The Confederation Poets
The Founding of a Canadian Poetry, 1880 to the First World War
The Confederation Poets: The Founding of a Canadian Poetry, 1880 to the First World War is a study of poets born between 1850 and 1866, focusing on the work they produced up until the end of World War I. Through this investigation, the climate of opinion that animated Canadian society following Confederation is brought to light. Poets covered range from the famous (Lampman, Roberts, Crawford, Carman) to the less well-known, but still important (Cameron, Herbin, Coleman, Wetherald). 55 Confederation poems, many hard to find today, are quoted in full.
James Deahl was born in Pittsburgh in 1945, and grew up in that city as well as in and around the Laurel Highlands of the Appalachian Mountains. He moved to Canada in 1970 and holds Canadian citizenship. He is the author or editor of forty literary titles, recently his two prior collections from Guernica, Rooms the Wind Makes and Red Haws to Light the Field, as well as Tamaracks: Canadian poetry for the 21st century, the first major anthology of Canadian poetry published in the U.S. in three decades. He is the father of Sarah, Simone, and Shona, with whom he is translating the poetry of the Québécois poet Émile Nelligan. Deahl lives in Sarnia with companion Norma West Linder.