Richard Harrison

Richard Harrison is the author of seven books of poetry, including On Not Losing My Father’s Ashes in the Flood, which won the Governor General’s Literary Award and the Stephan G. Stephansson Award for Poetry in Alberta. 25: Hockey Poems Selected and New celebrates the 25th anniversary of the publication of Hero of the Play, the first book of poetry to be launched at the Hockey Hall of Fame. Harrison’s poems have been translated into French, Spanish, Italian, Portuguese, and Arabic. He lives in Calgary and teaches English and Creative Writing at Mount Royal University.

FESTIVAL BOOK

25: Hockey Poems Selected and New

Richard Harrison’s The Hero of the Play has been in print continuously for 25 years, with a 10th anniversary edition released in 2004. 25 is a celebration of this fact, as well as a meditation on a quarter century of hockey poetry. This collection is a cataloguing of the way the game has woven itself into the life of the Governor General’s Literary Award–winning poet, from childhood to fatherhood to death. It is a reflection on how the game has become such a large part of Canadian identity, shifting and changing with the times. In 25, Harrison captures the grace of the player in fluid lines, sketches the arc of the play, and delivers the myth of the frozen pond to our human reality.