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Shannon Webb-Campbell

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Shannon Webb-Campbell is Canadian writer, poet and editor. She is descended from Miꞌkmaq people from the Qalipu First Nation in Newfoundland.[1]

Writing career

In December 2013 Webb-Campbell was chosen to be the 2014 Canadian Women in Literary Arts (CWILA) "critic in residence".[2] As part of her residency, she published interviews and reviews in The National Post, The Telegraph Journal, The Coast and Plenitude Magazine.[3]

Her first book, Still No Word, was published by Breakwater Books in 2015. The collection of poetry explores identity, wounding and healing.[4] The publication of the book was part of the Egale Canada Out in Print Literary Award, which Webb-Campbell had won in 2014.[5] The award provides "financial and publishing support to an emerging queer and/or trans-spectrum, female-identified writer in Canada."[5]

Controversy surrounding Who Took My Sister?

In 2018, Webb-Campbell published her second collection of poetry titled Who Took my Sister? focusing on themes of missing and murdered Indigenous women. The family of Loretta Saunders, one of the women whose murder Webb-Campbell described in a poem, spoke out against the book and revealed that the poet did not seek their permission prior to publication.[6] It emerged that Webb-Campbell had not spoken to any of the families of those who were depicted in her book.[6] In response Book*hug, her publisher, withdrew the book from sale and halted distribution.[7] In addition, Book*hug donated revenue from the book to the Loretta Saunders Community Scholarship Fund.[7]

Webb-Campbell personally wrote letters of apology to each of the families and, in collaboration with Lee Maracle, reworked the book, eventually publishing it as I Am a Body of Land in 2019.[8] The new book studies the relationship between individual and collective trauma, and bears little resemblance to the withdrawn work.[8] Reviewing the book for Arc Poetry Magazine, Kathy Mac describes the poet "[grappling] with the collapse of both her social life and her sense of self."[9] She notes that there is a "deliberate awkwardness" reflecting the alienation felt by the poet.[9] Reviewer T. Liem, writing in the Montreal Review of Books, praised Webb-Campbell's use of the "energy of repetition to build layers of meaning."[10] I Am a Body of Land was a finalist for the 2019 Quebec Writers' Federation A.M. Klein Prize for Poetry.[11]

Works

  • Still No Word. Breakwater. 2015. ISBN 9781550815887.
  • Who Took my Sister?. Book*hug. 2018. ISBN 9781771663984.
  • I Am a Body of Land. Book*hug. 2019. ISBN 9781771664776.

References

  1. ^ Towle, Sarah; Klang, Amanda (10 September 2017). "Turtle Island Reads returns: Discover the best in Canadian Indigenous writing". CBC News. Retrieved 31 May 2021.
  2. ^ "Interview with CWILA's 2014 critic in residence, Shannon Webb-Campbell". Room Magazine. Retrieved 21 March 2017.
  3. ^ "CWILA". We Are the City. Retrieved 31 May 2021.
  4. ^ Mills, Morgon (2018). "Shannon Webb-Campbell. Still No Word". Newfoundland and Labrador Studies. 33 (2). doi:10.7202/1058084ar.
  5. ^ a b Carter, Sue (6 August 2014). "Shannon Webb-Campbell wins Out In Print Literary Award". Quill & Quire. Retrieved 31 May 2021.
  6. ^ a b Googoo, Maureen (18 April 2018). "Family of Loretta Saunders relieved poetry book that contained graphic details of her death no longer for sale". Ku'ku'kwes News. Retrieved 1 December 2020.
  7. ^ a b "A Statement From the Publishers Regarding Who Took My Sister? by Shannon Webb-Campbell" (Press release). Book*hug Press. 30 March 2018. Retrieved 1 December 2020.
  8. ^ a b Deerchild, Rosanna (23 November 2018). "'I'm getting closer to forgiving myself': Author writes new chapter after controversial book pulled". CBC. Retrieved 31 May 2021.
  9. ^ a b Mac, Kathy (8 May 2021). "Intersection of Trauma and Desire: Shannon Webb-Campbell's I Am a Body of Land". Arc Poetry Magazine. Retrieved 31 May 2021.
  10. ^ Liem, T. (Summer 2019). "Contested Territory". Montreal Review of Books. Retrieved 31 May 2021.
  11. ^ "Announcing the 2019 QWF Literary Awards Shortlist" (Press release). Quebec Writers' Federation. 1 October 2019. Retrieved 31 May 2021.
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