Finalist, Gerald Lampert Memorial Award (2010)

Inventory is a collection of 58 object poems. Taking as a starting point the reciprocal relation between subjects and objects, the book explores the unique way that objects appear in an individual consciousness. Each object in this Inventory exists on its own and also reflects the author's experience, from the mundane stapler and tea bag, to the mysterious, extinct dodo bird, to entities that blur the line between person and thing.

In this way, the collection highlights the often hidden dimensions of the objects we encounter, including their temporal, political, locational and psychic aspects. It offers an opportunity for readers to reconsider their own investments in what, by dictionary definition, should be static categories.

Praise for Inventory:

"Like Francis Ponge, the focus on the object, the specifically physical and phenomenological does something uncanny to the speculative and metaphysical capacities of the Gallic mind for verse, not to mention triggering the wit and twists of logic and direction which make French Canadian Marguerite Pigeon's poems on an apartment block, a banana, a bicycle, any common thing, uncommon, and a lively labyrinth-race of surprises. She deserves a Canadian place beside the French masters of the art." (George McWhirter)

"Inventory by Marguerite Pigeon examines life's often forgotten elements. From her portrait of 'meaning' to her idyllic details of a clothespin, Pigeon is a master of naked realism and organic descriptions of expression. Her first publication, lnventory, was short-listed for the 2010 Gerald Lampert Memorial Award. The book explores the lucid philosophy of simple pleasures – it's a refreshing truth bound in a small package. ... "lnventory is a front-to-back read that meshes simplicity and intricacy in a witty and intelligent style. Pigeon's work is a gem of purity in a complex world." (Poetry is Dead)

"From the font to the cover design to the paper grade, it is a stunning object, which is a fitting irony, given the book is entirely about objects. ... the poet asks where does the object end and our way of seeing them begin? It's sort of like a concept album. Fifty-eight poems, each named for an object, seen from a variety of whimsical perspectives. ... Inventory sparks my interest in reading further work by Pigeon, who shows great promise with this first collection." (The Globe and Mail)

Marguerite Pigeon is a former journalist and traveller turned writer of fiction and poetry. In 2001 she lived for several months near the Honduran-Salvadoran border working with a local indigenous organization, an experience that became the inspiration for Open Pit. She later attended UBC’s Creative Writing MFA program. Since graduating, her short stories and poems have appeared in journals throughout Canada and internationally, and her first book of poetry, Inventory (Anvil 2009), was nominated for the Gerald Lampert Award. Originally from Blind River, Ontario, she currently lives in Vancouver.

Open Pit is her first novel.

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