Michael Redhill is the author of six collections of poetry, the most recent of which is Twitch Force, and seven novels. His 2006 novel, Consolation, reimagined Toronto’s mid-nineteenth century and was longlisted for the Man Booker Prize. His most recent novel, Bellevue Square, won the 2017 Scotiabank Giller Prize. He edited and published Brick: A Literary Journal from 1998 to 2007 and continues to teach as well as edit. He lives in Toronto.

Twitch Force is a collection concerned with love and its loss, despair and hard-won hope, knowledge and essential mystery, aging and timelessness. Readers are cautioned: ideas that present as self-explanatory may be closer than they appear. Twitch Force is a stunningly realized return to the form from one of Canada’s bravest and most original poets.

While reading your new collection of poetry, what would you recommend as . . .

One song or album to listen to: Okonokos, the live album by My Morning Jacket.

One film to watch: Paterson.

One meal to eat: Latkes with sour cream and apple sauce.

One piece of art to look at: Francis Bacon’s Three Studies for George Dyer.

One place to plan to visit: Circus Books and Music on the Danforth.

One quotation to read from another writer: “A person’s primitive beliefs . . . lie at the very core of his total system of beliefs, and they represent the subsystem in which he has the heaviest emotional commitment.” Milton Rokeach, The Three Christs of Ypsilanti.

One question to ask yourself or a friend: What can I do today to add to someone’s happiness?

Twitch Force by Michael Redhill