Lisa Richter - Nautilus and Bone
LISTEN to my August 16th, 2022 WIOX show featuring Canadian poet Lisa Richter who reads from and discusses her poetry collection Nautilus and Bone, winner of the National Jewish Book Award for Poetry, the Canadian Jewish Literary Award for Poetry, and the Robert Kroetsch Award for Poetry. Pamela Manché Pearce, Planet Poet’s endlessly interesting and erudite Poet-At-Large, also joins us on the show!
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Lisa Show-Nautilus and Bone
Season 4 Episode 9
Lisa Richter - Nautilus and Bone
LISTEN to Season 4 Episode 9 on Spotify
Lisa Richter is a Canadian poet, writer and educator. She is the author of two books of poetry, Closer to Where We Began (Tightrope Books, 2017), and Nautilus and Bone (Frontenac House, 2020), winner of the National Jewish Book Award for Poetry, the Canadian Jewish Literary Award for Poetry, and the Robert Kroetsch Award for Poetry. Her poems have been nominated for Best of the Net and a National Magazine Award, and appeared in numerous publications and anthologies, including The Literary Review of Canada, CV2, The Malahat Review, The New Quarterly, Rogue Agent and Crab Creek Review. She lives and writes in Toronto.
Canadian Jewish Literary Awards:
"Nautilus and Bone (Frontenac House) by Lisa Richter is a poetic tour de force. It is a reclamation project of Jewish literary history as well as an act of radical empathy. A reimagining of the unconventional life of the celebrated Yiddish poet, Anna Margolin, this collection has all the ambition, romance, and ferocity of its subject, a moving exploration of how a wild spirit searches for beauty and love. We return to it with pleasure and admiration."
National Jewish Book Award for Poetry:
“In Nautilus and Bone, Lisa Richter races around the life and work of Yiddish-language poet Anna Margolin (1887 – 1952) until her “words are wilding.” The poetry supersedes the mere biographical and showcases the triumphs of the genre: in forms including sonnet crowns, centos, and homophonic translations, Richter keeps up with Margolin’s escapades from Brisk to the Lower East Side. Poems such as “Flew the Peacock Off-Golden” combine iconic themes of Yiddish poetry with Richter’s exuberant syntax: “above sleep I became the peacock/my restless eye flew away you bow.” Language flaunts itself across history — with epigraphs ranging from Lorca to Lizzo, the collection memorializes Margolin’s legacy across time. Richter’s exhilarating achievement doesn’t merely bring Margolin to life — it dares the reader to live as fully as Margolin.”