Audrey Poetker

Audrey Poetker
Born1962 (1962)
Steinbach, Manitoba
OccupationPoet
NationalityCanadian
Period1980s–present
Notable worksstanding all the night through
Spouse
(m. 1991; died 2022)

Audrey Poetker (born 1962) is a Canadian poet and translator from New Bothwell, Manitoba.[1][2]

Career

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Born in Steinbach, Manitoba,[3] Poetker grew up in a Mennonite home in rural Manitoba.[4] She began publishing poetry in the 1980s and is the author of three volumes of poetry: i sing for my dead in german (1986), standing all the night through (1992) (writing as Audrey Poetker-Thiessen) and Making Strange to Yourself (1999), all published by Turnstone Press.[5] standing all the night through was a finalist for the McNally Robinson Book of the Year Award.[6] Along with Di Brandt her work is considered an important early example of secular Mennonite poetry and, along with Armin Wiebe, she is noted for the use of untranslated Plautdietsch (Mennonite Low German) words within her texts.[7][8]

Poetker was married to lexicographer Jack Thiessen from 1991 until his death in 2022, with whom she has translated Bern G. Langin's The Russian Germans Under the Double Eagle and the Soviet Star into English.[9][10]

References

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  1. ^ Audrey Poetker (1986). i sing for my dead in german. Turnstone Press.
  2. ^ "An Explorer's Guide to Manitoba Books". Armin Wiebe. Retrieved August 20, 2022.
  3. ^ Audrey Poetker (1986). i sing for my dead in german. Turnstone Press.
  4. ^ Audrey Poetker (1986). i sing for my dead in german. Turnstone Press.
  5. ^ Magdalene Redekop. Making Believe:Questions About Mennonites and Art. University of Manitoba Press.
  6. ^ Ann Hostetler. A Capella:Mennonite Voices in Poetry. University of Iowa Press.
  7. ^ "Book Reviews". Journal of Mennonite Studies.
  8. ^ Robert Zacharias (2022). Reading Mennonite Writing:A Study in Minor Transnationalism. Penn State University Press.
  9. ^ Ann Hostetler. A Capella:Mennonite Voices in Poetry. University of Iowa Press.
  10. ^ "Jack Peter Thiessen Obituary". Crossings Funeral Care. Retrieved October 12, 2022.