A History of My Brief Body

Billy-Ray Belcourt's debut memoir opens with a tender letter to his kokum and memories of his early life in the hamlet of Joussard, Alberta, and on the Driftpile First Nation. From there, it expands to encompass the big and broken world around him, in all its complexity and contradictions: a legacy of colonial violence and the joy that flourishes in spite of it, first loves and first loves lost, sexual exploration and intimacy, and the act of writing as a survival instinct and a way to grieve. What emerges is not only a profound meditation on memory, gender, anger, shame, and ecstasy, but also the outline of a way forward. With startling honesty, and in a voice distinctly and assuredly his own, Belcourt situates his life experiences within a constellation of seminal queer texts, among which this book is sure to earn its place. Eye-opening, intensely emotional, and excessively quotable, A History of My Brief Body demonstrates over and over again the power of words to both devastate and console us. (From Hamish Hamilton)

A History of My Brief Body is a finalist for the 2020 Governor General's Literary Prize for nonfiction.

Billy-Ray Belcourt is a Rhodes Scholar and PhD student from Driftpile Cree Nation in Alberta. His debut collection of poetry, This Wound is a World, won the 2018 Griffin Poetry Prize. He is also the author of the poetry collection NDN Coping Mechanisms. 

• Here are the finalists for the 2020 Governor General's Literary Awards
• Why Billy-Ray Belcourt felt more empowered after winning the Griffin Prize
• How Billy-Ray Belcourt became the first Indigenous Rhodes Scholar
• Billy-Ray Belcourt on writing an 'instruction manual for a queer Indigenous future'
• Billy-Ray Belcourt on the meditative power of prose
• Billy-Ray Belcourt wins $65K Griffin Poetry Prize for This Wound is a World
• 47 works of Canadian nonfiction coming out in fall 2020
• The CBC Books fall 2020 reading list
• The best Canadian nonfiction of 2020

Interviews with Billy-Ray Belcourt

Unreserved11:12Racist experiences prompted Billy-Ray Belcourt to write poetry, then he won the Griffin Poetry Prize

When Billy-Ray Belcourt went to Oxford as a Rhodes Scholar, he'd never written poetry. But racist experiences and feeling "unbodied" while studying overseas inspired his Griffin prize winning book, This Wound Is a World.

As It Happens6:34U of A student named first-ever First Nations Rhodes Scholar

Billy-Ray Belcourt is one of three University of Alberta students to be awarded a Rhodes Scholarship, and he's the first First Nations student to be awarded the prize.

Other books by Billy-Ray Belcourt