Hamilton Poet David McFadden dies at age 77
The Canadian literary community is mourning the passing of poet, novelist and travel writer David McFadden.
His death on Wednesday at age 77 comes just a day before the award of the $65,000 Griffin Prize for Poetry. McFadden was nominated in 2008 and won in 2013 for his collection “What’s The Score?”
In a statement posted on their website, the Griffin Trust said they were “deeply saddened” by his death and also offered “profound condolences to his beloved partner Merlin Homer and to the countless lovers of poetry who were delighted by his wry, perceptive words and were privileged to experience his wit, intelligence, kind mentoring, friendship and inspiration.”
Poet and editor Stuart Ross, who worked with McFadden on his last seven books, paid tribute, saying “We’ve lost a brilliant poet completely without pretension: his poetry was deeply human, a very friendly poetry, and full of curiosity and wonder. Exactly like Dave himself.”
“When I first discovered his poetry at age 15, I couldn’t believe it: you could write about profound things, and still be conversational and funny and even surreal. It was transformative for me.”
In an interview with the Toronto Star around the time of his 2008 Griffin prize nomination for “Why Are You So Sad?,” McFadden said, “The poet Frank O’Hara once remarked he wanted to die unheralded ... He didn’t want any honours. It might seem a little phoney for him to say that, but I understand what he was talking about. People keep saying to me, ‘Congratulations. It’s about time.’ What do you mean, ‘It’s about time?’ I’m only 68.”
Born and raised in Hamilton, McFadden worked at The Hamilton Spectator as a reporter covering police and courts, city hall and writing before becoming a fulltime literary writer in 1976 and moving to Toronto, where his writing was championed by the likes of George Bowering.
At age 71, he was diagnosed with logopenic aphasia caused by Alzheimer’s disease, the effects of which he wrote about in a moving essay for Toronto Life in 2014.
McFadden published more than 30 volumes of verse, three of which were nominated for the Governor General’s Literary Award: “Gypsy Guitar,” “The Art of Darkness” and “Be Calm, Honey.” In the 1980s he also wrote three well-regarded travelogues of his trips around the Great Lakes, collectively known as the “Great Lakes Suite.”