Language Matters: Interviews with 22 Quebec Poets

Is writing in English in Quebec these days a political act? An act of survival? An act of defiance? An act of futility? An act of celebration? In this book, some of the best and most innovative English-language poets of Canada -- rising stars and award-winning authors -- reflect on questions of politics and poetics. What's it like to be a minority within a minority, to write in the dominant language of North America -- English -- in a province where official " language police" patrol the highways and byways looking for missing accents, illegal apostrophes and on/off switches in the wrong language? A place where (sign) size matters and people have to mind their P's and Q's when greeting strangers in their "langue seconde."

Those interviewed include Erin Moure and Stephanie Bolster (winners, Governor General's Award); GG nominee David McGimpsey; Trillium Prize nominee Mary di Michele; Susan Gillis and Gabe Foreman (winners, A.M. Klein Poetry Prize), Carolyn Marie Souaid and Endre Farkas (winners, Zebra International Poetry Film Festival, Berlin); performance poets Catherine Kidd, Moe Clark and kaie kellough; and Rhodes scholar Mark Abley -- all contemplating the work they do against the backdrop of this interesting place and time.