Interview by Irma Kurti in Italia News Media (In Italian and English) and in Dooley’s Books, and in Oceano News (in Italian) and Women’s Literature Books, July 2024 and Quick Word News and Fjala e Lire (in Albanian) August  2024 and in Orfeu Magazine (in Kosovo in Albanian) September 2024 and InSight Magazine September 2024

https://alessandria.today/2024/07/05/irma-kurti-interviews-allison-grayhurst-canada/

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https://www.dooleysbooks.com/author-interviews-2024

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http://www.oceanonellanima.it/oceano/blogocn/blog_post.php?id=894

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Women’s Literature Books, July 2024

https://www.womensliteraturebooks.com/women-s-literature-author-interviews/1935000_author-allison-grayhurst?fbclid=IwY2xjawEZoNxleHRuA2FlbQIxMAABHTdd2VrJtMm3-ANBEy5frH-Vzrdd_RWUM0gAsAW8RQViFCwuS2re9j0jxw_aem_5xO4f53Drk9cmalKXDacgg

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https://quick-world-news.com/?p=14203

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https://www.fjalaelire.com/post/irma-kurti-intervist%C3%AB-me-poeten-allison-grayhurst-kanada

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https://orfeu.al/irma-kurti-interviste-me-poeten-allison-grayhurst-kanada

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https://www.insightmagazine25.com/2048386_allison-grayhurst-author-interview

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ALLISON GRAYHURST has been nominated for “Best of the Net” five
times. She has over 1,400 poems published in over 530 international
journals, including translations of her work.  She has 25 published
books of poetry and 6 chapbooks. She is an ethical vegan and lives in
Toronto with her family. She also sculpts, working with clay.

1. When and how did you start writing?

I’ve been writing since grade school. Language and writing have always been integral to my life as both my parents were writers/journalists. When I was five my family moved to Spain for a year so my dad could write a novel. Reciting Shakespeare and other poets at the dinner table was something my father did often. My mother helped me write my first short story and was always a great supporter of my poetry.

2. Do you remember what was your first poem or story was about?

My first short story was written when I was 12 and it was about a dolphin. My first writing of poetry was never a single poem. Starting at about 14 I would just constantly write pages of freestyle poetry/thoughts/images, trying to find my voice. None of it I kept.

3. When did poetry become an essential part of your life?

It always has been an essential part of my life. As I child I moved around a lot and so lived more in my imagination than in real life. I didn’t want to be a poet, but finally accepted when I was about 19 that I had no choice. 

4. You have published 25 books of poetry. What book do you feel connected to the most?

Right now, the book I just published called “The Light Given”, particular the 34-page poem in it called “My Mother’s Sky” which is about the recent loss of my mother. Then maybe “Walkways” for the depths and heights it took me, and “The River is Blind” for igniting a new type of inspiration within me.

5. What do you enjoy doing in your spare time?

I love being around animals, they are my joy. Before my mother got sick, I volunteered at an animal shelter, which I hope to start doing again soon. Other than that, reading, spending time with my soulmate husband Kyp Harness, who is a great artist, singer/songwriter and novelist, and hanging with our two adult children, Ava and Clay.

6. Some years ago the Canadian singer, songwriter and musician
   Diane Barbarash transformed eight of your poems into songs,
   creating a full album entitled RIVER. Can you tell us something
   more about this collaboration and experience?

Diane and I have been close friends since I was 15. She was the person I moved in with when I left home at 16. In our 30s we gradually lost touch as she moved to the other side of Canada. When we got back in touch again, she asked if she could make an album using some of my poems that were written and published years ago. Daine is so talented and has an astounding voice, so of course I said yes! We worked together back and forth through emails as some of the poems had to have the lines adjusted to fit the songs she created out of them. It was a beautiful and meaningful collaboration for both of us, and Diane and I are still the closest of friends.

7. What are some challenges that you have faced in your literary
   path?

In the past I would have said publishing, finding my niche in the publishing world, as well as not having the money to send my work out. But not anymore. The internet has made publishing a lot easier, and I usually don’t have a hard to get my work published when it is ready to be published. Do I wish I had a wider audience? Yes, but I find myself not caring about that as much anymore. So right now, I have no challenges except what I face as an artist to create out of necessity and vitality, never out of habit.

8. Why do you write?

Because I have to, there is no other reason. Writing is like eating for me and has been for most of my life. There were many times when I told myself I would never write again and many times I never wanted to write again. But now, I’ve stopped thinking that way as I know I am only fooling myself.

9. Do you think that writing has the power to change our lives?

Writers, poets and philosophers have changed my life over and over again, and even saved my life, so I would say yes, without a doubt.

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An Interview with Our Poetry Archive, May 2024

 INTERVIEW WITH NILVRONILL SHOOVRO

NILAVRONILL: Welcome to Our Poetry Archive, dear poet. And congratulations as the poet of this month. I would like to know your personal views on literature or poetry in general.

ALLISON GRAYHURST:   I feel literature and poetry are art forms and also vehicles to express spiritual insight. All the great poets are prophets of the human condition. We’re privileged to take part in God’s creation and announce the spiritual reality behind the things we see and experience every day.

NILAVRONILL: What are the factors that have influenced you immensely in the growing phase of your literary life. When, most probably you were not certain of your future as a poet or writer. Do you think society as a whole is the key factor in shaping up you as a poet, or your poetry altogether?

ALLISON GRAYHURST: Great artists like Rilke, Dostoevsky, Plath, Nietzsche, Rodin, Pablo Neruda and others have influenced me in the shaping of my voice as a poet. I’m greatly inspired by the authenticity of the animal world as well. I’ve learned never to think of the future as a poet.  Society has only been a key factor in my evolution as an artist in that I’ve had to learn some hard lessons in trying to survive as an artist. The struggles society has imposed have certainly informed the content and emotions contained in my poetry, yet these struggles are not unique to me.

NILAVRONILL: Is there anyone in your life, influenced you personally to develop your literary skills? Or inspire you to become a poet?

ALLISON GRAYHURST:  My parents were journalists – a very different type of writing, but still writers. In terms of ongoing inspiration, my husband Kyp Harness is a great writer, both of songs and fiction (he’s published two novels). As for the inspiration to become a poet in the first place, life did that. I didn’t want to become a poet, and in fact I resisted it.  But life, inspiration, my spiritual beliefs, and my natural inclination made me a poet.

NILAVRONILL: Do you consider your literary life as an extension of your self-existence? If so, how it is related with the time around you?

ALLISON GRAYHURST: My literary life is one and the same as my self-existence.  I seek the purity of a poetry that arises naturally from one’s life.  It relates implicitly to the time around me because I am a person of this time – striving for the eternal.

NILAVRONILL: According to you, what are the conditions to develop the creative soul of a poet in general? We would like to know from your personal experiences.

ALLISON GRAYHURST: A poet can create in any conditions. All throughout time poets have created without there being an ideal condition set up for them. All that’s needed is time, a drive that presents as necessity, and perhaps silence.

NILAVRONILL: Do you think in this age of information and technology the dimensions of literature have been largely extended beyond our preconceived ideas about literature in general?

ALLISON GRAYHURST: There are many more places to get published online and the process of submitting has been made a great deal easier than when you had to pay for postage.  Beyond that, not much has changed – time is still the great editor and decides whose work lives on eternally.

NILAVRONILL: As a poet, do socio-economy and politics in general influence your literary visions? If so how, and if not, why?

ALLISON GRAYHURST: Certainly much pain and spiritual struggle has come about because of politics and society, and that hardship – shared by everyone on the planet – has informed my poetry.  But as for them as subjects in themselves, they have very little interest to me.

NILAVRONILL: Do you consider, your national identity as an important factor to influence your literary creativity? Is your national identity an incentive for you to find your own literary voice?

ALLISON GRAYHURST: I am not a believer in nationalism, and like the subjects above, it only has tangential importance to my work.  My poetry comes from a place where we are all part of the same spiritual existence, the same universe, rather than being part of a place or a country. Saying that, I love feeling enveloped in the starkness, the raw, forgiving beauty that can happen on Canadian winter’s early morning.

NILAVRONILL: In between tradition and modernism, which one influence you most and why?

ALLISON GRAYHURST: They both influence me equally.  I would not be who I am without the writing of the past that I’ve read.  My poetry wouldn’t be what it is without being open to all the influences of modernism any artist of her time must be.  The content of my work is informed by tradition; the style of it by modernism.

NILAVRONILL: Do you think honest literary criticism has much to do with the development of a poet and the true understanding of his or her poetry?

ALLISON GRAYHURST: Ultimately we aren’t justified or validated by criticism or outward forces.  That can only happen within.

NILAVRONILL: I would like to know, whether your contemporaries inspire your writings in any way.

ALLISON GRAYHURST: No. In fact, I have delved further into the past where I have found my most recent literary inspiration – to Homer’s The Iliad – the first breath and fire of western literature.

NILAVRONILL: Do you believe, literature can eventually help people to uplift human conscience?

ALLISON GRAYHURST: I believe literature can help people to uplift human conscience – whether it will or not is a different matter.  There’s no doubt that inspired literature written in a pure way can, has, and always will uplift humanity.  The question is: to what degree?  So far, not enough – and that’s the human condition.  I also think writing literature that tries to uplift humanity is the quickest way to get literature that doesn’t uplift humanity.

NILAVRONILL: Humanity has suffered immensely in the past, and is still suffering around the world. We all know it well. As a poet or even as a literary person, how do you foresee the future of mankind?

ALLISON GRAYHURST: As I said, a poet doesn’t think about the future – only the present moment.  But I think to see the future you have to study the past. As well, I think it’s far too late in history to be using the term ‘mankind’ to refer to humanity.  ‘Humankind’, as used by Gorbachev, is much more appropriate.

NILAVRONILL: We are almost at the end of the interview. I remain obliged to you for your participation. Now, personally I would like to know your honest opinion about Our Poetry Archive. Since April 2015 we are publishing and archiving contemporary world poetry each and every month. Thank you for sharing your views and spending much time with us.

ALLISON GRAYHURST: I think highly of Our Poetry Archive, and greatly appreciate that all my work submitted has always been published. I am honoured to be chosen as the Poet of the Month. Thank you for this interview and for including my work.

SHORT BIO:

Allison Grayhurst has been nominated for “Best of the Net” five times. She has over 1400 poems published in over 530 international journals, including translations of her work. She has 25 published books of poetry and 6 chapbooks. She is an ethical vegan and lives in Toronto with her family. She also sculpts, working with clay; http://www.allisongrayhurst.com

https://ourpoetryarchive.blogspot.com/2024/05/allison-grayhurst-interview.html

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