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A nuanced, relational, and community-minded new book from one of Canada's preeminent poets.
South Side of a Kinless River wrestles with concepts of Métis identity in a nation and territory that would rather erase it. Métis identity, land loss, sexual relationships between Indigenous women and European men, and midwifery by Indigenous women of the nascent settler communities figure into these poems. They add up to a Métis woman's prairie history, one that helps us feel the violence in how those contributions and wisdoms have been suppressed and denied.
"Each poem is an anthem, every page showcasing the talent and necessity of this incredible poetic voice. Dumont brings the Métis tone, cadence and intricate stitch-work into all she creates."—Cherie Dimaline, author of The Marrow Thieves and Empire of the Wild
"The voice of this Métis woman is as loving, tender and humane, as it is powerful, satirical and political..."—Rita Bouvier, author of a beautiful rebellion
"The poems in the first section read like incantation and instruction, evoking a strong sense of place and time. As the collection progresses, the poem titles shorten, the poems themselves grow more contemplative, philosophical, and almost yearning in their deep, wide, river-like understandings. We're led into vulnerable ruminations: beliefs about language, archives, and inspiration."—Sanna Wani, Quill & Quire
"Marilyn Dumont's poetry asserts the distinctiveness of Métis identity and the difficulty in crediting the Métis, especially the women, for their culture and contributions."—Candace Fertile, The Malahat Review
Marilyn Dumont is a celebrated poet of Cree and Métis ancestry. Her first collection of poetry, A Really Good Brown Girl (1996), won the 1997 Gerald Lampert Memorial Award from the League of Canadian Poets; it continues to be read and course-adopted across Canada and in the US. Her most recent book, The Pemmican Eaters (2015), won the 2016 Writers' Guild of Alberta's Stephan G. Stephansson Award. She has been the writer-in-residence at five Canadian universities and the Edmonton Public Library as well as an advisor in the Aboriginal Emerging Writers Program at the Banff Centre. She teaches sessional creative writing for Athabasca University and Native Studies and English for the University of Alberta. She lives in Edmonton, Alberta.