Toronto poet and indie-press publisher Stuart Ross has been named the recipient of this year’s $10,000 Harbourfront Festival prize.

Established in 1984, the prize is presented each year to recognize an author’s contribution to the Canadian literature community, in terms of their writing but also their support and encouragement of other writers and members of the community.

Ross is a writer, editor, writing teacher and small-press activist originally from Toronto and now living in Cobourg. He has written 20 books of poetry, fiction and essays, taught writing workshops across the country and was the 2010 writer in residence at Queen’s University and has won multiple awards including the 2017 Jewish Literary Award for Poetry. His micro press, Proper Tales, is in its 40th year.

“The Harbourfront Festival Prize is a kind of encouragement I never imagined,” Ross said. Echoing the sentiment of the prize, he said he was “stunned and honoured” to receive the award, noting that it was “all the more poignant for me because I received the news while at the Paris, Ont., home of Nelson Ball, a great and undersung Canadian poet, publisher and bookseller who died in August. I’ve been going through six decades of Nelson’s papers, and hoped I had expressed to him just what a great mentor and example he was for me.”

The recipient of the Harbourfront Festival Prize is selected by a jury each year and the 2019 jury included Deborah Dundas (Toronto Star), Allison Jones (Quill & Quire) and Geoffrey E. Taylor (TIFA).

Past recipients of this prize, which was established in 1984, include Margaret Atwood, Wayson Choy, Austin Clarke, Margaret MacMillan, Lee Maracle, Alice Munro, Michael Ondaatje and Paul Quarrington, among others.