Cobourg poet Stuart Ross believes collaboration allows him to be part of poems Ñ and the kinds of poems Ñ he would never write on his own. He also believes the best poems are ones that explode the author's own intentions. In this book, Ross takes the stage in the vaudeville act that is collaborative poetry with writers from across Canada. The results are sometimes beautifully harmonic, sometimes chaotically slapstick Ñ but they are always as unpredictable as a live performance. And with the occasional exquisite pratfall. Ross's collaborators include Kasey Ball, Gary Barwin, Alice Burdick, Sarah Burgoyne, Jason Camlot, Michael Dennis, Clarice Eckford, Tanya Finestone, Verne Good, Mark Laba, Jay MillAr, Leigh Nash, Peter Norman, Jim Smith, Gillian Sze, Paul Vermeersch, Tom Walmsley and others.

Stuart Ross published his first literary pamphlet on the photocopier in his dad’s office one night in 1979. Through the 1980s, he stood on Toronto’s Yonge Street wearing signs like “Writer Going To Hell,” selling over 7,000 poetry and fiction chapbooks. A long-time literary press activist, he is a founding member of the Meet the Presses collective, Editor at Mansfield Press, and for eight years was Fiction & Poetry Editor at This Magazine. He is the author of two collaborative novels, two story collections, seven poetry books, and the novel Snowball, Dragonfly, Jew, which co-won the 2012 Mona Elaine Adilman Award for Fiction on a Jewish Theme. He has also published a collection of essays, Confessions of a Small Press Racketeer, and co-edited the anthology Rogue Stimulus: The Stephen Harper Holiday Anthology for a Prorogued Parliament. Buying Cigarettes for the Dog won the 2010 ReLit Award for Short Fiction. His most recent poetry book is You Exist. Details Follow. He lives in Cobourg, Ontario.

Stuart Ross' profile page

Alice Burdick lives in Mahone Bay, Nova Scotia. She is co-owner of Lexicon Books in Lunenburg, and serves on the board of the Writers Federation of Nova Scotia. In the early 1990s, she was co-editor of The Eternal Network, and assistant coordinator of the Toronto Small Press Fair. She is the author of many chapbooks and three full-length poetry collections: Simple Master (Pedlar Press, 2002); Flutter (Mans?eld Press, 2008); and Holler (Mansfield Press, 2012). Her work has appeared in many magazines, online and in print, and was shortlisted for the First Lemonhound Poetry Prize. Her poetry has been included in several anthologies, including Surreal Estate: 13 Canadian Poets Under the In?uence (The Mercury Press), Shift & Switch: New Canadian Poetry (The Mercury Press), Pissing Ice: An Anthology of New Canadian Poets (BookThug), To Find Us: words and images of Halifax (HRMP), and the forthcoming The Child Alone Anthology (Frog Hollow Press).

Alice Burdick's profile page

Leigh Nash is a Toronto-based writer, editor, and administrator. A graduate of the University of Guelph’s MFA in Creative Writing program, she is a partner in the editing firm Re:word Communications, a co-founder of The Emergency Response Unit, and was an executive member of the Scream Literary Festival. She is currently the managing editor at Coach House Books. Her work has appeared in various print and online literary journals. Goodbye, Ukulele is her first book.

Leigh Nash's profile page