
Anne Simpson
Biography
Anne Simpson is a writer, artist and teacher living in Antigonish, Nova Scotia. Simpson’s broad interests are also evident in her educational background. She has received a B.A. and M.A. from Queen’s University in Kingston, working briefly with Bronwen Wallace, and she has attended the Ontario College of Art and Design, where she completed a diploma in Fine Arts. Before moving to Antigonish, where she helped establish the St. Francis Xavier University Writing Centre and has since moved on to work part-time for the university's English Department, Simpson worked in Nigeria as a volunteer English teacher with CUSO. Her first major step onto the Canadian literary map was when she drew attention by co-winning the 1997 Journey Prize for her short story “Dreaming Snow.” While she had published in literary journals for some time, it was only in 2000 that her work appeared in book form. Simpson’s debut collection of poetry, Light Falls Through You (2000) won the Atlantic Poetry Prize and the Gerald Lampert Award and was a finalist for the Pat Lowther Award. Her poetry collection Loop again made waves as a finalist for the 2003 Governor-General’s Award for Poetry and was the winner of the 2004 Griffin Prize for Poetry, and her next collection Quick (2007) won the Pat Lowther Memorial Award in 2008. Her collection Is appeared in 2011. In addition to her poetry publications, Simpson has published two novels, Canterbury Beach (2001) and Falling (2008), and has edited a collection of Atlantic-Canadian Christmas stories, An Orange From Portugal (2003). She has served as the artist-in-residence at the Dalhousie Medical Humanities Program and the writer-in-residence for the Pictou Antigonish Regional Library, and has coordinated the Great Blue Heron Writing Workshop at St. F.X.
Bibliography
- Light Falls Through You. Toronto: McClelland & Stewart, 2000.
- Canterbury Beach. Toronto: Penguin/Viking, 2001.
- Loop. Toronto: McClelland & Stewart, 2003.
- ed. An Orange from Portugal: Christmas Stories from the Maritimes and Newfoundland. Fredericton: Goose Lane Editions, 2003. with photography by Heather Benning.
- Mayfly: Poetry. Saskatoon: JackPine Press, 2004.
- Quick. Toronto: McClelland & Stewart, 2007.
- Falling. Toronto, McClelland & Stewart, 2008.
- The Marram Grass: Poetry & Otherness. Kentville: Gaspereau, 2009.
- Is. Toronto, McClelland & Stewart, 2011.
Critical Sources
- Campbell, Wanda. “Postmodern Ekphrasis in the Poetry of Anne Compton, Anne Carson, and Anne Simpson.” Canadian Poetry: Studies, Documents, Reviews 65 (2010): 9-21.
- Compton, Anne. “Writing Paintings and Thinking Physics: Anne Simpson’s Poetry.” Canadian Literature 185 (2005): 30-42.
- Domet, Stephanie. Rev. of Canterbury Beach, by Anne Simpson. Quill & Quire 67.1 (2001): 30.
- Fitzgerald, Heather. Rev. of Loop, by Anne Simpson. Quill & Quire 69.3 (2003): 49.
- MacLeod, Alexander. “‘Having a Conversation With the Place You're In': Discussing the Past, Present and Future of Atlantic-Canadian Poetry with Brian Bartlett, Ross Leckie,
- Lindsay Marshall and Anne Simpson.” Dalhousie Review 89.1 (2009): 25-37.
- McNeilly, Kevin. "What Remains: Anne Simpson's Loop." Canadian LIterature 185 (2005): 197-200.
- Kinsella, W. P. Rev. of Canterbury Beach, by Anne Simpson. Books in Canada 30.3 (2001): 30.
- Prikryl, Jana. Rev. of Loop, by Anne Simpson. Books in Canada 32.8 (2003): 41-2.
- Sanger, Peter. "'Dreaming Each Other's Dreams': An Introduction to the Work of Anne Simpson." The Antigonish Review 138 (2004): 7-10.