I was a member of an undergraduate poetry workshop with Denise Levertov that year. Denise was the least self-absorbed of people, an ardent political activist, a traveller, a deeply spiritual soul, kind and compassionate, endlessly curious about the world, the arts, other cultures, and other people. She was as devoted to social justice as she was to the craft of poetry, confident in all her opinions but utterly without vanity. Her face turned towards hope the way a flower turns towards the sun. Everything that is good in my poetic practice, perhaps even in my larger life, derives from her mentorship and, later, her friendship …
Bio:
Susan Glickman was an English professor and then a creative writing instructor at both Ryerson University and the University of Toronto and now works as a freelance editor, poet, and writer. She is the author of seven volumes of poetry, most recently What We Carry (2019). Her first novel, The Violin Lover (Goose Lane, 2006), won the Canadian Jewish Book Award for fiction and was named one of the year’s best novels by the National Post. She has also written six other novels and two books of non-fiction, most recently a volume of essays entitled Artful Flight (Porcupine’s Quill, 2022).