medellin, Colombia, South America. 10 days.
Book launch, Now You Care. Goshen College, Goshen, Indiana.
Sounding in the Land. Mennonite Music-Literary Conference, University of Waterloo.
2002. Featured reader, International Mennonite Literary Conference, Goshen, Indiana.
2002. Wilfrid Laurier University/University of Guelph Joint Ph.D. Colloquium, Elora,
Ontario.
2001. Winnipeg International Writers' Festival.
Karl Franzens Universität, Graz, Austria.
2001. University of Maribor, Slovenia.
2000. Scottish Poetry Library, Edinburgh, Scotland.
2000. Bridgewater State College, Massachusetts.
1997. University of Chiba, Japan.
1997. Canadian Embassy, Tokyo, Japan.
Women and Texts and Communities International Canadian Studies Conference for
Women, University of Leeds, Leeds, England.
1997. Leeds Artists’ Guild, Leeds, England.
ACSUS (American Canadian Studies in the United States) Conference, University of
Minneapolis, Minnesota.
1997. Moorhead State University, Minnesota.
Triennial Conference of the Nordic Association for Canadian Studies, University of
Aarhus, Denmark.
The Quiet in the Land? Women of Anabaptist Traditions in Historical Perspective
Conference, University of Millersville University, Pennsylvania.
1991. University of Massachusetts, Amherst, Massachusetts.
1991. University of North Dakota Literary Conference.
1991. SUNY (Plattsburgh), New York.
1991. Bentley College, Boston.
1991. University of Vermont.
1991. Jerusalem Music Centre, Palestine.
1990. University of Trier, Germany.
1990. Fourth International Feminist Book Fair. Barcelona, Spain.
1990. The International Commonwealth Literatures Conference, Mannheim, Germany.
The Second Interdisciplinary Colloquium on Western Canada: Geography, Literature,
Ethnicity. University of Trier, Trier, Germany.
Readings at Canadian universities from 1987- present (average3 a year):
Simon Fraser, British Columbia, Victoria, Trent, Ottawa, Carleton, Concordia, Manitoba, Winnipeg, Saskatchewan, Regina, Calgary, Alberta (Edmonton), Toronto, York, McMaster, Wilfred Laurier, Waterloo, Queens, Western, New Brunswick, Guelph, Dalhousie, Capilano College (BC).
Readings at bookstores, libraries, art galleries, and other venues (average of 6 a year):
Including Vancouver, Victoria, Edmonton, Calgary, Saskatoon, Regina, Winnipeg, Altona (Manitoba), Carman (Manitoba), Toronto, Guelph, Peterborough, Hamilton, Waterloo, Kingston, London, Windsor, St. John’s, N.B.,St.Johns, Nfld., Dauphin (Manitoba), Fredericton, Ottawa, Charlottetown, Montreal, Halifax, Brandon.
POST SECONDARY EDUCATION:
University of Manitoba 1985-92. Ph.D. 1993 Canadian LiteratureCourses in The Canadian Novel (Robert Kroetsch), Milton, The Victorian Novel,
Contemporary Critical Theory, Canadian Contemporary Prose (Robert Kroetsch),
Readings in Feminist Theory, Women's Literature (Evelyn Hinz); Comprehensive
Examinations in Twentieth Century Literature (Pass with distinction) and Historical
Survey of Maternal Narrative; Dissertation: "Wild Mother Dancing: Maternal
Narrative in Contemporary Fiction in Canada and Quebec;" Supervisor David Arnason,
External Examiner Magdalene Redekop (University of Toronto)
University of Toronto 1975-76 M.A. 1976 Renaissance/Romantic Literature
Courses in Spenser and Sidney, The Romantic and the Sublime, Shakespeare, Principles
Of Literary Symbolism (Northrop Frye)
University of Manitoba 1973-75 B.A. (Hons.) 1975 English Honours
English Major, Religion Minor; Renaissance and Romantic Literature
Canadian Mennonite Bible College (Winnipeg) 1969-72 B.Th. 1972 Theology
University of Alberta 1996, 1998 -- Theatre
University of Manitoba 1980-81 Manitoba Teaching Certificate 1981
UNDERGRADUATE TEACHING EXPERIENCE:
Brandon University 2005-present (one or more sections):
30.353 Creative Writing: Poetry
30.367 ELUCIDATA: Multimedia Poetry Workshop
30.369 EnglishCanadian Poetry
30.498 Ecopoetic Post-postmodern Readings in Canadian Poetry
30.474 Seminar in Creative Writing (Thesis projects)
University of Windsor 1997-2005 (one or more sections):
26-104 Refiner’s Fire: Creative Process and Production
26-105 Creative Writing: Exploring the Genres
Workshop in Creative Writing
26-266 Modern and Contemporary Canadian Poetry
26-267 Modern and Contemporary Canadian Fiction
26-304 Topics in Creative Writing: Cross-Genre Writing
Topics in Creative Writing: Experiments in Drama
26-304 Topics in Creative Writing: Writing Windsor
26-361 The Canadian Experience: Contemporary Prairie Writing
The Canadian Experience: Contemporary Poetry & Poetics
The Canadian Experience: The Modernist Impulse in Canadian Women's Poetry
Canadian Poetry
Canadian Literature
Topic in Canadian Literature: Maternal Strategies in Contemporary Canadian Writing
University of Alberta 1995-97:
375.101 Critical Reading and Writing
University of Winnipeg 1986-95 (one or more sections):
17.3112-1 Advanced Creative Writing
17.3711-1 Canadian Literature
17.1100-1 Introduction to English Literature
17.1101-1 English 1: "Language and the Body in Poetry"
17.1101-1 English 1: "Reproductive Consciousness and Literary Texts"
17.1201-1 Twentieth Century Literature
17.1202-5 Twentieth Century Poetry and Drama
17.2921-1 Women’s Studies in Literature
17.3101-1 Advanced Composition for ESL Students (Malaysian Exchange)
Basic Composition (Stony Mountain Institute)
Life Skills (Stony Mountain Rockwood Institute)
W24081 Introduction to Creative Writing
S26055.001 Shakespeare for Seniors
University of Manitoba 1981-95 (one or more sections):
004.120 Representative Literary Works
156.153 Introduction to Women’s Studies
Professional Creative Writing Workshops 1985-95:
Professional Writing Workshops such as Sage Hill Writing Experience, Kingston School of Writing, Weyburn Writers' Colony, University of Alberta Women's Writing Institute, and others.
GRADUATE TEACHING EXPERIENCE:
Brandon University 2005- present:
30.479 Ecopoetic Post-postmodern Readings in Contemporary Canadian Poetry
University of Windsor 1997-present (one or more semesters):
26-590 Creative Writing: Prose and Poetry
26-456/562 Maternal Strategies in Contemporary Canadian Writing
26-570 Tutorial in Queer Theory and Canadian Literature
Karl Franzens Universitat, Graz, Austria 2001:
1 week Guest Lectureship in Canadian Studies
University of Maribor, Slovenia 2001:
1 week Guest Lectureship in Canadian Studies
University of Trier 1990:
Kanadistik: 3 week Guest Lectureship in Canadian Studies
University of Alberta 1995-97:
375. 478 Regional Literature of Canada: Prairie Literature
375. 532 Honours tutorial (Creative writing)
375. 532 Honours tutorial (Canadian Literature)
University of Winnipeg 1993-94:
Canadian Literature (Honours)
Manitoba Writers’ Guild Mentor Program 1990-95, 2007: 7
Professional 16 week ms. consultations with emerging writers
DISSERTATIONS SUPERVISED: 35
DISSERTATIONS CO-READ: 4
GRADUATE MAJOR PAPERS SUPERVISED: 80
THESES SUPERVISED: 1
EXTERNAL READER FOR DISSERTATIONS: 4
Ph.D. scholarly dissertation in English at the University of Waterloo 2001
MA scholarly dissertation in Comparative Literature at York University 2001
MA creative dissertations in Visual Arts at the University of Windsor 1999, 2000
PROFESSIONAL MEMBERSHIPS:
League of Canadian Poets 1987- .
The Writers’ Union of Canada 1987- .
P.E.N.1990- .
ACCUTE 1995-.
ASLE 2005-.
Manitoba Writers' Guild 1997- .
UNIVERSITY INVOLVEMENT:
Brandon University 2005-.
Chair, Aboriginal Literary Festival Committee, 2006-07. 30 Aboriginal Writers from Across Canada, to be held October 25-27, 2007.
Chair, BU Tenure Committee, 2006-07.
CRC English Rep, MA in Prairie Studies planning committee, 2005-07.
External Rep, Hiring Committee, Rural Development, BU, 2006-07.
English Rep, BU Academic Planning, 2005-06.
Chair, Literary Speakers Series committee, Faculty of Arts, 2005-. Extensive Literary Speakers Series.
Chair, National Ecopoetics Symposium Planning/Hosting Committee, 2005-2006.
Chair, Poetry-Science Symposium Planning/Hosting Committee, 2006-07.
University of Windsor 1997-present:
Women’s Caucus, Windsor University Faculty Association, 2004-2005.
Executive Council, WUFA, 2004-2005,
Hiring Committee 2000-2001. Hiring 5 full-time tenure-track positions and several Limited Term and sessional appointments.
Promotion, Tenure and Research Committee 2004, 2002.
Chair, Special Projects Committee 1998-2001.
Director of Creative Writing, 1999-2001.
Creative Writing Committee 1997-.
Library Committee 1997-98.
Multimedia Degree Program Planning Committee 1997-99.
Coordinator, Writer-in-Residence Program, 2000-2001.
Writer in Residence Committee, 2004-2005.
University of Winnipeg 1985-95:
Chair, English Visiting Lectures Committee, 1992-94.
Coordinator, Beyond Borders: A Meeting of Writers from the Canadian Prairies and the
American Midwest, co-sponsored by Red River Community College, 1993-94.
Chair, Creative Writing Degree Planning Committee 1992-93.
SERVICE TO THE PROFESSION:
Juries:
CBC Literary Prize, 2007. With Phil Hall and Sylvia Legris.
Saskatchewan Book Award, 2006.
Quebec Writers Federation A.M. Klein Poetry Prize, 2006.
The Writers' Union of Canada Short Fiction Contest 2002.
SSHRC Research Grant external reader, 2002.
SSHRC Publishing Grant external reader, 2001.
Chair, Ontario Graduate Scholarship Jury, 2000.
Contemporary Verse 2 National Poetry Contest, 2000.
Ontario Graduate Scholarship Jury, 1999.
Event Magazine Creative Nonfiction Contest, 1999.
Canada Council Governor General’s Award for Poetry, 1997.
Cranberry Tree Press Chapbook Award, 1998.
W.O. Mitchell Award, University of Windsor, 1998.
Homer F. Plante Creative Writing Awards, University of Windsor, 1998, 2004.
Reader for ACCUTE, 1996.
Reader for ACCUTE, 1995.
League of Canadian Poets National Poetry Contest, 1997.
Other Voices Poetry Contest, 1996.
Alberta Foundation for the Arts Best First Book Award, 1996.
Alberta Foundation for the Arts Writers Grants, 1995.
Regina Book Award, 1994.
Prairie Fire Magazine Long Poem Contest, 1994.
Manitoba John Hirsch Award, 1995.
Ottawa “Tree” Poetry Contest, 1993.
Manitoba Arts Council Writers Grants, 1990.
Manitoba Arts Council Writers Grants, 1989.
Manitoba Arts Council ArtsVentures Grants, 1988.
Advisory Boards:
Journal of Mennonite Studies, 1995- .
External Reader/Referee:
SSHRC Aid to Scholarly Publications Program, 2001, 2003, 2004.
University of Toronto Press, 2004.
University of Alberta Press, 1998, 2003.
Wilfred Laurier University Press,1997, 2001, 2005.
University of Manitoba Press, 1996.
Canadian Literary Studies 2004.
Mosaic Interdisciplinary Journal, 1997.
ACCUTE, 1995, 1996, 2004, 2006.
York University Tenure and Promotion Review for Susan Swan, May 1998.
Book blurbs for new books, 1987-. Average 2 a year.
Committees and Councils:
The Writers Union of Canada Floating Representative, 1995-96.
The Writers Union of Canada, Prairies/N.W.T. Regional Representative, 1994-95.
P.E.N. Manitoba Representative, 1992-94. Coordinator of Egypt watch.
League of Canadian Poets, Second Vice President, 1990-91.
Prairie Fire Magazine. Consultant and member of steering committee for special issue on “Mennonite writing,” 1989-90.
League of Canadian Poets, Manitoba Representative, 1988-90. Founding coordinator of first and second annual Rites of Spring benefit readings.
Manitoba Writers’ Guild. Planning committee for Common Ground conference, 1989.
League of Canadian Poets. Coordinator of annual feminist caucus panel on poetry, 1989, 1990.
SERVICE TO THE COMMUNITY:
Chair, Panel on Cross-Border Cultural Issues, Wayne State-University of Windsor Annual Cross-Border Symposium, 2000.Organizing readings and creative writing workshops at the Eclectic Café and The Book Room, Windsor, 1997-, and at many venues in Winnipeg, 1985-95.
Volunteer Work for Prairie Fire Magazine and the Manitoba Writers’ Guild. Planning confeences, Bingo fundraisers, etc. Winnipeg 1987-95.
Organizing Folk Art Exhibition for Mary Janzen 75th Birthday Party, Winnipeg 1997.
Parent volunteer, and artist-in-the-school volunteer, Montrose School, 1985-88.
Mothering two daughters, born 1976 and 1979. (Sole custody from 1988).
NON-ACADEMIC EMPLOYMENT:
Education Consultant, Manitoba Children’s Museum, 1985-86.
RESPONSES TO DI BRANDT'S WRITING (incomplete list):
Books and papers:
Zirker, Herbert. Selected Essays in English Literatures: British and Canadian. Jonathan Swift - John Fowles - Margaret Laurence - Margaret Atwood - Di Brandt & Dennis Cooley. Frankfurt: Peter Lang: Europaischer Verlag der Wissenschaften, Vol. 38, 2002.
Reimer, Douglas. Surplus at the Border: Mennonite Writing in Canada. Winnipeg: Turnstone Press, 2002.
“the sadness in this book is that I’m reaching for this story…” and “that questioning self.” Sounding Differences: Conversations with Seventeen Canadian Women Writers. With Janice Williamson. Toronto, Buffalo, London: University of Toronto Press, 1993. 29-53.
Butling, Pauline, and Susan Rudy (University of Calgary). Defining the Radical. Book about Canadian women writers and questions of community, Wilfrid Laurier UP, 2003.
Kasdorf, Julia. The Body and the Book: Writing From a Mennonite Life. New York: John Hopkins University, 2002.
Carriere, Marie. A Poetics of Ethics: Writing in the Feminine in English Canada and Quebec. University of Toronto Press, forthcoming 2002.
Carriere, Marie. A Poetics of Ethics. Ph.D. Dissertation, Comparative Literature, University of Toronto, supervised by Linda Hutcheon, 2000.
Verduyn, Christl. Paper on Dancing Naked: Narrative Strategies for Writing across Centuries. American for Canadian Studies in the United States AGM, University of Minneapolis 1997.
Tiessen, Hildi Froese. University of Waterloo. Book about Canadian Mennonite writers, forthcoming.
Williamson, Janice. University of Alberta. Book about Canadian Prairie Women Writers, including Di Brandt, forthcoming..
Jantzi, Kristine F.. “Kiss and Tell: When the Flesh Becomes Word: A Feminist Critique of the Poetry of Di Brandt.” Unpublished undergraduate dissertation, University of Waterloo, 1991.
Gressnich, Dorothy. “Cultural Aspects of Contemporary Canadian Prairie Poetry.” Unpublished graduate paper, University of Trier, 1989.
Interviews, profiles, features, articles:
Donna Nurse, “Land’s End: Di Brandt’s Poetry on the Edge.” Quill & Quire, June 3, 2004. Cover feature, photographs. 18-19.
Michael Posner, “Dallaire book takes Writers’ Trust Prize.” Globe and Mail, April 6, R3. Photograph.
Judy Stoffman, “Windsor Poet a nominee for two literary prizes,” Toronto Star, April 6, 2004.
Trillium Prize Shortlist Press Conference, Toronto Public Library, April 6, 2004.
Griffin Prize Shortlist Press Conference, Royal York Hotel, Toronto, April 6, 2004.
Morley Walker, “A great day for an ex-Winnipegger.” Winnipeg Free Press, April 7, D3.
W5 Radio Interview and poetry reading (Windsor). April 6, 2004.
Eleanor Wachtel, Griffin Poetry Prize feature, CBC Radio, June 3, 2004.
“Award-winning Author: Asking Questions.” FASS Forward, University of Windsor Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences Newsletter. Front page photograph. April 2004. 6.
Feature profile and photograph. The Lance (UWindsor Student Newspaper). May 2004. 2 pp.
Paul Vasey, Interview and poetry reading. CBC Radio (Windsor). May 2004.
Paul Vasey, Interview and poetry reading, CBC Radio (Windsor), February 2003.
Arts Report, CBC (National) Radio. Interview and poetry reading, February 2003.
CBC National Radio and Internet Headline. Wider Boundaries of Daring Conference, interviews with Di Brandt and Brian Trehearne, October 25, 2001.
Ted Shaw, "New page of history: Weekend conference set to hype Canadian women poets." Windsor Star, Thursday, October 25, 2001.
Christopher Menard, Interview, The Lance, October 2001.
Leo Driedger and Diane Driedger. "Finding Creative Identities: Mennonite Writers in Winnipeg." Canadian Ethnic Studies/Etudes ethniques au Canada, XXXII, no. 2, 2000. 75-94.
CBC Television local and national news item, featuring the reinstated University of Windsor Writer-in-residency, with profiles of inaugural Writer-in-Residence Lillian Allen and coordinator of the program, Di Brandt, with University of Windsor classroom shots of Lillian Allen giving a reading. October 2000.
Feature with photograph, "Top Ten Profs," Room Magazine, September 1997.
Liam Lacey. “Making words more manageable.” Feature article and photograph. The Globe and Mail, Thursday, October 25, 1990, C1.
Val Ross. “Rewards scant for Canada’s poets,” Feature, Governor General’s Award finalists, Globe and Mail, 1995, C10.
Gordon Morash. “Edmonton fares well again in Governor General’s race.” Edmonton Journal, Saturday, October 28, 1995. A3.
Marty Gervais. “Dazzling talent.” The Windsor Star, October 26, 1997. Photograph.
Val Ross. “Small-press books top GG shortlist.” Feature. Globe and Mail, Friday, October 27, 1995, A10.
“Canadian Authors’ Association Literary Awards.” Globe and Mail, June 6, 1996, C4.
Erin Patterson. “Six of the best: Interviews with the winners of the CAA Literary Awards.” Canadian Author 72/1 (Fall 1996): 8-14. Cover photograph.
“Is God a Woman?” Cover feature, Maclean’s, April 8, 1996. 46-51.
“Three Writers on Writing.” Prairie Fire 13/4 (Winter 1992-93): 37-45.
Julia Spicher Kasdorf “The Making of Canada’s ‘Mennonite’ Writers.” Festival Quarterly, Summer 1990, 14-16.
Paula Kelly. “Write On Course.” The Winnipeg Sun. Sunday, May 7, 1989, S4.
Marg Zavaros. “A look at the poetry of Mennonite Di Brandt.” Waterloo Chronicle. Wednesday, October 31, 1990. 19.
“Authors question future of Canada.” Dakota Student 1908/41 Friday, March 22, 1991.
Virginia Aulin. “Feminism and the quill. Review of Language in her Eye, ed. Libby Scheier, Sarah Sheard and Eleanor Wachtel.” Vancouver Sun. Feature photos of Margaret Atwood and Di Brandt. Saturday, January 12, 1991.
Julia Kasdorf. “The Making of Canada’s ‘Mennonite’ Writers.” Festival Quarterly (Summer 1990): 14-16. Photograph.
Harry Loewen. “Leaving Home: Canadian-Mennonite Literature in the 1980s.” Ethnic Forum 8 (1988): 94-105.
Colin Corneau. “A Poet of Contradictions.” Selkirk-Springfield Enterprise. Thursday, February 2, 1991, 2.
Maurice Mierau, “Rebel Mennos Move into the Arts.” Midcontinental 4/6 (1987-88): 18-23.
Mavis Reimer. Profile. Mennonite Mirror, Winter 1989.
Wilma Doerksen. Profile, The Mennonite Reporter. Spring 1989.
Tony Davis. “Winnipeg poet defends Manitoba Arts Council.” Winnipeg Free Press, November 15, 1989.
“Northern Exposure: Writers Talk Canada.” Grand Forks Herald, March 20, 1991.
Susan Rempel Letkemann. Interview, CMBC Alumni Bulletin. 1986.
Robert Enright. “Write speaking Mennonites (a symposium).” Border Crossings 5/4 (1980): 21-28.
Reviews of Now You Care:
Alison Calder. “Di Brandt collection an ironic commentary.” Winnipeg Free Press, April, 2003.
Barb Carey. “Laments for an Age Mired in Crisis. Now You Care. Toronto Star, May 2, 2004. D14.
George Elliott Clarke. “Powerful, lyrical voices of Bartlett and Brandt.” Halifax Herald. April 2004.
Sonnet L’Abbe. “Three out of the box.” Globe and Mail, Saturday, July 17. D12.
Rachel Zolf. “Well-Versed.” HERizons ( Winter 2004): 43.
Clarise Foster. “Consider yourself warned.” Globe and Mail Books center page, cover feature. Saturday, April 17. D14.
Marty Gervais. “Poet Paints Pictures that Aren’t so Pretty.” Now You Care. Windsor Star. Saturday, March 26 Cover feature. 2 photographs. March 27 F7 2004.
Michael Greens tein. Now You Care. Prairie Fire Magazine. April, 27, 2004. www.prairiefire.mb.ca/reviews
Zachariah Wells. “The Redress of Poetry Awards: New Plumes for the Griffin.” maissoneuve.org. May 17, 2004.
Chris Wiebe. “The Life of Di.” Vue Weekly . April 22, 2004.
Fraser Sutherland. “Wanted: Verse of Distinction.” Review of The Griffin Poetry Prize Anthology , ed. Phyllis Webb. Globe and Mail, Saturday, June 19. D14.
Jeff Gundy. “New Maps of the Territories: On Mennonite Writing.” Georgia Review LVII/4 (Winter): 870-887.
Stephanie Hart, Stephanie. Now You Care. Quills Canadian Poetry Magazine 1/2 (Spring 2004): 163-4.
Nathaniel Stark. Now You Care. Echomag 9/7 (November). www.echoweekly.com .
Leo and Diane Driedger. "Finding Creative Identities: Mennonite Writers in Winnipeg." Canadian Ethnic Studies/Etudes ethniques au Canada, XXXII, no. 2, 2000. 75-94.
Reviews of Dancing Naked:
Donna Nurse. Dancing Naked. Quill & Quire 63/1 (January 1997): 33. Photograph.
Margaet Loewen Reimer. Dancing Naked. Mennonite Reporter 27/7 (March 31, 1997): 8.
Diane Driedger. Dancing Naked. Prairie Fire Magazine 18/2 (Summer 1997): 135-136.
Reviews and previews of Jerusalem, beloved:
Paula E. Kirman. “Understanding heaven: Jerusalem and the terrible truth.” Cover feature. Prairie Books Now, Winter 1995, 9.
Jill Battson, Jerusalem, beloved. Quill & Quire 61/11 (November 1995): 38. * Starried review indicating special merit.
Linda Rosborough. “City poet moved by Israel.” Winnipeg Free Press, October 11, 1995. Photograph.
Charles Mandel. Feature profile of Governor General’s Award nominees in Alberta. The Edmonton Journal, November, 1996.
Mark Morton. Prairie Fire Magazine 16/4 (Winter 1995-96): 112-113.
Glen Downie. “Hearing Voices.” Event 25/2 (1996): 128-132.
Sherry Johnson. “Halls of Sion.” NeWest Review 21/4 (1996): 27-28.
Reviews of Wild Mother Dancing:
Sheryl Halpern. Review of Wild Mother Dancing. Books in Canada 23/4 (Spring 1994): 51-52.
Carol Beran. Wild Mother Dancing. American Review of Canadian Studies 24/3 (1994): 396-398.
Vivian Hansen. “Has matriarchy been ignored?” Calgary Herald, Saturday, September 10, 1994.
Christopher Bradshaw. “(M)others’ Voices. Review of Wild Mother Dancing.” Canadian Literature 146 (Fall 1995): 160-62.
Kevin Prokosh. “Author explores anguish caused by the missing mother figure.” Winnipeg Free Press, 1992.
Alison Mayes, “Notebook.” Profile, Whig-Standard Magazine, Kingston, Ontario, 25/6 (1988).
Kevin Prokosh, “The Write Stuff.” Winnipeg Free Press feature profile, Saturday, February 6, 1988, 21, 25.
Christy Carlson. Wild Mother Dancing. University of Toronto Quarterly 64/1 (Winter 1994): 190-194.
Catherine Hunter. Wild Mother Dancing. Prairie Fire Magazine 15/1 (Spring 1994): 144-147.
Heather Emberley. “Maternal Narrative missing in Canada.” Winnipeg Free Press, Sunday, January 23, 1994, D17.
Carol Morrell. “A Secret Tradition.” NeWest Review 20/1 (1994): 27-28. Photograph.
Wild Mother Dancing. Calgary Herald, September 10, 1994. A19.
Reviews and previews of mother, not mother:
Mark Young. mother, not mother. Scene Magazine, January 1993.
Kate Hodson. “Brandt’s poetry celebrates ‘pain, ecstasy’ of women.” Uniter (Winnipeg) 45/3, September 23, 1992, 11.
Maurice Mierau. mother, not mother. Prairie Fire Magazine (1992): 154-58.
Deborah Pearce. “Poet escapes cultural exile.” Times-Colonist (Victoria), March 1993.
Lynn Crosbie. mother, not mother. Canadian Woman Studies/les cahiers de la femme: Women Writing 14/1 (Fall 1993): 105-6.
Sujata Bhatt. mother, not mother. Malahat Review 102 (Spring 1993): 113-6.
Gary Boire. “Tranparencies: of sexual abuse, ambivalence, and resistance.” Essays in Canadian Literature 51/2 (1993/1994): 211-232.
P.J. Gerbrecht. “Generation.” Canadian Literature 141 (Summer 1994): 110-113.
Mark Frutkin. mother, not mother. Journal of Canadian Poetry 9 (1994): 16-19.
Reviews of Agnes in the sky:
Gary Boire, “Against Powerful Mal(e)dictions.” Essays in Canadian Writing 47 (Fall 1992): 124-34.
Stella Stocker, Agnes in the sky. orbis (September 1991): 114. (UK)
Rhea Tregebov. “The Healed Heart.” Books in Canada (November 1990): 42.
Bill Robertson. “Poet resides in often-desperate world.” Star-Phoenix, Saturday, August 24, 1991.
Stephen Scobie. Agnes in the sky. Malahat Review, 1991.
Beryle Williams. “Writing their hearts out with style and grace.” Minnesota Women’s Press, December 19, 1990-January 1, 1991. 5.
Laura McLaughlin. Agnes in the sky. Canadian Woman Studies/Les Cahiers de la Femme (1992), 118.
Ronald B. Hatch. Agnes in the sky.” University of Toronto Quarterly, 61/1 (Fall 1991).
Betsy Nuse. “Agnes in the sky.” Canadian Book Review Annual, 1990, 209.
Norm McCurdy. “Agnes in the sky flies high.” Uptown Magazine (Winnipeg), May 2-15, 1991, 7.
Birk Sproxton, “Geographies of Hurt.” Border Crossings 1991, 55.
Jill Mandrake. “Two Poets worth a read.” Kinesis (Dec/Jan 91): 23.
Kevin Prokosh, “Writer finds, explores freedom in her poetry.” Winnipeg Free Press, Monday December 24, 1990, p. 41.
Marke Andrewes. “Raging against a Christian childhood.” Vancouver Sun, Saturday October 27, 1990, D17.
Maurice Mierau. Agnes in the sky.” Prairie Fire Magazine 11/2 (1991): 215-16.
Thom Tammaro. Review of Agnes in the sky. North Dakota Quarterly 59/3 (1991): 234-7.
Patrick Lane. “Stretched Thin Like Parchment.” NeWest Review, June/July 1991, 32.
Pierre Neveu. Agnes in the sky. Spirale 124 (May 1993): 13. (in French)
Reviews of questions i asked my mother:
John Oughton. “New Voices, Old Ballads..” Books in Canada, March 1988.
Deanna Wiebe. questions i asked my mother. Manitoban 77/28 (February 26, 1990): 8-9.
Ralph Friesen. questions i asked my mother. Border Crossings 1988.
Nadine McInnis. questions i asked my mother. Journal of Canadian Poetry 4 (1989), 24-36.
E.F. Dyck, “The True Colours of Plain Speech.” Books in Canada 17:7 (1987-88): 18-23.
Victor Doerksen. “New Voices, New Issues in Mennonite Poetry.” Journal of Mennonite Studies 5, 1987.
E.F. Dyck. questions i asked my mother. Freelance. Saskatchewan Writers’ Guild, 1988.
Joan Ruvinsky. questions i asked my mother. Rubicon, Fall 1988.
Carolyn Enns. “Exile and Return.” CMBC Alumni Bulletin, 1988.
What is Resonance? A Poet's Perspective
Presented at the Brandon University Poetry-Science Symposium, March 17, 2007, hosted by Di Brandt, where six poets and six scientists and other experts spent a day in dialogue with each other on the topic, "What is Resonance?" The symposium featured poetry readings by the guest poets, including internationally renowned and award-winning Canadian poets Christian Bök, Laurie Block, Mari-Lou Rowley and Steven Smith, and a dazzling interdisciplinary multi-media exhibition/performance by the father-son art & science team extraordinaire, BU President Lou Visentin and his son Patrick Visentin, of Montreal. Scientists and other experts who took part in the dialogue included Jeff Williams, mathematical physicist, Bruno Tomberli, biophysicist, BU CRC Wendy Untereiner, botanist, and Glen Carruthers, musicologist.
In poetry, resonance is everything. Resonance is what turns a bunch of plain lumpy leaden words into shimmering webs of eloquence. Resonance is what makes the words of a poem acquire echoes, multiple meanings, auras, rippling out in every direction, in countless dimensions. Resonance is what makes it possible for us to string together ordinary linguistic currency about any random experience, could be about a nail, or a hailstorm, or extinct dinosaur, or engineering manual, or broken heart, or toothbrush, or hungry ghost, or half-remembered dream, or hot love, or thought of death, or about nothing! into a concentrated bundle of energy that vibrates so beautifully and eloquently that it becomes a shining hologram of everything: the World in a Grain of Sand, and Heaven in a Wild Flower, as William Blake famously put it. Resonance is what makes it possible for us to speak words that are private, and come out of the most isolated, lonely, misunderstood, trampled upon, shivering corners of our heart, and have them come out dancing, bowing, shining, and if they've been put together well enough, they can pierce right through the conventions and psychic armour and habits of mind by which people arm themselves to face the daily onslaughts of existence, stealing right into the very core of their being. Seduction, meditation, inspiration, love, entertainment, persuasion, rant, conquest, and surrender, all these effects can be enacted poetically at once, leading to extraordinary engagements of grief and wonder, breathtaking intimacies, deep psychic transformations, and the conception and creation of never before seen beautiful shining things, to use a resonant phrase of American writer Martin Prechtel's. As you can see, I don't buy W.H. Auden's oft quoted dictum that "poetry makes nothing happen." (But then I think he meant "happen" in its most utilitarian industrialist sense.) On the contrary, I believe, with William Blake, and perhaps with Auden too, that poetry is what makes everything happen. Poetry is the human species singing its heart's truth, poetry is reaching for the stars while rooting deep into the rotting earth. Poetry is the epitome of our planetary organism's spiritual restlessness, empathetic capacity, linguistic skill, imaginative drive, to go somewhere, do something, make something, say something, sing something, feel something, know something, bring forth something, that we haven't already known and done and seen and had before. Poetry is creativity at its most concentrated. In this way, the poet participates in the very creation of the evolutionary universe. The poet is, as Samuel Taylor Coleridge famously and heretically claimed, the great I AM: the poet is god, she participates in singing the world into being. And resonance is the magic ingredient that makes words and sounds and rhythms coalesce into poetry. Resonance is the spark that breathes life into the language. It is the quality that enables poetry to have psychic, spiritual, prophetic dimensions far beyond the words themselves, or the intent of the poet, or the cultural context in which it was formed. Resonance is what leads poets to make grand claims about having been touched by divinity, of having been visited by the gods.
But what is resonance exactly? And how do you know if you've got enough of it? If I feel physically as if the top of my head were taken off, then I know it is poetry, Emily Dickenson said. But how does it work? And how do you get it to be the poem? That's the thing: no one knows exactly! There's no recipe. You invite it in. You grovel and plead with the muse. You nod over the page, you forget what you were saying, and when you wake up you take all your scribbles apart and start all over again, inspired by the surreality of your recent dream. You read the words out loud to yourself. You inflict them on your best friend. You imitate the best poetic tricks of your most envied colleagues and mentors. You stumble home from the party after too many glasses of wine and discover that the moon has fallen into the pond. Every time you've just figured it out, you've finally come out of the woods where you've been fumbling your way through brambly bushes to the clear, every time you just get to the sunny field of resonance, look, there it is! lying around everywhere to be picked up in armfuls, every time you think aha! you've figured out how it all works, at last, well, just then it goes flat, it goes dead, and you have to start all over again, leaping off the cliff edge, into empty space, into nowhere, you have walk backwards again, all the way to the edge of your brain, to where your consciousness, your observing mind, blurs into dream, and hallucination, and fantasy, you have to let yourself sink down, down, down into your bloodstream, down into the very essence of the chromosomes of your coiled and trembling DNA, to that dark pungent rooted place where your desire begins, your breath, your fantasy, your pulse, to where you begin, and set about to create, to labour over the words and sounds and rhythms and images, to listen to the whispers in the air around you, the slight tremor in the chair you're sitting on, the slight wobble of the earth under you, and put all that into play, all over again, releasing the collected energy of all that into language, into the poem. There's no recipe, but there are certain identifiable formal ingredients. Rhythm. Repetition. Resemblance. Revision. Reverence. Romance. Poetry apparently functions by a logic of analogy, and alliteration, it comes at things obliquely, playfully, at a slant, and with love, tenderly, preferring dappledness to bright overhead light, preferring seduction and suggestion and circularity, or if that doesn't work, a couple of grand tsunamis will do! preferring a wild wandering intuitive logic filled with unpredictabilities and surprises and digressions, to rationalist methodical linear analysis.
The Toronto sound poet bp Nichol liked to talk about the ancient Hopi creation myth, in which the world has been created four times. Every time the whole ecosystem begins to flourish, it crashes apart and everything dies and the whole thing has to evolve all over again. The reason it crashes apart is because it operates on a very delicately calibrated system of harmonious sounds and rhythms, all making music together in a grand cosmic symphony, and every species on the planet is required to contribute to the general harmony by singing its particular species song. There's one species that keeps forgetting to sing its song - guess which one that is in the present incarnation - and this forgetting, this straying into less harmonious realms, into machine noise, for example, and highway traffic, and airplane roar, and automatic rifles going off, as is happening so overwhelmingly these days, throws the whole system out of whack, and everything gets destroyed and has to begin all over again. (Incidentally, the four world crashes remembered by the Hopi coincide precisely with the four world cataclysms identified by contemporary geologists, the last of which wiped out the dinosaurs, though smaller, hardier creatures such as honeybees and salamanders came through it just fine. It is a lesson, among other things, in the environmental truth that smaller is sometimes, often, smarter than bigger.) bp Nichol believed that poetry and song and dance are very specifically our human species song, and that it's really important for us to sing and dance and speak our species song over and over and over, in as many creative ways as we can, otherwise that crash will happen again, and perhaps all too soon. That puts an exalted onus on poets and poetry, and musicians and dancers and sound artists, and on the world that listens to them - or not: to make sounds that are aesthetically, emotionally, intellectually, spiritually inspiring, that is to say, challenging, a wake-up, and to consider these expressions culturally important: of profound political import.
I'm intrigued by contemporary string theory, which as I understand it proposes that matter is made up not of atoms or electrons or any kind of solid particles at all, but rather a little vibratory string of sound, of energy, of electricity. I'm interested in the fact that traditional Mayans similarly believe that matter is made of sound. I'm intrigued by the Lakota creation myth in which Grandmother Spider and her daughters Icstity and Nautsity sing the multiverse into being. I'm interested in the fact that geologists recently reported on CNN that they had noticed energetic vibrations emitted by large glaciers in Antarctica, which they recorded on a tape recorder and speeded up so the sounds could be heard by human ears, and they sounded like a gigantic beautiful symphony. I'm interested in the fact that a researcher recorded the song of whales in the Atlantic Ocean and the song of hummingbirds in the Central American jungle, and when he speeded up the song of the whales it sounded a lot like the hummingbirds' song, and when he slowed down the song of the hummingbirds it sounded a lot like the whales' song, enough so that he was able to attract whales to his boat in the ocean with the slowed down hummingbird songs, and hummingbirds to his post in the jungle with the speeded up whale songs - to his great astonishment and delight. I'm interested in the fact that plants apparently possess the ability to communicate with each other through bioelectrical impulses, and that they are sensitive to sound, discriminatingly so, responding differently to different kinds of music, flowering and bending towards the sounds of Mozart and Indian sitar music, and wilting and shrinking back from the Grateful Dead. I'm interested in the fact that salt crystals can be demonstrated to form differently in response to different kinds of musical vibrations, beautifully calibrated ones if the music is harmonious, jagged harsh ones if the music is jangled.
I'm interested in the fact that German researcher Hans Jenny found that different vowel sounds create different, recognizable patterns when their vibrations are sent electrically through sand. I'm interested in neurobiologists' claims that memory functions by resemblance, and by vibratory stimulus. I'm interested in Terence McKenna's notion that all living organisms, from the smallest cell to the largest animal, and all ecosystems, communicate with each other through resonance, through vibratory pulses, through sound. I'm interested in Julie Cruikshank's account of Inuit beliefs in the moral intelligence of glaciers, listening to the world around them and doling out appropriate glacial impact. I'm interested in British biologist Rupert Sheldrake's theory of "morphic fields" surrounding organisms linked to each other by species or by some other bond of caring, which enables instant nonlocal communication between them, wherever they may be located. I'm interested by the way love heightens the capacity for morphic resonance between dogs and their human owners, between mothers and babies, between lovers across a crowded room, between parents and their almost grown up daughter traveling in Central America and not calling home on her 21st birthday (as it turned out, not for reasons of catastrophe, but merely for geographical remoteness from a telephone in the jungle of Guatemala). I'm interested in the mysterious method by which homeopathy captures the essence, the resonance of various substances through distillation, and sets off a healing process in the human body through a logic of resemblances. I'm interested in musicologist Jocelyn Godwins speculation that the ancient trope of the Music of the Spheres might have a demonstrable physical and ecological, as well as spiritual, basis, as Johannes Kepler and George Gurdjieff, among other modern thinkers, have claimed. I'm interested in the fact that you can make poetry out of anything, including scientific jargon, and that such poetry undercuts the earnestness and analyticalness of science by adding playfulness and affiliation and feeling.
When I first asked myself this question, a few years ago, what exactly is resonance anyway, I had no idea that it would lead to everything, to the very fabric of how the multiverse is put together, how we humans are put together, the very essence of what poetry is made of, but so it now seems.