Vintage 94: League of Canadian Poets

Bert Almon is a professor of English at the University of Alberta and
the author of Calling Texas and Earth Prime.

Vintage 94 presents the prize winners and runners-up in the League of
Canadian Poets’ annual poetry contest. The anthology offers a good
snapshot of mainstream poetry in Canada at the present. The experimental
edge is not included: for example, there’s no sign of the
“Language” poets who flourish in Vancouver and Calgary. Sandra
Nicholls praises Tim Bowling’s first-prize winner “Snowy Owl After
Midnight” in her introduction, saying that it resonated in the minds
of the judges for weeks; it will likely have the same effect on readers.
The rest of the book, as might be expected, includes well-known and
unknown poets. The anonymous judging has ensured that no one would be
included merely for name appeal. Among the better-known poets are John
Barton, Colin Morton, Joan Crate, John Pass, Cornelia Hoogland, Patricia
Young, and Paulette Dubé. Judging from this collection alone, a reader
would conclude that contemporary Canadian poetry shows plenty of
competence but—except for Bowling’s work—relatively little
excitement.