Ian Williams

Ian Williams is the author of seven books of fiction, poetry, and nonfiction, including What I Mean to Say, the 2024 CBC Massey Lectures o rehabilitating conversations. His previous book, Disorientation, considers the impact of racial encounters on ordinary people. It was selected as a best book of the year by the Boston Globe. His novel, Reproduction, won the Scotiabank Giller Prize and was published in Canada, the US, the UK, and Italy. His poetry collection, Word Problems, converts the ethical and political issues of our time into math and grammar problems. It won the Raymond Souster Award from the League of Canadian Poets. His previous collection, Personals, was shortlisted for the Griffin Poetry Prize and the Robert Kroetsch Poetry Book Award. His short story collection, Not Anyone’s Anything, won the Danuta Gleed Literary Award for the best first collection of short fiction in Canada. His first book, You Know Who You Are, was a finalist for the ReLit Poetry Prize. He is a trustee for the Griffin Poetry Prize. 

Williams completed his Ph.D. at the University of Toronto and is a tenured full professor of English, director of the Creative Writing program, and academic advisor for the Massey College William Southam Journalism Fellowship. He was a former Canadian Writer-in-Residence for the University of Calgary’s Distinguished Writers Program and has held many other posts, including Visiting Fellow at the American Library in Paris.