Monty Reid

Monty Reid (born 1952 in Spalding, Saskatchewan) is a Canadian poet.

Life

He graduated from the University of Alberta, with an M.A. He lived in Drumheller, Alberta and worked at the Royal Tyrrell Museum, and worked at the Canadian Museum of Nature starting in 1999 (since retired). He also worked at Arc Poetry Magazine as Managing Editor until 2017.

Awards

• 2007 Lampman-Scott Award

Works

• "five SMALLER dreams", QWERTY, University of New Brunswick
• "Moving the Diorama", Arc 56, Summer 2006
• The Life of Riley. Saskatoon, Saskatchewan: Thistledown Press. 1981. ISBN 978-0-920066-40-9.
• These Lawns (Red Deer, Alberta: Red Deer College Press, 1990)
• The Alternate Guide (Red Deer College Press, 1995)
• Dog Sleeps. Edmonton, Alberta: NeWest Press. 1993. ISBN 978-0-920897-35-5.
• Flat Side. Red Deer College Press. 1998. ISBN 978-0-88995-188-4.
• Crawlspace. Toronto, Ontario: House of Anansi. 1993. ISBN 978-0-88784-539-0.
• Disappointment Island. Ottawa, Ontario: Chaudiere Books. 2006. ISBN 978-0-9781601-1-1.
• Garden. Ottawa, Ontario: Chaudiere Books. 2014. ISBN 978-1-9281070-1-9.
• Meditatio Placentae. London, Ontario: Brick Books. 2016. ISBN 9781771314398.

Chapbooks

• Cuba A book (Ottawa ON: above/ground press, 2005)
• Sweetheart of Mine (Toronto ON: BookThug, 2006)

Anthologies

• Decalogue: ten Ottawa poets

Reviews

Twelve powerful meditations in Monty Reid's Flat Side explore the subtle connections between life and words, matter and consciousness, ourselves and the earth and sky. The first poem, "Burning the Back Issues," features the poet experiencing a sense of release as he casts into the fireplace back issues of American Poetry Review to warm his house on New Year's day.

The thing that impressed me the most about Monty Reid's work is the sense of absolute distance that he evokes. With a title like Disappointment Island, this seems laughably obvious, but delving into the opening pages of his first section "Songs for the Mammoth Steppe," a whiff of something truly Romantic comes out at you.

External links

• "Monty Reid", 100 Canadian poets, University of Calgary
• "Monty Reid", Planet Earth Poetry At Black Stilt - The Reading Series, February 27, 2009