{"title":"Al Purdy","description":"\u003cp\u003eDiscover the evocative poetry of Al Purdy, a distinctly Canadian voice. Explore themes of landscape, identity, and the human condition in his raw and honest verses. Start your poetic journey here.\u003c\/p\u003e","products":[{"product_id":"sing-for-the-inner-ear-book-al-purdy-9781884206047","title":"Sing for the Inner Ear","description":null,"brand":"WoB","offers":[{"title":"GB \/ VERY_GOOD \/ INTERNAL","offer_id":49530300334353,"sku":"GOR013420279","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0784\/4072\/6801\/files\/1884206042.jpg?v=1751379669"},{"product_id":"starting-from-ameliasburgh-book-al-purdy-9781550171273","title":"Starting from Ameliasburgh","description":"During the years Al Purdy was becoming one of Canada's best-loved poets, he also wrote and published many pages of distinctive prose. This selection of almost forty years of essays and anecdotes is vintage Purdy. Part I, \u003ci\u003eNo Other Country\u003c\/i\u003e, consists of essays on seeing the world as a Canadian. It begins as a fascinating travel diary as Purdy takes the reader riding the rails through the Depression-era West, continues to Labrador to search for two lost Inuit hunters, and covers an astonishing variety of points between. Part II, \u003ci\u003eThe Writing Life\u003c\/i\u003e, offers distinctive personal takes on the work of Charles Bukowski, Margaret Atwood, Irving Layton, Peter Trower, Bliss Carman and Rudyard Kipling, as well as touching personal memoirs of friends such as Milton Acorn, Malcolm Lowry and Earle Birney. Part III reviews poets from from Raymond Souster to bill bissett, and ends with a tribute to Russian poet Anna Akhmatova. Even in Purdy's sidetrips to the Galapagos Islands and the former Soviet Union, the spirit that permeates \u003ci\u003eStarting from Ameliasburgh\u003c\/i\u003e is passionately Canadian. \"There is a tireless runner in my blood,\" Purdy writes, \"that encircles the borderlands of Canada through the night hours, and sleeps when day arrives. Then my mind awakes and the race continues... This is what I was and what I became...The map of my country, the carography of myself.\"\u003cbr\u003e \u003cbr\u003e \u003cbr\u003e \u003cbr\u003e Whether describing Newfoundland fishermen cod-jigging for the body of a comrade killed by a whale, or Milton Acorn \"ranting untranslatable PEI lobster jargon,\" or Roderick Haig-Brown \"writing his first book longhand in school scribblers, while devil's club thorns pop out of his arms and shoulders,\" Purdy's prose crackles with the vitality of a mind that is never at rest.","brand":"WoB","offers":[{"title":"US \/ GOOD \/ SBYB","offer_id":49810323505425,"sku":"CIN1550171275G","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false},{"title":"US \/ NEW \/ INGRAM","offer_id":51036989587729,"sku":"NIN9781550171273","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false},{"title":"GB \/ NEW \/ INGRAM","offer_id":52680276738321,"sku":"NLS9781550171273","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0784\/4072\/6801\/files\/1550171275.jpg?v=1751244151"},{"product_id":"poems-for-all-the-annettes-book-al-purdy-9781770892606","title":"Poems for All the Annettes","description":"Originally published by Contact Press in 1962, then later by House of Anansi in 1967, and again in a revised, expanded edition in 1972, Poems for All the Annettes stands as one of the essential documents of the great Al Purdy’s career. So many beloved poems are here—\"At Roblin Lake,\" \"At the Quinte Hotel\"—but also so many undiscovered gems and treasures. It is at once the perfect introduction to this remarkable poet’s work and a collection rich and deep enough to satisfy even the experienced Purdy fan. This edition reproduces the final, expanded text of the 1972 edition, and features a brilliant new introduction by poet and novelist Steven Heighton, who knew Purdy well.","brand":"WoB","offers":[{"title":"US \/ GOOD \/ SBYB","offer_id":50097381998865,"sku":"CIN1770892605G","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false},{"title":"GB \/ NEW \/ INGRAM","offer_id":52820281950481,"sku":"NLS9781770892606","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0784\/4072\/6801\/files\/1770892605.jpg?v=1750765884"},{"product_id":"rooms-for-rent-in-the-outer-planets-book-al-purdy-9781550171488","title":"Rooms for Rent in the Outer Planets","description":"A selection of poems by the man described by the \u003ci\u003eGlobe \u0026amp; Mail\u003c\/i\u003e as \"the greatest of our poets.\" \u003ci\u003eRooms for Rent in the Outer Planets\u003c\/i\u003e includes three decades' worth of thought-provoking work, including poems from the Governor-General's Award-winning \u003ci\u003eThe Cariboo Horses\u003c\/i\u003e to \u003ci\u003eNaked with Summer in Your Mouth.\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e \u003cbr\u003e \u003cbr\u003e \u003cbr\u003e Purdy personally made this selection, assisted by Sam Solecki, the editor of \u003ci\u003eStarting from Ameliasburgh: The Collected Prose of Al Purdy\u003c\/i\u003e. In these poems, Purdy ponders the remains of a Native village; encounters Fidel Castro in Revolutionary Square; curses a noisy cellmate in the drunk tank; and marvels at the \"combination of ballet and murder\" known as hockey, all in the author's inimitable man-on-the-street style.\u003cbr\u003e \u003cbr\u003e \u003cbr\u003e \u003cbr\u003e \u003ci\u003eRooms for Rent in the Outer Planets\u003c\/i\u003e is destined to become the standard Purdy poetry volume for many years to come.","brand":"WoB","offers":[{"title":"GB \/ VERY_GOOD \/ INTERNAL","offer_id":50429132800273,"sku":"GOR006650593","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false},{"title":"US \/ GOOD \/ SBYB","offer_id":50625624768785,"sku":"CIN1550171488G","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false},{"title":"US \/ NEW \/ INGRAM","offer_id":51037414785297,"sku":"NIN9781550171488","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false},{"title":"US \/ VERY_GOOD \/ SBYB","offer_id":51334415909137,"sku":"CIN1550171488VG","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false},{"title":"GB \/ NEW \/ INGRAM","offer_id":52681510682897,"sku":"NLS9781550171488","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0784\/4072\/6801\/files\/1550171488.jpg?v=1750719054"},{"product_id":"more-easily-kept-illusions-book-al-purdy-9780889204904","title":"The More Easily Kept Illusions","description":"Much-loved, cantankerous, and brilliant, Al Purdy galloped across the Canadian literary landscape for decades, grandly embodying the self-taught and hard-living image of the 1960s and '70s poet. The More Easily Kept Illusions: The Poetry of Al Purdy is a selection of thirty-five poems that includes some of his best-loved and unearths lost and ignored treasures.     Robert Budde introduces the collection with an overview of Purdy's tumultuous life of letters, his legendary personality, his outrageous antics, his peers, his influences, and the history of his publishing career. Reorganizing Purdy's body of work, this collection also re-interprets the chronological and thematic development of his writing. Choosing poems for a book like this is necessarily an act of literary criticism and Budde takes care to balance the various critical attentions that have structured the historical responses to Purdy's work. The selected poems will mix lesser-known gems with Purdy's greatest hits. Teachers, poetry-lovers, students, and writers will rediscover Purdy's unique voice. Those who are new to his work will get a full and rich sense of the man some have called the last Canadian poet.     Also includes an Afterword by Russell Morton Brown.","brand":"WoB","offers":[{"title":"GB \/ NEW \/ GARDNERS","offer_id":50630869254417,"sku":"NGR9780889204904","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false},{"title":"US \/ NEW \/ INGRAM","offer_id":51009500512529,"sku":"NIN9780889204904","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true},{"title":"GB \/ NEW \/ INGRAM","offer_id":52327472857361,"sku":"NLS9780889204904","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0784\/4072\/6801\/files\/088920490X.jpg?v=1763474975"},{"product_id":"beyond-remembering-book-al-purdy-9781550172256","title":"Beyond Remembering","description":"By the time Al Purdy succumbed to lung cancer at his waterfront home in Sidney BC on April 21, 2000, he was universally acknowledged to be one of the greatest writers Canada has produced. In five decades as a published author he had produced over forty books and received innumerable distinctions, including two Governor General's Awards and the Order of Canada. A hands-on writer who delighted in co-producing specialty publications and small press titles in addition to his major collections with leading publishers, Purdy left a massive and diverse body of work, much of it long unavailable to the public.\u003cbr\u003e \u003cbr\u003e \u003cbr\u003e \u003cbr\u003e \u003ci\u003eThe Collected Poems\u003c\/i\u003e, edited by Purdy critic Sam Solecki with the full participation of the author, for the first time brings all of Purdy's poetic writings together in one volume, including all his later books, work previously uncollected from earlier periods as well as several excellent new poems he completed in the months before his death. It is, as he said, everything he wished to be remembered for.","brand":"WoB","offers":[{"title":"US \/ NEW \/ INGRAM","offer_id":51037183770897,"sku":"NIN9781550172256","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false},{"title":"GB \/ VERY_GOOD \/ INTERNAL","offer_id":51340254839057,"sku":"GOR010358754","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false},{"title":"US \/ VERY_GOOD \/ SBYB","offer_id":51845015798033,"sku":"CIN1550172255VG","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false},{"title":"GB \/ NEW \/ INGRAM","offer_id":52680461386001,"sku":"NLS9781550172256","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0784\/4072\/6801\/files\/1550172255.jpg?v=1750861163"},{"product_id":"to-paris-never-again-book-al-purdy-9781990776595","title":"To Paris Never Again","description":"\u003cp\u003eThis print-on-demand title is available by request from most booksellers.\u003c\/p\u003e \u003ci\u003eTo Paris Never Again\u003c\/i\u003e is Purdy's first collection of new writing 's since 1994: fifty-one poems plus \"Home Country,\" an essay of nostalgic anecdotes that provides a fascinating background to much of the poetry. Here is the work of a major poet in the maturity of a long, eventful life, a voice steeped in the wisdom of age, yet responsive to the subtlest shadings of experience.","brand":"WoB","offers":[{"title":"- \/ - \/ -","offer_id":51680064078097,"sku":"","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true},{"title":"US \/ NEW \/ INGRAM","offer_id":51680064241937,"sku":"NIN9781990776595","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0784\/4072\/6801\/files\/1990776590.jpg?v=1751125689"},{"product_id":"reaching-for-the-beaufort-sea-book-al-purdy-9781550170887","title":"Reaching for the Beaufort Sea","description":"Long known to insiders as one of the most unique personalities in Canadian letters, the celebrated poet Al Purdy begins this story of his life by noting that just as he was about to be born his hometown of Trenton was flattened by a historic explosion as the local munitions factory, \"no doubt accounting for any oddity and eccentricity in my character.\" By the time the readers realize just how much there is to account for, they may be forgiven for wondering if the Trenton Blast was big enough to do the job.\u003cbr\u003e \u003cbr\u003e \u003cbr\u003e \u003cbr\u003e \u003ci\u003eReaching for the Beaufort Sea\u003c\/i\u003e is one of the most engaging and revealing autobiographies ever undertaken by a leading Canadian author. Writing in a relaxed, conversational style with ribald humour never far below the surface, Purdy shows himself no mercy as he exposes what surely must be one of the most unlikely literary apprenticeships ever served. He is equally merciless when it comes to providing uncensored glimpses of writers like Margaret Atwood, Margaret Laurence, F.R. Scott, Earle Birney, Louis Dudek, Irving Layton, Hugh MacLennan, Leonard Cohen, and John Newlove, who worked, loved and brawled alongside Purdy during Canadian literature's coming of age.\u003cbr\u003e \u003cbr\u003e \u003cbr\u003e \u003cbr\u003e Gossipy and lighthearted as it is at times, \u003ci\u003eReaching for the Beaufort Sea\u003c\/i\u003e nevertheless makes an important contribution to the understanding of modern Canadian letters, and is essential reading for anyone hoping to appreciate fully a writer Dennis Lee has called \"one of the substantial poets in English of the century.\"","brand":"WoB","offers":[{"title":"GB \/ NEW \/ INGRAM","offer_id":52667580743953,"sku":"NLS9781550170887","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0784\/4072\/6801\/files\/9781550170887.jpg?v=1762282906"},{"product_id":"yours-al-book-al-purdy-9781550173321","title":"Yours, Al","description":"In this fascinating and funny collection of correspondence, Canada's greatest poet lets it all hang out in spirited private exchanges with Pierre Trudeau, Carol Shields, Earle Birney, Anna Porter, Charles Bukowski, Margaret Laurence, Margaret Atwood, Michael Ondaatje, Gwendolyn MacEwan, Jack McClelland, Northrup Frye, William Golding, Darryl Sittler, Alistair MacLeod, Susan Musgrave, Irving Layton, Lynn Crosbie, George Bowering, Anthony Burgess, Joseph Brodsky and many other notables. \u003ci\u003eYours, Al\u003c\/i\u003e is an uncensored, intimate glimpse into the life of Canada's most celebrated poet. Al Purdy's personal letters present the Can-lit scene as an ongoing conversation between members of a tight, supportive community spanning generations of talented writers. From generous encouragement to brash, unsparing insults--it's all here, with responses from many recipients of his letters. Encompassing more than fifty years, the letters show Purdy at his best--and his worst.","brand":"WoB","offers":[{"title":"GB \/ NEW \/ INGRAM","offer_id":52680003191057,"sku":"NLS9781550173321","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0784\/4072\/6801\/files\/9781550173321.jpg?v=1762312036"},{"product_id":"to-paris-never-again-book-al-purdy-9781550171730","title":"To Paris Never Again","description":"\u003ci\u003eTo Paris Never Again\u003c\/i\u003e is Purdy's first collection of new writing 's since 1994: fifty-one poems plus \"Home Country,\" an essay of nostalgic anecdotes that provides a fascinating background to much of the poetry. Here is the work of a major poet in the maturity of a long, eventful life, a voice steeped in the wisdom of age, yet responsive to the subtlest shadings of experience.","brand":"WoB","offers":[{"title":"GB \/ NEW \/ INGRAM","offer_id":52680137048337,"sku":"NLS9781550171730","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0784\/4072\/6801\/files\/9781550171730.jpg?v=1762312371"}],"url":"https:\/\/www.worldofbooks.com\/collections\/author-books-by-al-purdy.oembed","provider":"World of Books ","version":"1.0","type":"link"}