Cyril Dabydeen
Poet Laureate of Ottawa
1984 -
1987
Cyril Dabydeen is the Sandbach Parker Gold Medallist poet born in Guyana, South America (Caribbean region). An acclaimed poet and fiction writer, he has written eight books of poetry, five of stories, and four novels (his latest, Drums of My Flesh, was nominated for the prestigious IMPAC/Dublin Prize and won the national Guyana Prize for fiction). He also edited two key anthologies: A Shapely Fire: Changing the Literary Landscape, and Another Way to Dance: Contemporary Asian Poetry in Canada and the U.S.
His poetry and fiction have appeared in over 60 literary magazines, such as The Critical Quarterly (UK), The Fiddlehead, Prism International, The Antigonish Review, ARC, ARIEL, Atlanta Review (USA), Artsrage (UK), Canadian Literature, Chandrabhaga (India),Canadian Author, Canadian Ethnic Studies, Caribbean Quarterly, Canadian Forum, CV II, Dalhousie Review, Exempla (W.Germany), Event, Grain, Illuminations (USA), Kunapipi (Australia), Quarry, Small Axe (University of Indiana), This Magazine, World Literature Today (University of Oklahoma), Wasafiri (UK) and Kunapipi (Australia), and anthologized in over 20 volumes in seven countries, including in the Oxford, Penguin, and Heinemann Books of Caribbean Verse.
Cyril also worked for many years in human rights and race relations as advisor to municipal governments (80's and 90's) travelling extensively to over 30 towns and cities in the country.. He was Poet Laureate of Ottawa from l984-87, and is an editor for the Journal of Caribbean Studies (US). He is a four-times finalist for the Archibald Lampman Poetry Prize, and was nominated for the prestigious Pushcart Prize (USA). He is the recipient of Ottawa’s first Heritage award for writing and publishing, and was honoured with a Certificate of Merit from the Government of Canada (1988) for contribution to the Arts. He is a former member of the League of Canadian Poets (he served on the Membership and the International Affairs committees).
Cyril has done over 300 public readings from his books across Canada, the US, UK/Europe, the Caribbean (including Cuba and Jamaica), South America, and Asia. He has adjudicated the James Lignon Price Poetry Competition (the American Poets University & College Poetry Prize Program) via St Lawrence University, New York; and served as a juror of the Year 2000 Neustadt International Prize for Literature (University of Oklahoma) and twice juried for Canada’s Governor General’s Award for Literature (Poetry) in Years 2000 and 2006. His latest books are Play a Song Somebody: Selected Stories (Mosaic Press), Imaginary Origins: New and Selected Poems (Peepal Tree Press, UK), and Uncharted Heart, Poems (Borealis Press). He teaches writing in the Dept. of English, University of Ottawa.
