VERSeFest is thrilled to introduce our inaugural Poet-in-Residence, local poet and short fiction author Amal El-Mohtar.
Amy Iliza is an African writer, creator and poet who made her debut as a spoken word artist at the OG500 slam competition in Ottawa.
André Duhaime is a retired teacher who now gives his full attention to poetry.
Anne Boyer is a poet and essayist. Her 2015 book, Garments Against Women was published by Ahsahta Press.
Annie St-Jean is the editor of Slam Outaouais : 10 ans de parole (Renaud-Bray, 2018)
Barâa Arar loves stories. She believes everyone has a narrative and we should all lend our ears to hear it.
A local and much lauded poet, Ben Ladouceur's most recent is Mad Long Emotion (Coach House).
Poetry is gay and so is Blue Louise Moffatt.
Caroline Pignat is the two-time Governor Generalʼs Award winning author of highly acclaimed young adult novels.
Cathy Petch is a playwright, spoken word artist, haiku deathmaster and musical saw player for The Silverhearts.
Colin Morton has published more than ten books, ranging from visual and sound poetry to historical narratives.
David McGimpsey lives in Montreal and is the author of Asbestos Heights and winner of 2015's A.M. Klein Award for Poetry.
Doyali Islam's hot off the press second collection, heft investigates rupture and resilience.
Élise Turcotte has published many poetry collections, for which she has received several awards.
Erin is a performance poet from Calgary and has been part of five consecutive Calgary Slam teams from 2010-2015.
Ottawa poet Frances Boyle is the author of Light-carved Passages and a chapbook, Portal Stones.
François Turcot is the author of My Dinosaur (Bookthug), a finalist for the 2014 Prix du Festival de poésie de Montréal.
Frédéric is a Masters student of the University of Ottawa's French Department, specializing in science fiction.
Trained as an actor, Gabriel Robichaud also writes (poetry, plays) and sings.
Geneviève Bouchard is currently completing her Masters in Creative Writing at the University of Ottawa.
George Elliott Clarke has recently been named Canada's Parliamentary Poet Laureate.
Two-time winner of the Saskatchewan Book Award for Poetry, Gerald Hill's latest collection is Hillsdale Book (NeWest Press).
Ger∂ur Kristny won the Icelandic Literature Awards in 2010 for her book of poetry Bló∂hófnir (Bloodhoof).
Guy Perreault creates and sets up concerts, comedy shows and variety shows that are presented as far away as Switzerland.
Hector Ruiz is the author of Désert et renard du désert, Gestes Domestiques, and Qui s'installe ?.
Jamaal Jackson Rogers is a nationally recognized artist, entrepreneur and arts educator, and Ottawa's English Poet Laureate.
Jane Munro's sixth poetry book, Blue Sonoma (Brick Books), won the 2015 Griffin Poetry Prize.
Katherine Leyton's first collection of poetry, All the Gold Hurts My Mouth, will be published in March 2016 by GooseLane.
Kathryn is a passionate advocate for ecological integrity, and the theme is commonly reflected in her poetry.
Rhythmic moral voice Kevin Matthews calls for our best selves.
King Kimbit is an Ottawa rapper. Deal with it.
Part of the 2015 Saskatoon Slam Team, Larissa Tarasoff won first place at the Canadian Festival of Spoken Word.Â
Leontia Flynn has won the Forward prize for best First Collection and the Rooney Prize for Irish Literature, among many more.
In Letters in a Bruised Cosmos, Liz Howard makes sentences a sculptor's elegance.
M. Travis Lane has published fifteen books of poetry--most recently Crossover (Cormorant Books).
Marc LeMyre is a media based poet living in Toronto. He is also a photographer and a psychotherapist.
Award-winning poet Marilyn Dumont's latest collection The Pemmican Eaters (ECW Press) was published in 2015.
Editor of London, UK's The Poetry Review, Maurice Riordan's latest collection is The Water Stealer (Faber, 2013).
Maya Basudde is an artist who has been singing and writing ever since she can remember.
Mia Morgan is the former OAR Magazine editor, and co-founder of Coven Editions.
Natalie Hanna is the author of the poetry collection lisan al’asfour (ARP, 2022)
Pamela Mordecai's first novel, Red Jacket (2015) was shortlisted for the Rogers Writer's Trust Fiction Prize.
Paul Savoie is a writer and translator with more than twenty books in both French and English.
A festival favourite GG winner Phil Hall’s newest collection is Toward A Blacker Ardour.
As a spoken word artist, activist, writer and a philanthropist, Rational Rebel's mission is to tell stories that are hard to tell.
Rebecca Lea Thomas was captain of the Nova Scotia Slam poetry team for two consecutive years.
One of Canada's most loved English writers, Robyn Sarah, writes of the lyrical beauty of the daily.
Playwrite, novelist and poet, Sanita Fejzić’s latest poetry collection is: Psychomachia.
Sébastien Bérubé published his first book of collected works, Sous la boucane du moulin (Éditions Perce-Neige) in 2015.
Shannon Maguire's most recent collection of poetry is Myrmurs: An Exploded Sestina (BookThug, 2015).
Sneha Madhavan-Reese is the winner of the 2015 Diana Brebner Prize. Her debut collection is Observing the Moon.
Sonia Lamontagne hails from Northern Ontario and her debut collection, À tire d'ailes, won the Trillium Prize for poetry in 2012.
Terry Ann Carter is the author of five collections of poetry and five chapbooks of haiku.
Thierry Dimanche is the author of nine books of poetry.
Tina Charlebois is the author of four books of poetry published with Le Nordir and Les Éditions L'Interligne.
Vanessa Rotondo merges science with art and words to facilitate expression.
Wes Ryan is a genre-mashing performance artist living in Peterborough, Ontario.
Winner of the Pulitzer Prize in 1994, Yusef Komunyakaa is the current Poet Laureate for the State of New York.
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