Mogul Recollected

In 1836 an elephant drowned off the coast of New Brunswick. Poet Richard Outram explores the significance of this bizarre occurrence in his brilliant new volume of poetry, Mogul Recollected.

These witty and profound poems recreate the dismal conditions of Mogul''s existence before he plunged to his death during a ship fire. Some are told from the point of view of Mogul himself, others from the perspective of ruthless trainers and circus owners. Recasting the tragedy as an inversion of the Noah''s Ark story, Outram delineates with startling clarity man''s betrayal of beast.

Outram was born in Canada in 1930. He was a graduate of the University of Toronto (English and Philosophy), and worked for many years at the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation as a stagehand crew leader. He wrote more than twenty books, four of these published by the Porcupine''s Quill (Man in Love [1985, Hiram and Jenny [1988, Mogul Recollected [1993, and Dove Legend [2001). He won the City of Toronto Book Award in 1999 for his collection Benedict Abroad (St Thomas Poetry Series). His poetry is the subject of a significant work of literary criticism, Through Darkling Air: The Poetry of Richard Outram, by Peter Sanger (Gaspereau Press, 2010).

Richard Outram died in 2005.