Daniela Elza
Daniela Elza is a local poet with a prolific CV and writing accolades from magazines, anthologies, peer-reviewed journals, literary contests and prizes. Elza received her doctorate from SFU in the philosophy of education and her thesis was nominated for the 2011 distinguished dissertation award from the Canadian Association for Graduate Studies. She has also been awarded the Dean of Graduate Studies Convocation medal this June.
Elza’s poetry has appeared in well-known anthologies such as Rocksalt, Verse Map of Vancouver, 4poets, and the Enpipeline Anthology. She has more than 150 poems published in more than 100 different publications. Her own poetry collection, the weight of dew, was published in March.
She is also the Vancouver/Lower Mainland Regional Representative for Federation of B.C. Writers and Vancouver editor for the Pacific Poetry Project, a forthcoming anthology from Ooligan Press, based in the U.S.
On June 28, Daphne Marlatt received the George Woodcock Lifetime Achievement Award, presented annually for outstanding literary career in British Columbia. SFU professors Stephen Collis, Wayde Compton, and Jerry Zaslove were in attendance for the 19th annual presentation at the Vancouver Public Library, and also spoke in celebration of the centenary of George Woodcock’s birth. In addition to the $5,000 prize, Marlatt’s name will be added to the Writer’s Walk on the north plaza of Library Square downtown.
Marlatt was the SFU writer-in-residence when the Department of English revived the program in 2004 with help from professor and author Roy Miki. Much of Marlatt’s writing focuses on memory, immigration, social and cultural boundaries, and feminism. The hard-to-find Opening Doors in Vancouver’s East End: Strathcona, published in 1979 and edited by Daphne Marlatt and Carole Itter, was re-released last year along with nine other classic Vancouver titles as part of the city’s 125th anniversary.
Marlatt’s prolific career spans writing fiction, non-fiction and poetry, teaching, edititng literary magazines, and writer residencies across Canada. She has authored more than 20 books, was appointed to the Order of Canada in 2006, and received the 2009 Dorothy Livesay Poetry Prize for The Given.
