Back to Title Page

Read a Poem

Read a Review

By the Same Author

Order Direct

To order

The Trillium Award

Kurgan, a book of poems by Don Coles, has been awarded the 14th annual Trillium Prize / Prix Trillium given to the best book published (in any genre) in the province of Ontario in the year 2000. For more information, of an official nature, on the history of the Trillium Prize please click here.

`Kurgan is the work of a poet who has mastered the full range of his voice,' commented [Trillium] English-language jurors Kim Echlin, Andrew Pyper and Michael Redhill. `It is a collection that seems at times easily elegant in its language, but that at the same time plumbs the depths of human experience.'

[PQL Senior Editor John] Metcalf says that the `absolutely wonderful thing about his [Coles's] poems is the precision, the note-perfect diction and the tremendous depth of feeling that is achieved in quite simple language. He finds huge humanity and huge dignity in quiet, homely things and I think that, too, is part of the reason he is so good.' (The Globe and Mail)

Publisher Tim Inkster (left) with the Honourable Tim Hudak, Minister of Tourism, Culture and Recreation. Photo courtesy of the Ontario Ministry of Tourism, Culture and Recreation.

St Lawrence Hall, King Street East, Toronto. Photo courtesy of the Ontario Ministry of Tourism, Culture and Recreation.

The Honourable Tim Hudak (left), publisher Tim Inkster, editor John Metcalf. Photo courtesy of the Ontario Ministry of Tourism, Culture and Recreation.

PQL editor John Metcalf accepts the Trillium Award on behalf of Don Coles, who, unfortunately, could not attend. Photo courtesy of the Ontario Ministry of Tourism, Culture and Recreation.