When Niigaan Sinclair presented his collection of articles to a publisher in Toronto, he was told that “Winipek: Visions of Canada from an Indigenous Centre” was a “regional book.”

The Winnipeg-based Anishinaabe columnist and publisher recalls being told to expect little attention outside major urban centers, so he wasn’t surprised to see that “80 per cent” of his sales came from Manitoba, northwestern Ontario and Saskatchewan .

But on Wednesday, Sinclair was reassured that the book resonated far beyond its geographic context, winning the Governor General’s Literary Award for non-fiction.

“They didn’t even do book launches for me in the rest of the country. And then boom, these were all hits. I think the country responded,” Sinclair says from Winnipeg in a video call.

Sinclair makes a predictable list announced Wednesday morning that includes fiction winner Jordan Abel of Edmonton for the allegorical novel “Empty Spaces” and poetry winner Chimwemwe Undi of Winnipeg for “Scientific Marvel.”

Abel, a queer Nisga’a writer from Vancouver, says he suspected the unusual approach he took to his debut novel would be a barrier to certain audiences. “Empty Spaces” contains no characters and no dialogue in its examination of Indigenous relationships with lands, displacement and diaspora. Winning the prize for fiction put an end to those concerns.

“This award is incredibly affirming, you know, in that (this book) has done good things in the world, people are interested in it. Not everyone is afraid of difficulty, and that’s a really good feeling,” says Abel of Edmonton , where he is an associate professor of English at the University of Alberta.

“All writing is political, and I think this book is deeply political. So I was hoping for that, or at least hoping for the opening of a conversation. And it’s hard from an author’s perspective to tell whether that happens or not, but I hope it did and there are conversations that continue from this book.”

While on the surface he says Empty Spaces can be described as an indigenous response to James Fenimore Cooper’s The Last of the Mohicans, he says he explores an argument posited by author Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz that Cooper’s book has been instrumental in undoing the guilt associated with indigenous peoples in the Americas and is the backbone of American nationalism.

It’s a timely idea given the hateful rhetoric leading up to and around the most recent US presidential election, Abel notes.

“The work in ‘Empty Spaces’ is not disconnected from the current political climate in America. I can absolutely see the two of them in conversation with each other,” says Abel.

The Canada Council for the Arts announced the winners in seven categories, in both official languages.

The writers, translators and illustrators of the winning books receive $25,000, and the finalists receive $1,000 each. Publishers of winning books receive $3,000 to promote them.

The drama prize went to “There Is Violence and There is Righteous Violence and There Is Death, or the Born-Again Crow” by Calgary’s Caleigh Crow, while the French to English translation prize went to “Nights Too Short to Dance” by Katia Grubisic of Montreal (Second Story Press); a translation of “Un c┼ôur habite de mille voix” by Marie-Claire Blais.

In the Young People’s Literature categories, the text award went to “Crash Landing” by Li Charmaine Anne of New Westminster, BC (Annick Press), while the picture book award went to “Skating Wild on an Inland Sea” by Jean E .Pendziwol of Thunder Bay, Ont. and Todd Stewart of Montreal (Groundwood Books, House of Anansi).

Sinclair also hopes his book can spark conversation about efforts to address Indigenous injustice and violence in “Winipek” — a region that extends beyond Winnipeg to encompass the watershed and parts of other provinces.

“There are other places that are doing important work, but the most critical issue is being addressed here on a daily basis — not so much in Toronto, Montreal, Ottawa,” says Sinclair, a professor in the Native Studies department at the University of Manitoba.

“The kind of front line of Canada has always been Winipek — this territory right here, the first province, the first treaty.”

Sinclair says the vast majority of articles in his book were originally written between 2018 and 2023, although some date back as far as 2009. He says a lot has changed in those intervening years, especially a growing attention and interest in indigenous writing in general – – such as those of Abel, Manitoba Premier Wab Kinew and his late father Murray Sinclair, Chief Commissioner of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission in Residential Schools.

“There’s been a massive amount of interest and engagement. I think the skill level of the country has gone up,” he says.

At the same time, he detected a “very vocal” and “very vocal minority” of residential school naysayers.

“It’s no coincidence that at the very moment indigenous peoples are being listened to there is an equal and opposite force that then starts saying, ‘Don’t listen to them,'” he says.

“There never needed to be a force that said, ‘Don’t listen to them,’ because that’s how society worked.”

This report by The Canadian Press was first published on November 13, 2024.