Kama
La Mackerel
Kama La Mackerel is a multilingual Mauritian-Canadian writer, visual artist, performer, educator, and translator of fiction and children’s literature. In 2020, their book ZOM-FAM was shortlisted for the Dayne Ogilvie Prize for LGBTQ2S+ Emerging Writers, named a best poetry collection of the year by CBC Books, and included on The Globe and Mail’s list of best debut books. La Mackerel is a recipient of the Canada Council for the Arts’ Joseph S. Stauffer Prize in the visual art category. They live in Tio’tia:ke (Montreal).
Award History
2021 Finalist
Dayne Ogilvie Prize for LGBTQ2S+ Emerging WritersJury Citation
“Kama La Mackerel’s poetry is a sensuous and fiercely political exploration of gender, familial love, and the intergenerational impacts of colonization. Their multilingual, lyrical poems entrance with hypnotic rhythm and tell a story that spans decades and borders. La Mackerel captures the power of connections maintained in spite of the blunt, relentless pain of distance. Wooing the reader with a carefully orchestrated, gentle lapping of words, they then jolt us with earned, splashy staccatos of euphoria.”
— 2021 Dayne Ogilvie Prize jury (Daniel Allen Cox, Eva Crocker, and Danny Ramadan)
