Joel Michael Yates (April 10, 1938 – April 15, 2019), known as J. Michael Yates, was a Canadian poet, dramatist, fiction writer, and corrections officer.
Early life and career
Yates was born in Fulton, Missouri and raised in Germany. He did graduate degrees at the Universities of Missouri and Michigan, and received an honorary doctorate from Ohio University. Yates emigrated to Vancouver, British Columbia in 1966.
Yates was a widely published author of poetry, fiction, drama, translations, and philosophical essays. He edited several anthologies and founded and edited several literary magazines. His work has been translated into most of the western languages and several of the eastern ones and his drama for radio, television, and stage have been produced both nationally and internationally. His last rank as a university professor was Distinguished Professor.
He won many literary prizes including the Major Hopwood Awards (both poetry and drama the same year) and the Lifetime Achievement Award in the Arts and Sciences from University of Missouri, The Look of Books (for Volvox: Poetry from the Unofficial Languages of Canada in English Translation), The Olympic Arts Award for Schedules of Silence.
He was also a logger, a powder monkey, a motorcycle racer, a broadcasting executive, a broadcaster, an advertising executive, a print salesman, a commercial photographer, a publisher. He retired after seventeen years as a Maximum Security Prison Guard and SWAT team member, and taught languages, history of ideas, and science with his wife in their home in Vancouver.
Death
Yates died on April 15, 2019, at his home in Vancouver. He was survived by his wife and two stepsons.
Bibliography
Poetry Spiral of Mirrors - 1967 Hunt in an Unmapped Interior - 1967 Cantacle for Electronic Music - 1967 Parallax - 1971 The Great Bear Lake Meditations - 1971 Nothing Speaks for the Blue Moraines - 1973 Breath of the Snow Leopard - 1974 The Qualicum Physics - 1975 Esox Nobilior Non Esox Lucius - 1978 Fugue Brancusi - 1983 Insel: The Queen Charlotte Islands Meditations - 1983 Various Northern Meditations - 1984 The Completely Collapsible Portable Man - 1984 Schedules of Silence - 1986 During - 1999 Hongyun: New and Collected Shorter Poems 1955-2005 - 2005
Fiction Man in the Glass Octopus - 1968 Fazes in Elsewhen - 1976 Torque - 1988 Torpor: Collected Fiction, 1960-1987 - 1989
Fiction and drama The Abstract Beast - 1971
Drama Night Freight - 1975
Non-fiction Line Screw: Memoir of a Prison Guard - 1994
Anthologies Light Like a Summons - 1990
Awards International Broadcasting Award, 1960 and 1961 Major Hopwood Award for Poetry and Drama from the University of Michigan, 1964 Look of Books Award, 1972 Lifetime Achievement Award in the Arts and Sciences from the University of Missouri The Writer's Choice Award, 1988 The Vancouver Award for Line Screw
References
External links Official Site Archives of J. Michael Yates (J. Michael Yates fonds, R11834) are held at Library and Archives Canada