Anne Michaels(born 15 April 1958) is a Canadian poet and novelist whose work has been translated and published in over 45 countries. Her books have garnered dozens of international awards including theOrange Prize,theGuardian Fiction Prize,theLannan Award for Fictionand the Commonwealth Poetry Prize for the Americas. She is the recipient of honorary degrees, the Guggenheim Fellowship and many other honours. She has been shortlisted for theGovernor General's Award,theGriffin Poetry Prize,twice shortlisted for theGiller Prizeand twice long-listed for theInternational Dublin Literary Award.Michaels won a 2019Vine AwardforInfinite Gradation,her first volume of non-fiction. Michaels was thepoet laureateofToronto, Ontario,Canada from 2016 to 2019, and she is perhaps best known for her novelFugitive Pieces,which was adapted for the screen in 2007. Michaels won the 2024 Giller Prize for her novelHeld.[1]
Anne Michaels | |
|---|---|
 Michaels in 2013 | |
| Born | 15 April 1958 Toronto,Ontario, Canada |
| Alma mater | University of Toronto |
| Occupation(s) | novelist, poet |
| Years active | 1985–Present |
| Notable work | Fugitive Pieces,The Winter Vault,The Weight of Oranges,Miner's Pond,Skin Divers,Correspondences |
| Website | www |
Early life
editAnne Michaels was born inToronto,Ontario, in 1958. She attendedVaughan Road Academyand then later theUniversity of Toronto,where she is an adjunct faculty member in the Department of English.
Career
editWith her first two poetry collections,The Weight of OrangesandMiner's Pond,Michaels gained attention as a writer who balances technical precision with profound meditation and humanity.[2]The recipient of theCommonwealth Poetry Prizefor the Americas and the Canadian Authors' Association Award, and a finalist for both the Governor General's Award and the Trillium Award, Michaels secured her place among the finest Canadian poets early in her career.[3]
Following her early success with poetry, Michaels found herself "bumping up more frequently against its limits. [She] was pushing the form as far as [she] could in longer pieces, trying to make connections on a larger scale. [She] stretched poetry as far as it would go in terms of length." Her debut novel,Fugitive Pieces(1996), offered Michaels the opportunity to work more expansively with complicated questions related to history, identity, location, and grief: "a way of layering things; of having images and gestures that connect between page 100 and page 303. It [gave her] the chance to bring readers in slowly, via as many strands as [she could]."[4]
WithFugitive Pieces,Michaels lays the thematic foundation of her future works, exploring the relationship between history and memory, and how we, as a people, remember. She also launches her meditation on "what love makes us capable of, and incapable of," and the paradoxical understanding that "there is nothing a man will not do to another; nothing a man will not do for another." Confronting the horrors of war, violence, dislocation, and loss through her writing, Michaels "travels with the reader through terrain that is philosophically, morally and emotionally perilous" and refuses to publish unless she can "in some way deliver the reader and [herself] to the other side." She writes: "We don't need repeated proof of violence or horror - a single incident convinces us - but we do need proof, again and again, of the strength, the power, the reach, and the consequences of love."
Fugitive Pieces,the story of a holocaust survivor trying to find his way back into the world, went on to be critically acclaimed internationally, winning the Orange Prize for Fiction, the Guardian Fiction Prize, the Lannan Literary Award for Fiction, the Trillium Book Award, the Books in Canada First Novel Award, the City of Toronto Book Award, the Heritage Toronto Award of Merit, the Martin and Beatrice Fischer Award, the Harold Ribalow Award, the Giuseppe Acerbi Literary Award and the Jewish Quarterly-Wingate Prize.
While working on her second novel,The Winter Vault,Michaels releasedSkin Divers,her third poetry collection and the last of three volumes, beginning withThe Weight of OrangesandMiner's Pond.All three were intended to speak to one another, and were later published inPoems(2000).Notable for her poetic style, both in her poetry and prose, Michaels writes that "[poetry is] such a good discipline for a novelist: it makes you aware that even if you have four or five hundred pages to play with, you mustn't waste a single word."[4]
During this period, Michaels also began writing for the stage. A collaboration withJohn Bergerled to the development ofVanishing Points(2005), a profound meditation on railways, love and loss, directed by Simon McBurney, produced byCompliciteand presented in the historicGerman Gymnasiumin King's Cross.[5]This work was later published asRailtracks(2011). She also contributed the libretto to Canadian composer Omar Daniel'sThe Passion of Lavinia Andronicus(2005), offering a new dimension to the tragic figure at the centre of one of Shakespeare's most harrowing plays in a performance by the Hilliard Ensemble and Tafelmusik Chamber Choir.[6]
Michaels would not publishThe Winter Vaultuntil 2009, thirteen years following the release ofFugitive Pieceswhich, likewise, took nearly a decade to write. LikeFugitive Pieces,her second novel considers deeply the "complicated relationship between huge historic events and intimate, domestic events; the relationship between historical grief and personal grief; how we remember privately, and how we remember - and memorialize – publicly, collectively. Each community, each nation, faces this question and answers it in its own way, according to its own needs."
Connecting three historic events - the dismantling and reconstruction of Egypt's Abu Simbel Temple; the building of the St. Lawrence Seaway in Canada and the drowning of towns, villages and graves; and the rebuilding of Warsaw after World War II - the novel considers whether a temple, taken apart stone by stone and rebuilt, is the same temple; a river barraged, the same river; a city reconstructed, the same city; and whether the heart can be repaired and rebuilt after a profound personal loss.The Winter Vaultwent on to garner international praise and was a finalist for the Scotiabank Giller Prize, the Trillium Book Award and the Commonwealth Prize, and was also long-listed for the International Dublin Literary Award.
In 2011, Michaels contributed to theBush Theatre's 24-hour performance ofSixty-Six Booksto mark the 400th anniversary of theKing James Bible,providing 66 playwrights, poets, songwriters, and novelists - of all faiths and none, from over a dozen countries and across five continents - the opportunity to respond to some of the oldest stories ever told.[7]Her contribution, "The Crossing," was later anthologized inSixty-Six Books: 21st Century Writers Speak to the King James Bible(2011).An extract from "The Crossing" was also performed atWestminster Abbey's King James Bible Service for Her MajestyThe Queen,His Royal HighnessThe Duke of Edinburghand His Royal HighnessThe Prince of Wales.[8]
Michaels returned to poetry with the release of her book-length poem,Correspondences(2013), an historic and personal elegy in an accordion-style format that can be read frontwards or backwards. A collaboration with artist Bernice Eisenstein,Correspondencesalternates poetry with haunting portraits of the 20th century writers and thinkers to whom Michaels' pays tribute. The work went on to receive the Helen and Stan Vine Book Award and was shortlisted for the Griffin Poetry Prize.[9]
In October 2015, Michaels began her tenure as thepoet laureateof Toronto, succeedingGeorge Elliott Clarke.[10]Her personal mandate is to provide a platform for Toronto's many tongues: "How do we make a space for all these literatures that have come to us in such tremendous largesse, such tremendous richness? We need Torontonians to bring their cultures, bring their poets to us, so we have access to that huge international library."[11]2015 also saw the release of Michaels' first children's book,The Adventures of Miss Petitfour,with its follow-up,The Further Adventures of Miss Petitfour,being released in 2022.
In 2017, a new collection of poetry,All We Saw,and a new work of non-fiction,Infinite Gradation(with afterword by poet Gareth Evans) were published. Both books were shortlisted for the 2019Vine Awards for Canadian Jewish Literaturein the Poetry and Non-Fiction categories respectively.[12]Infinite Gradationwon the Non-Fiction prize.[13]
Michaels published her third novel,Held,in November 2023. It was shortlisted for the 2024Booker Prize,[14]and won the 2024Giller Prize.[15]
In 2023, she was elected as aRoyal Society of LiteratureInternational Writer[16]
Publications
editPoetry collections
edit| Year | Title | Awards | Result |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1986 | The Weight of Oranges | Commonwealth Poetry Prize for the Americas | Winner |
| 1991 | Miner's Pond | Canadian Authors' Association Award | Winner |
| Governor General's Award | Finalist | ||
| Trillium Award | Finalist | ||
| 1999 | Skin Divers | ||
| 2000 | Poems | ||
| 2011 | Railtracks | ||
| 2013 | Correspondences | Helen and Stan Vine Book Award | Winner |
| Griffin Poetry Prize | Shortlist | ||
| 2017 | All We Saw |
Novels
edit| Year | Title | Awards | Result |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1996 | Fugitive Pieces | Orange Prize for Fiction | Winner |
| Guardian Fiction Prize | Winner | ||
| Lannan Literary Award for Fiction | Winner | ||
| 15th Anniversary Orange Prize Youth Panel Award | Winner | ||
| Trillium Book Award | Winner | ||
| Books in Canada First Novel Award | Winner | ||
| City of Toronto Book Award | Winner | ||
| Heritage Toronto Award of Merit | Winner | ||
| Martin and Beatrice Fischer Award | Winner | ||
| Harold Ribalow Award | Winner | ||
| Giuseppe Acerbi Literary Award | Winner | ||
| Jewish Quarterly-Wingate Prize | Winner | ||
| Scotiabank Giller Prize | Shortlist | ||
| International Dublin Literary Award | Longlist | ||
| Canadian Booksellers Association Author of the Year Award | Finalist | ||
| 2009 | The Winter Vault | Scotiabank Giller Prize | Shortlist |
| Trillium Book Award | Finalist | ||
| Commonwealth Writers' Prize | Finalist | ||
| International IMPAC Dublin Literary Award | Longlist | ||
| 2023 | Held | Booker Prize | Shortlist |
| Giller Prize | Winner | ||
| Prix Transfuge du meilleur roman anglo-saxon | Winner |
Other selected works
edit- The Passion of Lavinia Andronicus(2005)
- Vanishing Points(2005)
- Sixty-Six Books(2011)
- Sea of Lanterns(2012)
- The Adventures of Miss Petitfour(2015)
- Infinite Gradation(2017)
- The Further Adventures of Miss Petitfour (2022)
Adaptations
editFugitive Pieceswas directed and adapted for the screen byJeremy Podeswa,scored by Nikos Kypourgos, and selected to open the 2007Toronto International Film Festival.Michaels' debut novel was also adapted into a radio drama forBBC Radio 3.[17]
Skin Diverswas adapted in 2009 for theNational Ballet of Canadaby Dominique Dumais with music byGavin Bryars.Incorporating spoken word and visual projections,Skin Diversexplores "the body as a living archive of experience, or a museum of memory."[18]
References
edit- ^"Anne Michaels wins the $100K Giller Prize for novel Held".
- ^The Kingston Whig-Standard Review ofMiner's Pond
- ^Vancouver Sun Review ofMiner's Pond
- ^abCrown, Sarah (2009-05-01)."Anne Michaels, fugitive author".The Guardian.ISSN0261-3077.Retrieved2017-01-28.
- ^Complicite."Complicite - Vanishing Points".www.complicite.org.Retrieved2017-01-30.
- ^"Soundmakers - The Passion of Lavinia Andronicus by Omar Daniel".www.soundmakers.ca.Archived fromthe originalon 2017-02-02.Retrieved2017-01-30.
- ^"Sixty-Six Books".www.bushtheatre.co.uk.Retrieved2017-01-30.
- ^"Westminster Abbey Official Press Release".
- ^"Griffin Poetry Prize | Anne Michaels".Griffin Poetry Prize.Retrieved2017-01-30.
- ^"Anne Michaels is Toronto's new poet laureate".Toronto Star,October 14, 2015.
- ^Rider, David (14 October 2015)."New poet laureate Anne Michaels will focus on Toronto's many tongues | Toronto Star".thestar.com.Retrieved2017-01-30.
- ^"Toronto poet Anne Michaels nominated for two 2019 Vine Awards".Toronto Star.September 27, 2019.
- ^Balser, Erin (October 23, 2019)."Anne Michaels among winners for $10K Vine Awards for Jewish Canadian literature".CBC Books.
- ^Creamer, Ella (2024-07-30)."Three British novelists make Booker 2024 longlist among 'cohort of global voices'".The Guardian.Retrieved2024-07-30.
- ^Brad Wheeler,"Anne Michaels wins the 2024 Giller Prize for her generations-spanning novel Held".The Globe and Mail,November 18, 2024.
- ^"RSL International Writers | 2023 International Writers".Royal Society of Literature. 3 September 2023.Retrieved3 December2023.
- ^Fugitive Pieces Pt. 1,retrieved2017-01-30
- ^"National Ballet of Canada - Skin Divers Programme".
