Authors & Headliners

Writer and storyteller Shauntay Grant served as Halifax’s third poet laureate. A descendant of Black Loyalists, Jamaican Maroons, and Black Refugees who came to Canada during the 18th and 19th centuries, Shauntay’s love of language stretches back to her storytelling roots in Nova Scotia’s historic Black communities. She is a multidisciplinary artist with professional degrees and training in creative writing, music, and theatre, and her homegrown artistic practice embraces African Nova Scotian folk tradition as well as contemporary approaches to literature and performance. She is currently developing her stage play The Bridge as 2b theatre company’s Playwright-In-Residence; the company will premiere the work in 2019. Shauntay’s awards and honours include a Poet of Honour prize from Spoken Word Canada, a Best Atlantic Published Book Prize from the Atlantic Book Awards, and a Joseph S. Stauffer Prize from the Canada Council for the Arts. She teaches creative writing at Dalhousie University.