Alden Nowlan selected poems : edited and with an introduction by Patrick Lane and Lorna Crozier

Alden Nowlan, one of Canada's finest and most influential poets, died in 1983. He leaves a rich legacy of poetry that is accessible yet profound, and that speaks to people's lives with wry observation and keen insight. For Nowlan fans and new readers alike, award-winning poets, editors, and critics Lorna Crozier and Patrick Lane help to re-view and recontextualize Nowlan's place in twentieth-century Canadian poetry with Alden Nowlan: Selected Poems. Lane and Crozier's choices reflect the recurring themes that illuminate Nowlan's work. This new volume is truly the best of Alden Nowlan's poetry, and above all is a tribute to a poet who deserves to be treasured for all time. From the author of the award-winning The Sisters Brothers comes a dark, boozy, and hilarious tale from the LA underworld. A nameless barman tends a decaying bar in Hollywood and takes notes for a book about his clientele. Initially, he is morbidly amused by watching the regulars roll in and fall into their nightly oblivion, pitying them and their loneliness. In hopes of uncovering their secrets and motives, he establishes tentative friendships with them. He also knocks back pills indiscriminately and treats himself to gallons of Jameson's. But as his tenure at the bar continues, he begins to lose himself, trapped by addiction and indecision. When his wife leaves him, he embarks on a series of squalidly random sexual encounters and a downward spiral of self-damage and irrational violence. To cleanse himself and save his soul, he attempts to escape . . .

Alden Nowlan, one of Canada's finest and most influential poets, died in 1983. He leaves a rich legacy of poetry that is accessible yet profound, and that speaks to people's lives with wry observation and keen insight. For Nowlan fans and new readers alike, award-winning poets Lorna Crozier and Patrick Lane help to review and recontextualize Nowlan's place in twentieth-century Canadian poetry. With these selected poems, Lane and Crozier's choices reflect the recurring themes that illuminate Nowlan's work. This new volume is truly the best of Alden Nowlan's poetry, and above all is a tribute to a poet who deserves to be treasured for all time.