Verbatim
The Prince Edward Island 2012 Book
Awards:
This is a
story of how aspirations and literary posterity collided.
Following the
publication of Verbatim: A Novel, in
fall 2010, my publisher, Enfield & Wizenty, sent copies to reviewers and to
judges of prizes.
One of the
last competitions to occur is the Prince Edward Island Book Awards. This prize
is awarded every two years for the best book in the categories of Fiction,
Poetry and Non-fiction. Having lived in Charlottetown since 2000 it seemed a
sensible thing to try for. The local writers are known to each other, and we
sometimes get together. The field is small.
I never
thought the book would impress the Giller or GG judges. I’m not in that league,
and the book is an experimental work whose arc is fragmented with characters
that aren’t lovable.
Thanks to
statements by such literary people as Rabindranath Maharaj, Canadian authors
have had fair warning that innovation is regarded with unease. But not
every judge despises the new and seeks only the easy read. On PEI, with its
abundance of poets that gets renewed each year, artistic expression demonstrably
matters.
On 25 April
the shortlist for the PEI Book Awards came out. While I didn’t expect to win, I
did think I’d see-my title on the fiction list, alongside J.J. Steinfeld’s A Glass Shard and Memory and David
Helwig (either Mystery Stories or Killing
McGee). Both are well-known writers, provincially and nationally,
and between them they have a long string of prizes and a wealth of story
collections, novels and plays. David, a former-Poet Laureate, likely would win.
Instead of
those names, the choices of three judges as the best works put out in fiction
since 2010 were: Patti Larsen for Family
Magic; Patti Larsen for Run (The
Hunted), and Dale McNevin for Treasures
to Find. McNevin’s entry is a 24-page children’s picture book that easily
has over 60 words in it; Larsen is a self-published author of paranormal books
(until June 2012, when her newest book came out from the Establishment, i.e.,
The Acorn Press) that often are part of a series. Seeing the list sharply
chastened my ego.
On 16 May I attended
the ceremony and sat to one side making notes. Unlike the 2010 event, which
I’ve written about here, this one went off professionally: it was
held at the Carriage House, a downtown Charlottetown venue with a small stage
and fine acoustics, not like the main library with its poor sound system where
these things have gone off before; slides showed the covers of, it seems, every
book entered; nice-looking treats were plentiful; and the attendance was good,
indicating that word had circulated. The minister of culture seemed pleased to
be supporting the literary arts (the next month he announced the
cut of the meagre $10,000 subsidy given to PEI book publishers), and stood
accompanied by departmental staff. Of the audience members I recognized, most
were there to support Dianne Hicks Morrow, a poetry finalist, with What Really Happened is This. (One poet
mentioned that the absence from the poetry shortlist of Richard Lemm’s latest
book, Burning House, looked quite
odd.) Most of the more familiar faces from the writing community were missing.
Naturally,
the fiction category most interested me, so before the event I looked up
McNevin and Larsen. As indicated, McNevin’s book can be gone through quite
quickly. With Larsen, you can’t just go into a book store and check her titles
to see if they’re worth buying. Her website describes them, and lists how
well-liked they are by Amazon readers. But no critical comments. Here’s a quote from her
site that caught my eye:
Who are you
to read my book or anyone else's and tell us we're not good enough? That our
work is crap so we don't have the right, in this free and beautiful world, to
publish it? To share it? Our heart's desire, our deepest passion whether
suckage or a work of art?
Because it's
all art to the author; www.pattilarsen.com/mywritinglife/the-self-appointed-self-pub-police
Who are you,
indeed; who am I; who are we?
(Chances are good that if you’re reading Arts East
you’re a writer who has gone through the usual process of getting a book
published.) More to the point, who were the judges, those non-paying readers
who had willingly taken on the task of deciding what books were good enough to
win such prizes? Their names would soon would be revealed, but for now their
motivations, their credentials, and their experience remained mysterious.
By the time
the event started the number of people present had reached around fifty, which
is very good for Charlottetown on a mild spring night. Readings by Wayne
Johnston and Michael Crummey bring in a hundred, local writers much less. One
bow-tied departmental functionary, impressed that artists do so well on so
little funding, as he once stated over lunch in Casa Mia (careful, writers with
notebooks are often at nearby tables), led the proceedings, promising we’d know
who the finalists were, that we’d hear from the judges (only one showed), and
that the authors themselves would get to read (in 2010 they weren’t shown such
respect). The minister, up again, commented that PEI “must be inspirational” to
have so many books produced over two years. (You understand those subsidy cuts
won’t affect inspiration, just actually getting books out.) Artwork, resumed
the functionary, gesturing to attractive hand-made stained glass with lines of
poetry embedded in them, would be given, along with the prize money (amount
never disclosed) and a sticker for the front of the book, as a further
indication that the award had developed “some traditions,” specifically, “a
partnership with the Island fine craft community.”
We heard the
familiar bilge that comparing various books “taxes the judges.” Frankly, that’s
expected, and if they weren’t taxed then something would be very wrong with our literary
scene. Turning pages doesn’t make you a hero. It’s not like they rescued a dog
or a child from a burning house. Or a dog-child, which would be cool.
But I
digress.
The
mandarin’s next words made sudden chilling sense of the shortlist, and of all
we’ve seen over the recent years when it comes to institutional respect for
writers and the PEI Writers’ Guild (of which I’m a member). “This is not a
literary book award only... This is not a competition of literary critics...
Our judges represent the reading public.”
As people
used to say seriously, and now with irony: Whaffuck?
The judges’
names were finally announced: Grace Dawson (literacy and public services
librarian), Nancy Smitheram (educator) and Ann Thurlow (editor and journalist).
With respect
to the hander-out of books, the teacher, and the columnist, as far as I know
none of them have created and published a collection of poems, a long
non-fiction work, a book of short stories or a novel. Yet they donned that
thorny mantle of taxing pages and indicated to Islanders, to Canadians, and to
everyone with access to the Internet that PEI’s thriving community of writers
can, over two years and at best,
produce a slim children’s picture book, and two self-published genre titles
that you can’t physically see in a bookstore.
From the 17
May ministerial press release: “The Prince Edward Island Book Awards celebrate
our authors and raise awareness of Island literature.” Incorrect. The judges
celebrated the Island’s fiction output by removing from consideration the
literary aspect, the part that has to do with crafting an art work that will
last, and with that gone we’re left with a general “book award” instead,
something that appeals to those who value the readerly over the writerly.
“You’re
always scribbling,” the minister said to me before the event began, so I’ll go
back to my notes.
The
non-fiction winner, Marian Bruce, wrote Remembering
Old Dan: Farm Horses and People of Prince Edward Island. It came out from
Island Studies Press (UPEI), and drew praise for its depiction of horses and
horse life, its “sweet” nature, and its “celebration” of when “life was
simple.” Probably not sweet or simple if you were a hard-working horse who’d
just bust a leg and who’d next hear a gunshot, but never mind that cavil. Bruce
didn’t show to claim the prize. Fiction came next, and Larsen won with Run (The Hunted). And seriously, by this
time I was rooting for that underdog title over her other one on the list, Family Magic, because not enough titles
with parentheses win awards. (They indicate, in this case, that The Hunted is a
series.) Grace Dawson, the one judge present, compared Larsen to J.K. Rowling,
calling her work “action-packed” and praising her “interesting” characters.
Larsen then read a passage. Most of the sentences were short and dully written;
functional over memorable or poetic. Poetry was last, but the functionary had
to single it out with another bland statement: “PEI poets have a unique perspective
on this place.” Plumbers and oyster fishers can offer unique perspectives, too.
But can you imagine a world where the alternative perspectives to a poet’s view
are taken from a thriller that features the hunting and killing of children?
(If Run (The Hunted) actually caught
the essence of The Gentle Island, that’d be quite the message sent out to
potential visitors. There’s a niche market, of a new and unpleasant stripe.)
Dianne Hicks Morrow claimed the poetry prize, and received praise for capturing,
in an “incredibly touching” way, what occurs when our parents decline.
After that,
there were a few final words from the head bureaucrat, then time for pictures
and snacks.
What lesson
do I learn from all this, apart from the fact that my ego should never get so
swollen as to think I deserve to be shortlisted for any prize? There are
several. The first is that when it comes to the fiction category the PEI Book
Award, as a prize, didn’t live up to the efforts of Joe Sherman (1945-2006),
the driving force behind its creation. How could it when its judges haven’t
written anything of literary worth? We can’t suddenly expect them to recognize
works of lasting literary value if they don’t aim to create such works
themselves. Also, they seem to have decided to (or been encouraged to) put
aside critical thinking in favour of choosing a good read over a demanding one;
they let their young child and rebellious tween take over. That kind of
attitude is robbing the PEI Book Award of its initial worth and reducing its
importance. It needs to be, in the words of Steven Mayoff (winner of the 2010
award for fiction), as imbued “... with the same sense of dignity and pride
that many of us feel in being part of PEI's literary community.” Right now it’s
not.
Looking over
the long list some time later I saw that David Helwig hadn’t entered - two less
books of literature for the judges to discard.
Jeff Bursey,
Autumn 2012
The views of the author do not
necessarily reflect those of Arts East
