THE BEST BOOK OF POETRY PUBLISHED BY a B.C. author in 1988 was Robin Blaser's Pell Mell (Coach House). Its exclusion from the list of nominees for the 1988 B.C. Book Prize in poetry is so unacceptable/ outrageous/ criminal that I'm impelled to at least make a claim for Pell Mell's importance publicly. I can, if need be, provide a list of a dozen prominent B.C. writers who will verify my claim. Yet, of the three B.C. poetry prize judges, only Barry McKinnon proposed Pell Mell be nominated. The other two judges, Leona Gom and Susan Musgrave, were, as near as I can tell from my investigations, unable to understand Blaser's poetry. I suppose the greater part of the blame rests with McKinnon for not insisting on its inclusion or, alternatively, resigning from the committee. Since Gom and Musgrave are both reputable poets, if incompetent judges, this isn't one of those problems easily remedied. All one can do is protest that the judges blew it. I'm not a great partisan of writing prizes, but since they exist, I've decided to take them seriously rather than succumbing to that form of despair known as cynicism. If we writers are not willing to fight for excellence then the provincial prizes will indeed become provincial in the most pejorative sense of that word.

Stan Persky, Vancouver

[BCBW Autumn 1989]