The annual Griffin Poetry Prize gala is a chance for poets and poetasters alike to dine, drink, dance, and let their lines run right to margin. This year’s event, held June 6 at The Stone Distillery in Toronto’s Distillery District, was no exception. For the story in Q&Q Omni, click here. For pictures from the event, scroll down. (Photos by Tanja-Tiziana Burdi)
Kitty Lewis of Brick Books arrives at the gala.
Griffin jury member and past nominee Karen Solie arrives with her husband, poet David Seymour.
The CBC’s Lisa Godfrey, author Gil Adamson, House of Anansi’s Laura Repas, Griffin nominee Ken Babstock, and Anansi publisher Lynn Henry assemble near the bar. (Babstock’s Airstream Land Yacht was in the running for the Canadian prize.)
Novelist Austin Clarke, The Walrus’s Ken Alexander, the Canada Council’s Melanie Routledge, and poet Earl Lovelace chat and quaff.
Ladies and gentlemen, the white stripes.
Nominated poet Priscila Uppal with her brother.
Charles Wright, winner of the international prize, expresses himself at the podium.
The prize’s founder, funder, and namesake, Scott Griffin, angrily shushes the crowd. (Kidding.)
Don McKay, the Canadian winner, addresses the largest number of media microphones ever simultaneously aimed at a poet in this country, ever. (Again, kidding.)
