George Bowering

George Bowering, well recognized as one of Canada’s most prolific writers of poetry, short stories and novels, was named Canada’s first official poet laureate in November 2002.  He has twice won the prestigious Governor General’s Literary Award.

Born in Penticton, British Columbia, in 1935, Bowering served as a photographer in the RCAF (Royal Canadian Air Force) in the mid 1950s. While attending the University of British Columbia, he met fellow poets Frank Davey, Fred Wah, David Dawson and James Reid, with whom he started TISH (a newsletter of Vancouver poetry).

He later founded Imago (a magazine dedicated to long poems and sequences) and is contributing editor forOpen Letter (a journal of writing and poetry).

Bowering has taught at the University of Calgary, the University of Western Ontario, and recently retired from Simon Fraser University in Vancouver, where he taught for nearly three decades.