The Dyzgraphxst

Ebook
On sale Mar 24, 2020 | 112 Pages | 9780771048616

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Windham-Campbell Prize, Winner
OCM Bocas Prize for Caribbean Literature, Winner
OCM Bocas Prize for Caribbean Literature Poetry, Winner
Griffin Poetry Prize, Winner
Derek Walcott Prize for Poetry, Winner 
Rebel Women Lit Caribbean Readers' Awards, Finalist
Governor General's Literary Award for Poetry, Finalist
Trillium Book Award for Poetry, Finalist
Raymond Souster Award, Longlist
Pat Lowther Memorial Award, Longlist
Quill & Quire 2020 Books of the Year: Editor’s Picks
CBC Best Canadian Poetry of 2020
Winnipeg Free Press Top 10 Poetry Picks of 2020
The Paris Review, Contributor's Edition, Best Books of 2020
 


The Dyzgraphxst presents seven inquiries into selfhood through the perennial figure Jejune. Polyvocal in register, the book moves to mine meanings of kinship through the wide and intimate reach of language across geographies and generations. Against the contemporary backdrop of intensified capitalist fascism, toxic nationalism, and climate disaster, the figure Jejune asks, how have I come to make home out of unrecognizability. Marked by and through diasporic life, Jejune declares, I was not myself. I am not myself. My self resembles something having nothing to do with me.
in an infinite series where we approach each oth’r
Jejune, forked in some road that might have
cropped up anyhow to cross us barely ready

or were we unaware that we had cracked I
to save us, split us three ways
as the centuries that made us possible left us

with all possible comprises, we have this one
existence, this so many elsewheres, in others,
I, and in every elsewhere, us both

and so you have arrived, Jejune, and so I
in a million pictures of our face, and still
I was not myself, i am not myself, myself

resembles something having nothing to do
with me and the idea that I would like
a holiday, a whole lifetime from this bend
© Rachel Eliza Griffiths
CANISIA LUBRIN’s books include Voodoo Hypothesis and The Dyzgraphxst. Lubrin’s work has been recognized with the Griffin Poetry Prize, the OCM Bocas Prize for Caribbean Literature, the OCM Bocas Prize for Poetry, the Derek Walcott Prize for Poetry, the Writer’s Trust of Canada Rising Stars prize, and others. Also a finalist for the Trillium Book Award for Poetry and the Governor General's Literary Award, Lubrin has held fellowships at the Banff Centre, Civitella Ranieri in Italy, Simon Fraser University, Literature Colloquium Berlin, Queen’s University, and Victoria College at the University of Toronto. She studied at York University and the University of Guelph, where she now coordinates the Creative Writing MFA in the School of English & Theatre Studies. In 2021, Lubrin received a Windham-Campbell Prize for poetry, and the Globe and Mail named her Poet of the Year. Code Noir: Metamorphoses is her debut fiction, and includes stories listed for the Journey Prize (2019, 2020), Toronto Book Award (2018) and the Shirley Jackson Award (2021). Born in St. Lucia, Lubrin now lives in Whitby, Ontario, and is the poetry editor at McClelland & Stewart. View titles by Canisia Lubrin

About

Windham-Campbell Prize, Winner
OCM Bocas Prize for Caribbean Literature, Winner
OCM Bocas Prize for Caribbean Literature Poetry, Winner
Griffin Poetry Prize, Winner
Derek Walcott Prize for Poetry, Winner 
Rebel Women Lit Caribbean Readers' Awards, Finalist
Governor General's Literary Award for Poetry, Finalist
Trillium Book Award for Poetry, Finalist
Raymond Souster Award, Longlist
Pat Lowther Memorial Award, Longlist
Quill & Quire 2020 Books of the Year: Editor’s Picks
CBC Best Canadian Poetry of 2020
Winnipeg Free Press Top 10 Poetry Picks of 2020
The Paris Review, Contributor's Edition, Best Books of 2020
 


The Dyzgraphxst presents seven inquiries into selfhood through the perennial figure Jejune. Polyvocal in register, the book moves to mine meanings of kinship through the wide and intimate reach of language across geographies and generations. Against the contemporary backdrop of intensified capitalist fascism, toxic nationalism, and climate disaster, the figure Jejune asks, how have I come to make home out of unrecognizability. Marked by and through diasporic life, Jejune declares, I was not myself. I am not myself. My self resembles something having nothing to do with me.

Excerpt

in an infinite series where we approach each oth’r
Jejune, forked in some road that might have
cropped up anyhow to cross us barely ready

or were we unaware that we had cracked I
to save us, split us three ways
as the centuries that made us possible left us

with all possible comprises, we have this one
existence, this so many elsewheres, in others,
I, and in every elsewhere, us both

and so you have arrived, Jejune, and so I
in a million pictures of our face, and still
I was not myself, i am not myself, myself

resembles something having nothing to do
with me and the idea that I would like
a holiday, a whole lifetime from this bend

Author

© Rachel Eliza Griffiths
CANISIA LUBRIN’s books include Voodoo Hypothesis and The Dyzgraphxst. Lubrin’s work has been recognized with the Griffin Poetry Prize, the OCM Bocas Prize for Caribbean Literature, the OCM Bocas Prize for Poetry, the Derek Walcott Prize for Poetry, the Writer’s Trust of Canada Rising Stars prize, and others. Also a finalist for the Trillium Book Award for Poetry and the Governor General's Literary Award, Lubrin has held fellowships at the Banff Centre, Civitella Ranieri in Italy, Simon Fraser University, Literature Colloquium Berlin, Queen’s University, and Victoria College at the University of Toronto. She studied at York University and the University of Guelph, where she now coordinates the Creative Writing MFA in the School of English & Theatre Studies. In 2021, Lubrin received a Windham-Campbell Prize for poetry, and the Globe and Mail named her Poet of the Year. Code Noir: Metamorphoses is her debut fiction, and includes stories listed for the Journey Prize (2019, 2020), Toronto Book Award (2018) and the Shirley Jackson Award (2021). Born in St. Lucia, Lubrin now lives in Whitby, Ontario, and is the poetry editor at McClelland & Stewart. View titles by Canisia Lubrin