Prathna Lor recently completed a PhD in the Department of English at the University of Toronto. Lor’s dissertation is titled “Unthinkable Subjects: Postmortem Poetics in Modernity.” Their second poetry chapbook 7, 2 (Toronto: Knife Fork Books) was published in 2019. Lor is the poetry editor at the Canadian online literary journal Shrapnel Magazine. They live in Montreal, QC.
Poetry (Chapbook)
7, 2
Toronto: Knife Fork Book, 2019.
Publisher’s Synopsis (From its website)
Prathna Lor’s second poetry chapbook joins oblique objects with the tender edges of parataxis and longing. 7,2 is full of the solidity of the hard-won image: inside one finds tiny carnages mixed with rejuvenation; the tickle of epiphany narrowly escaped; the freshness of a syntax hardly worn. Here is a lesson in the benevolent contradiction of how speaking hurt nourishes.
Poetry
Emanations: Poems
Hamilton: Wolsak & Wynn, 2022.
PS8623.O7 E43 2022
Publisher’s Synopsis (From its website)
In Prathna Lor’s first full-length collection we are introduced to a unique voice in Canadian poetry. Moving fluidly between prose poems and more fractured, open verse, Lor meditates on voice, on disaster and on identity, pushing always against commodification, against a consumable narrative.
Awards and Honours
2023 Lambda Literary Awards–Transgender Poetry (Finalist)
Poetry (Chapbook)
Ventriloquism
Portland, OR: Future Tense Books, 2010.
Also available as a Kindle e-book.
Publisher’s Synopsis (From its website)
Lor’s quick stories are both darkly funny and emotionally unsettling, with a style that focuses heavily on amazing sentences and sexually ambiguous undertones.
Note: Kevin Sampsell, an editor at Future Tense Books observed in a blogpost that: “Ventriloquism features works that do that wondrous thing I love so much–when a piece of writing feels so fresh and original that you’re not sure if it’s prose poetry or flash fiction. It’s beautifully uncategorizable, with body parts flitting their way through deeper emotions that Lor’s language tries to dissect with grace and force and unexpected humour.” Cf. http://htmlgiant.com/tag/prathna-lor/
Links
Prathna Lor personal website
Publisher Future Tense Books
Publisher Knife Fork Book
Publisher Wolsak & Wynn