Governor General's award 'for Pat'

English professor Dr. Christine Wiesenthal has been short-listed for the Governor General's Literary Award for her biography of Canadian poet Pat Lowther.

"I need to grab a cup of coffee and let this sink in," said Wiesenthal on the phone from Vancouver the morning of Oct.16. "I came in from yoga with an armful of groceries and the message light was flashing - now the phone has been ringing off the hook."

The Half-Lives of Pat Lowther is an expansive biography of a Vancouver poet who became the centre of one of the most sensational murder cases in Canadian literary history. In 1975, at the age of 40, Lowther was bludgeoned to death by her abusive husband, also a poet.

Wiesenthal argues that the murder case eclipsed Lowther's significant contribution to Canadian poetry, and so to set the record straight, Wiesenthal spent eight years researching and writing her critical biography.

In an interview last year she said, "[Lowther's] own work was remarkable ... She was well ahead of her time in terms of her interest in science and technology, the environment, and how she incorporated those into her poetics. She was really inquisitive about the world and politics and about fairly far-flung places and issues, so she often did a lot of research and reading."

Wiesenthal admits she's somewhat surprised her book attracted enough attention to make the non-fiction shortlist.

"It's flabbergasting, since it was a book that came out with a very small print run and is about a woman poet whose work isn't terribly well known. For all those reasons, it's astounding ... I stepped out onto the balcony this morning to get some air after hearing the news and thought, 'After all the hard work, this is for Pat.' "

The book's publisher, University of Toronto Press, was equally delighted by the announcement.

"Pat Lowther had a fascinating life, and is an important (if relatively little known) literary figure," said Bill Harnum of U of T Press. "Professor Wiesenthal's book will, I am sure, bring her to the attention of a wider public." He said the nomination will mean an earlier, November release for the paperback version.

Children's author Glen Huser, a former instructor of library and information studies and a former creative writing instructor in elementary education at the U of A, has also been short-listed for his latest book, Skinnybones and the Wrinkle Queen. Huser won the 2003 Governor General's Award for his young adult novel, Stitches.

The winners will be announced on Tuesday, Nov. 21 at 10 a.m. at simultaneous new conferences in Toronto and Montreal.