Biography
Patrick Lane, one of Canada’s most beloved poets, wrote from a self-confessed “desire to salvage some beauty from a fallen world.” His poetry, celebrated for its elegance, narrative power and insight into the human condition, earned many honours over his fifty-year career. Poems New and Selected won the Governor General's Literary Award for poetry; Lane was awarded the Lieutenant Governor’s Award for Literary Excellence; and he became an officer of the Order of Canada in recognition of his body of work, which includes 27 poetry collections, as well as novels and nonfiction books. Lane was self-taught. A poet from a working-class, rural background who never went to university, he spent years working in sawmills and driving trucks in B.C.’s interior—his poetic territory. A passionate mentor to generations of Canadian poets, Lane received several honorary doctorates, including one from UVic, where he taught. For many decades he lived with his wife, the poet Lorna Crozier, on the Saanich Peninsula.