The evolution of Farkas’ poetry since he began writing it 35 years ago illuminates one of Montreal’s key literary figures, first, as one of the Vehicule poets of the 1970s, an experimental group of writers bent on celebrating life and pushing the boundaries of their craft and, later, as one profoundly aware of his role as a poet engaged with the world, one with a social conscience and a moral obligation to speak about it. In many of his darker poems, he ruminates on oppression and injustice and on some of the sources of Man’s more subtle discontent, but always somewhere in the shadows lurks a hopefulness, an awareness that the jazz that paints the night is also about love and human fellowship—and compassion. As a poet, Endre Farkas celebrates the flux, the internal energy of a poem. He is not afraid to

Endre Farkas was born in Hungary and is a child of Holocaust survivors. He and his parents escaped during the 1956 uprising and settled in Montreal. His work has always had a political consciousness and has always pushed the boundaries of poetry. Since the 1970s, he has collaborated with dancers, musicians and actors to move the poem from page to stage. Still at the forefront of the Quebec English language literary scene - writing, editing, publishing and performing - Farkas is the author of eleven books, including Quotidian Fever: New and Selected Poems (1974-2007). He is the two-time regional winner of the CBC Poetry "Face Off" Competition. His play, Haunted House, based on the life and work of the poet A.M. Klein, was produced in Montreal in 2009. Farkas has given readings throughout Canada, USA, Europe and Latin America. His poems have been translated into French and Spanish, Hungarian, Italian, Slovenian and Turkish.

Endre Farkas' profile page