Biography

Jason Heroux (born 1971)^[1] is a Canadian poet. He is the third poet laureate of the city of Kingston, Ontario, Canada, a position to which he was appointed in 2018.^[2] He is the author of four books of poetry and three novels;^[3] his works have been translated into French, Italian, and Arabic.^[4] He was born in Montreal, and has lived in Kingston since 1990.^[5] He has described his writing as "the surrealism of the everyday",^[6] a characterization elaborated on by Christopher Doda, who writes that Heroux's poems "contain a keen sense of the uncanny, the moment where the commonplace becomes unsettling, when one's comfortable surroundings become a landscape of disquietude."^[7] Poems of his were selected for Best Canadian Poetry in English in 2008, 2011, and 2016.^[8] His first poetry collection, Memoirs of an Alias, was called "an amazing debut" by a reviewer in Books in Canada;^[9] his 2012 collection Natural Capital was described as "a helluva good read" by a review in Arc Poetry Magazine, which concluded, "I'd give it several major prizes all at once."^[10] Heroux's novel Good Evening, Central Laundromat was shortlisted for the 2011 ReLit Awards,^[11] and his poetry collection Natural Capital was shortlisted for the 2013 ReLit Awards.^[12]

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