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A crossing of her beloved partner into the realm of Alzheimer's sparked Jane Munro's sixth collection, Blue Sonoma (Brick 2014), a title drawn from T.S. Eliot but evoking the tradition of Taoist poetry. Munro received the 2015 Griffin Prize for poetry for this book.
She has also used the subject matter of being her husband's caretaker in her memoir Open Every Window (D&M, 2021). Munro chronicles the pain of watching a partner approach death as well as the exhaustion of caretaking and the regret in seeing one's life narrow and diminish. Throughout the narrative, she investigates the nature of love, the knife edge between duty to oneself and duty to others, and the fierceness of constant growth.
Having lived for 13 years in a house tucked in the woods near Victoria's Point No Point resort, Jane Southwell Munro saluted her neighbourhood, its nearby writer's cabin and her forebears in Point No Point (M&S $17.99). The final poem "Moving to a Colder Climate" describes how her father Raymond Southwell, a builder, came to visit the new home site and died the weekend Munro moved in.
Point No Point also pays tribute to Munro's grandfather, George Southwell, who painted some controversial semi-nudes in the rotunda of the B.C. Legislature. Her title Point No Point is derived from the geographical survey of the former timberlands where she lives. Point no point is a technical term referring to a secondary point of land that is apparent, but doesn't extend farther than two primary points on either side. "It's a ten-minute walk-down the gravel drive with its mossy centre strip, across the highway, into a maze of trails winding through tall salal and wind-stunted alder to the beach. This is my headland. On a map, it's a promontory that's a point from one side, not the other. Point No Point." There is also a "point no point" on the east coast of Canada.
Married to editor Robert Amussen, Munro, has her doctorate in adult education, an MFA in Creative Writing and an MA in English. She has taught at the University of Victoria, the University of British Columbia and Kwantlen University College. She grew up, and raised a family, in Vancouver, and has travelled in Europe and Asia. The former Sooke resident is also a member of the poetry collective called Yoko's Dogs, which issued a collective volume called Whisk in 2013
CITY/TOWN: Vancouver, BC
DATE OF BIRTH: December 3, 1943
PLACE OF BIRTH: Chilliwack, BC
EMPLOYMENT OTHER THAN WRITING: Educator
BOOKS:
Daughters (Fiddlehead Poetry Books, 1982)
The Trees Just Moved Into a Season of Other Shapes (Quarry Press, 1986)
Grief Notes & Animal Dreams (Brick Books, 1995, reprinted 2002)
Presence at a Distance: The Educator-Learner Relationship in Distance Learning (American Center for the Study of Distance Education, 1998)
Point No Point (McClelland & Stewart, 2006). 0-7710-6678-3
Active Pass (Pedlar, 2010) 978-1-897141-38-0
Blue Sonoma (Brick, 2014) 978-1-926829-88-3 $20
A Sally Port (espresso, 2018) 978-0-9866214-8-2
Glass Float (Brick, 2020) 9781771315241 (softcover) $20 20190237546 (ebook)
Open Every Window: a memoir (D&M, 2021) 28.95 hc 9781771622967
False Creek: Poems (Harbour, 2022) $19.95 97819900776090
AWARDS:
Griffin Poetry Prize for Blue Sonoma 2015
Fred Cogswell Award (2nd place) for Blue Sonoma 2015
Short-listed for Prism international's Poetry Prizes 2010 & 2009
Bliss Carman Poetry Award 2007 for Master your hands and your feet, your words and your thoughts
Short-listed for CBC Literary Award 2006 for Active Pass
Finalist for League of Canadian Poets' National Poetry Contest 1998
Wedemeyer Award for best book-length scholarly publication 1992
Shortlisted for Pat Lowther Award for Daughters 1983
Macmillan Prize for Creative Writing for Daughters 1978
[BCBW 2021]
She has also used the subject matter of being her husband's caretaker in her memoir Open Every Window (D&M, 2021). Munro chronicles the pain of watching a partner approach death as well as the exhaustion of caretaking and the regret in seeing one's life narrow and diminish. Throughout the narrative, she investigates the nature of love, the knife edge between duty to oneself and duty to others, and the fierceness of constant growth.
Having lived for 13 years in a house tucked in the woods near Victoria's Point No Point resort, Jane Southwell Munro saluted her neighbourhood, its nearby writer's cabin and her forebears in Point No Point (M&S $17.99). The final poem "Moving to a Colder Climate" describes how her father Raymond Southwell, a builder, came to visit the new home site and died the weekend Munro moved in.
Point No Point also pays tribute to Munro's grandfather, George Southwell, who painted some controversial semi-nudes in the rotunda of the B.C. Legislature. Her title Point No Point is derived from the geographical survey of the former timberlands where she lives. Point no point is a technical term referring to a secondary point of land that is apparent, but doesn't extend farther than two primary points on either side. "It's a ten-minute walk-down the gravel drive with its mossy centre strip, across the highway, into a maze of trails winding through tall salal and wind-stunted alder to the beach. This is my headland. On a map, it's a promontory that's a point from one side, not the other. Point No Point." There is also a "point no point" on the east coast of Canada.
Married to editor Robert Amussen, Munro, has her doctorate in adult education, an MFA in Creative Writing and an MA in English. She has taught at the University of Victoria, the University of British Columbia and Kwantlen University College. She grew up, and raised a family, in Vancouver, and has travelled in Europe and Asia. The former Sooke resident is also a member of the poetry collective called Yoko's Dogs, which issued a collective volume called Whisk in 2013
CITY/TOWN: Vancouver, BC
DATE OF BIRTH: December 3, 1943
PLACE OF BIRTH: Chilliwack, BC
EMPLOYMENT OTHER THAN WRITING: Educator
BOOKS:
Daughters (Fiddlehead Poetry Books, 1982)
The Trees Just Moved Into a Season of Other Shapes (Quarry Press, 1986)
Grief Notes & Animal Dreams (Brick Books, 1995, reprinted 2002)
Presence at a Distance: The Educator-Learner Relationship in Distance Learning (American Center for the Study of Distance Education, 1998)
Point No Point (McClelland & Stewart, 2006). 0-7710-6678-3
Active Pass (Pedlar, 2010) 978-1-897141-38-0
Blue Sonoma (Brick, 2014) 978-1-926829-88-3 $20
A Sally Port (espresso, 2018) 978-0-9866214-8-2
Glass Float (Brick, 2020) 9781771315241 (softcover) $20 20190237546 (ebook)
Open Every Window: a memoir (D&M, 2021) 28.95 hc 9781771622967
False Creek: Poems (Harbour, 2022) $19.95 97819900776090
AWARDS:
Griffin Poetry Prize for Blue Sonoma 2015
Fred Cogswell Award (2nd place) for Blue Sonoma 2015
Short-listed for Prism international's Poetry Prizes 2010 & 2009
Bliss Carman Poetry Award 2007 for Master your hands and your feet, your words and your thoughts
Short-listed for CBC Literary Award 2006 for Active Pass
Finalist for League of Canadian Poets' National Poetry Contest 1998
Wedemeyer Award for best book-length scholarly publication 1992
Shortlisted for Pat Lowther Award for Daughters 1983
Macmillan Prize for Creative Writing for Daughters 1978
[BCBW 2021]
