1970: A Novel Poem is poet and novelist Elizabeth Rhett Woods’ personal exploration of a pivotal year of turmoil, discovery and transition. Draft-dodgers, Viet Nam, literature and LSD, love affairs, liaisons and leavings - each has their season in a year scarred by the Kent State tragedies and the War Measures Act. Against this backdrop the poet traces an interior landscape of restlessness and renewal. Beginning with winter and a thirtieth birthday, Woods’ novelistic approach artfully paints the divided heart of spring romance leading to summer disappointment and the inevitable upheaval of autumn. Witnessing the self as a character in a novel, the poet exposes the forces driving transitions from youth to maturity, intoxication to sobriety, marriage to separation, and finally East to West. Resonant with the vibrations of those heady days, 1970: A Novel Poem invites the reader to remember and relive or experience as never before the turbulent waves of change breaking on the shore of the present.

Elizabeth Rhett Woods has published five books of poetry and three novels, including Beyond The Pale (Ekstasis Editions, 2006) and the underground classic The Yellow Volkswagen (PaperJacks, 1971). Her poetry and plays, including the 90-minute verse play Maya (Tuesday Night, 1974) have been broadcast on CBC Radio. Ekstasis Editions published Woman Walking: Selected Poems in 2009. She lives in Victoria, BC.

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