Biography
Lorna Goodison is an internationally acclaimed poet who served as Jamaica’s poet laureate from 2017 to 2020. In personal stories of her family and in explorations of the past, including the slave trade, she captures her homeland’s people, history and culture. Goodison received the Queen’s Gold Medal for Poetry in 2019, prompting poet Simon Armitage to say, “She has created a body of enchanting, intelligent and socially aware poetry in the authentic registers of her own tongue.” Women’s resilience is a common theme in her 16 award-winning works of poetry, short fiction and non-fiction. In her latest collection, Mother Muse, she celebrates the spirit and tenacity of women with poems about “Sister Iggy,” an inspirational teacher who ran a school for wayward boys in Jamaica. Goodison, while maintaining strong ties with her home country, divides her time between Toronto and Ann Arbor, Michigan.