Vancouver Sun
Thursday, February 07, 2008
VANCOUVER -- Author Lorna Goodison has won one of Canada's largest literary prizes - the B.C. Award for Canadian Non-Fiction.
The honour, announced by the province today, is for Goodison's lyrical family memoir, From Harvey River: A Memory of My Mother and Her People.
The book was published by McClelland & Stewart.
Premier Gordon Campbell presented Goodison with the $40,000 prize in Vancouver at a ceremony that also celebrated the two other finalists for the award, Donald Harman Akenson for Some Family: The Mormons and How Humanity Keeps Track of Itself (McGill-Queen's University Press) and Jacques Poitras for Beaverbrook: A Shattered Legacy (Goose Lane Editions).
The award, now in its fourth year, is the only national literary award to originate in British Columbia and is the largest award for Canadian non-fiction, a provincial news release said.
Presented annually, the award was established by the British Columbia Achievement Foundation, an independent foundation endowed by the province.
The 2008 jury for the award consisted of David Mitchell, Patrick Lane and Sandra Martin.
They cited Goodison's book for how it "evokes family history through lyrical storytelling and imagery that is both vivid and lush. [From Harvey River] is a memoir of a family, their roots and the memorable characters who formed them ... a book that combines love and tragedy, poverty and loss in rich and authentic prose."
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