Dorothy Livesay Poetry Prize

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Awarded for a book of poetry written by an author from British Columbia or the Yukon. Prior to 1989, this award was known as the BC Poetry Prize. Part of the BC Book Prizes.

indicates a review is available for that book

2015

  • Cecily Nicholson – From the Poplars

Also shortlisted:

  • Jen Currin – School
  • Kayla Czaga – For Your Safety Please Hold On
  • Rob Budde – Dreamland Theatre
  • Patrick Lane – Washita

2014

  • Jordan Abel – The Place of Scraps

Also shortlisted:

  • Catherine Greenwood – The Lost Letters
  • Jennica Harper – Wood
  • Renée Sarojini Saklikar – children of air india
  • Russell Thornton – Birds, Metals, Stones and Rain

2013

  • Sarah de Leeuw – Geographies of a Lover

Also shortlisted:

  • Evelyn Lau – A Grain of Rice
  • Roger Farr – IKMQ
  • Patricia Young – Night-Eater
  • Colin Browne – The Properties

2012

  • John Pass – crawlspace

Also shortlisted:

  • Patrick Lane – The Collected Poems of Patrick Lane
  • Susan McCaslin – Demeter Goes Skydiving
  • Garry Thomas Morse – Discovery Passages
  • Sharon Thesen – Oyama Pink Shale

2011

Also shortlisted:

  • Ken Belford – Decompostions
  • George Bowering – My Darling Nellie Gray
  • Jen Currin – The Inquisition Yours
  • Eve Joseph – The Secret Signature of Things

2010

  • Fred Wah – is a door

Also shortlisted:

  • Gillian Jerome – Red Nest
  • Larissa Lai – Automaton Biographies
  • Miranda Pearson – Harbour
  • David Zieroth – The Fly in Autumn

2009

  • Daphne Marlatt – The Given

Also shortlisted:

  • Karen Hofmann – Water Strider
  • Elise Partridge – Chameleon Hours
  • Nilofar Shidmehr – Shirin and Salt Man
  • George Stanley – Vancouver: A Poem

2008

  • Rita Wong – Forage

Also shortlisted:

2007

  • Don McKay – Strike / Slip

Also shortlisted:

  • Maxine Gadd – Backup to Babylon
  • Steven Price – Anatomy of Keys
  • Sharon Thesen – The Good Bacteria
  • Terence Young – Moving Day

2006

  • Meredith Quartermain – Vancouver Walking

Also shortlisted:

  • Stephen Collis – Anarchive
  • Jordan Scott – Silt
  • George Sipos – Anything But the Moon
  • Jan Zwicky – Thirty-seven Small Songs & Thirteen Silences

2005

Also shortlisted:

  • Aislinn Hunter – The Possible Past
  • Eve Joseph – The Startled Heart
  • Patrick Lane – Go Leaving Strange
  • D.C. Reid – The Hunger

2004

  • Philip Kevin Paul – Taking the Names Down From the Hill

Also shortlisted:

2003

  • bill bisset – peter among th towring boxes

Also shortlisted:

  • Colin Browne – Ground Water
  • Marlene Cookshaw – Shameless
  • Patrick Friesen – The Breath You Take From the Lord
  • Tom Wayman – My Father's Cup

2002

  • Karen Solie – Short Haul Engine

Also shortlisted:

  • Stephen Guppy – Understanding Heaven
  • Aislinn Hunter – Into the Early Hours
  • Daphne Marlatt – This Tremor Love Is
  • Catherine Owen – The Wrecks of Eden

2001

  • Don McKay – Another Gravity

Also shortlisted:

  • George Bowering – His Life
  • Patrick Lane – The Bare Plum of Winter Rain
  • John Pass – Water Stair
  • Sue Wheeler – Slow-Moving Target

2000

  • Lorna Crozier – What the Living Won't Let Go

Also shortlisted:

  • Wayde Compton – 49th Parallel Psalm
  • Susan Musgrave – Things That Keep and Do Not Change
  • D.C. Reid – Love and Other Things That Hurt
  • Tom Wayman – The Colours of the Forest

1999

Also shortlisted:

  • Patrick Friesen – St. Mary at Main
  • Jan Zwicky – Songs for Relinquishing the Earth

1998

  • Patricia Young – What I Remember from My Time on Earth

Also shortlisted:

  • Linda Rogers – Heaven Cake
  • Lyle Neff – Ivanhoe Station

1997

  • Margo Button – The Unhinging of Wings

Also shortlisted:

1996

  • Patrick Lane – Too Spare, Too Fierce

Also shortlisted:

  • Robin Skelton – The Edge Of Time
  • Kate Braid – To This Cedar Fountain

1995

  • Linda Rogers – Hard Candy

Also shortlisted:

  • Aaron Bushkowsky – ed and mabel go to the moon
  • Adeena Karasick – Mêmewars

1994

  • Gregory Scofield – The Gathering: Stones For The Medicine Wheel

Also shortlisted:

  • Howard White – Ghost In The Gears
  • Brian Brett – Poems New And Selected

1993

  • bill bissett – inkorrect thots

Also shortlisted:

  • Kirsten Emmott – How Do You Feel?
  • Diana Hartog – Polite to Bees: A Bestiary

1992

  • Barry McKinnon – Pulplog

Also shortlisted:

  • Michael Turner – Company Town
  • John Pass – The Hour's Acropolis

1991

  • Jeff Derksen – Down Time

Also shortlisted:

  • Phyllis Webb – Hanging Fire
  • bill bissett – hard 2 beleev

1990

  • Victoria Walker – Suitcase

Also shortlisted:

  • Maureen McCarthy – The Girls In The Last Seat Waving
  • Marlene Cookshaw – The Whole Elephant

1989

  • Charles Lillard – Circling North

Also shortlisted:

  • Doug Beardsley – Dancing Star
  • bill bissett – what we have

1988

  • Patricia Young – All I Ever Needed Was A Beautiful Room

Also shortlisted:

  • Norm Sibum – Eight Poems
  • Sharon Thesen – The Beginning of the Long Dash

1987

  • Diana Hartog – Candy From Strangers

Also shortlisted:

  • John Newlove – The Night the Dog Smiled
  • Tom Wayman – The Face of Jack Munro

1986

  • Joe Rosenblatt – Poetry Hotel