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Camilla Gibb

The award-winning and bestselling author Camilla Gibb discusses her first poetry collection I Used to be a Pisces (Book*hug Press, 2026), with Joseph Planta.


I Used to be a Pisces by Camilla Gibb (Book*hug Press, 2026).

Click to buy this book from Amazon.ca: I Used to be a Pisces [1]


Text of the introduction by Joseph Planta:

I am Planta: On the Line, in Vancouver, British Columbia, at TheCommentary.ca.  

Camilla Gibb joins me again. The award-wining and bestselling author has recently published her first poetry collection, I Used to Be a Pisces. It’s collection of poetry that examines our relationship to the earth, but also one another. The book also has a number of collages that Camilla’s made, that offer something visually interesting and/or stimulating amidst the poetry. It’s poetry that can cut to the heart or resonate closer than the reader might like. The poems in the collection are meditations on change, not just ourselves and who we might love, but the landscape itself. Camilla looks at relationships that not just affect her life, but those around her. I’ll ask Camilla about the reflections she’s made in this collection and what they might have yielded. I’ll ask her about writing and more. She’s appeared on the program three times previously. In 2010, she discussed her novel The Beauty of Humanity Movement, and in 2015 she returned to talk about her memoir This is Happy. We last spoke in 2021 when her novel The Relatives was published. She is the recipient of the Trillium Book Award, the City of Toronto Book Award, and the CBC Canadian Literary Award. She was shortlisted for the Scotiabank Giller Prize, and the RBC Taylor Prize. She has a PhD in anthropology from Oxford University. This new collection is published by Book*hug Press. We spoke last week with Camilla joining me from Toronto. Please welcome back to the Planta: On the Line program, Camilla Gibb; Professor Gibb, good morning.