English Language
Fiction
Winner:
- Guy Vanderhaeghe, The Englishman's Boy
Other Finalists:
- Margaret Atwood, Alias Grace
- Elisabeth Harvor, Let Me Be the One
- Janice Kulyk Keefer, The Green Library
- Cordelia Strube, Teaching Pigs to Sing
- Audrey Thomas, Coming Down from Wa
Poetry
Winner:
- E. D. Blodgett, Apostrophes: Woman at a Piano
Other Finalists:
- Elizabeth Brewster, Footnotes to the Book of Job
- Crispin Elsted, Climate and the Affections
- Charles Lillard, Shadow Weather
- Erin Mouré, Search Procedures
Drama
Winner:
- Colleen Wagner, The Monument
Other Finalists:
- Wendy Lill, The Glace Bay Miners' Museum
- John Mighton, The Little Years
- Michael O'Brien, Mad Boy Chronicle
- Betty Quan, Mother Tongue
Non-Fiction
Winner:
- John Ralston Saul, The Unconscious Civilization
Other Finalists:
- Roy MacGregor, The Home Team - Fathers, Sons & Hockey
- T.F. Rigelhof, A Blue Boy in a Black Dress
- Lake Sagaris, After the First Death: A Journey Through Chile, Time, Mind
- Merilyn Simonds, The Convict Lover: A True Story
Children's Literature - Text
Winner:
- Paul Yee, Ghost Train
Other Finalists:
- Jan Andrews, Keri
- David Boyd, Bottom Drawer
- Gillian Chan, Glory Days and Other Stories
- Don Gillmor, The Fabulous Song
Children's Literature - Illustraion
Winner:
- Eric Beddows, The Rooster's Gift
Other Finalists:
- Alan and Lea Daniel, Sody Salleratus
- Wang Kui, The Wise Washerman - A Folktale from Burma
- Johnny Wales, Gruntle Piggle Takes Off
- Werner Zimmermann, Whatever You Do, Don't Go Near That Canoe!
Translation - from French to English
Winner:
- Linda Gaboriau, Stone and Ashes
Other Finalists:
- Sheila Fischman, Ostend
- D.G. Jones, For Orchestra and Solo Poet
- Shelley Tepperman, In Vitro
Read more about this topic: 1996 Governor General's Awards
Famous quotes containing the words english and/or language:
“To write or even speak English is not a science but an art. There are no reliable words.... Whoever writes English is involved in a struggle that never lets up even for a sentence. He is struggling against vagueness, against obscurity, against the lure of the decorative adjective, against the encroachment of Latin and Greek, and, above all, against the worn-out phrases and dead metaphors with which the language is cluttered up.”
—George Orwell (1903–1950)
“Poetry is the universal language which the heart holds with nature and itself. He who has a contempt for poetry, cannot have much respect for himself, or for anything else.”
—William Hazlitt (1778–1830)