Western University’s David Bentley wins 2015 Killam Prize

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Western University’s David Bentley – a nationally acclaimed teacher from the Faculty of Arts and Humanities and a leading scholar of Canadian poetry – is a 2015 Killam Prize winner.

The Canada Council for the Arts announced the recipients of the 2015 Killam Program earlier today. This prestigious program, administered by the Canada Council, is funded by a private endowment supporting creativity and innovation through research and higher learning.

Five Canadian researchers will receive $100,000 each in recognition of their exceptional career achievements in humanities, engineering, natural sciences, social sciences, health sciences, and interdisciplinary studies within these fields.

“Winning a Killam Prize came as a huge surprise. It is wonderful, and it means a very great deal to me,” says Bentley, a Distinguished University Professor and Western’s Carl F. Klinck Professor in Canadian Literature. “I truly believe that Western was a perfect place for me to pursue my academic career because of the enormous teaching and research opportunities provided by the University.”

From the Canada Council for the Arts official announcement: David Bentley has greatly broadened and enriched understanding and awareness of Canadian literature and culture across Canada and around the world. A nationally acclaimed teacher and leading scholar of Canadian literature and culture, he founded and is continuing editor of Canadian Poetry: Studies, Documents, Reviews, The Canadian Poetry Press, and Canadian Poetry: An Electronic Resource (www.canadianpoetry.ca). In addition to his many publications and presentations on Canadian subjects, he has made significant contributions to scholarship on nineteenth-century English literature and art and to discussions of the importance and value of the arts and humanities.

Bentley becomes Western’s fifth Killam Prize winner and the most recent winner since Economics professor John Whalley won in 2012. Other Western winners include Engineering professors Alan Davenport (1993) and Maurice Bergiougnou (1999) and Robarts Research Institute co-founder Henry Barnett (1988).

For more about the 2015 Killam Program, including the other winners, please visit: https://killamprogram.canadacouncil.ca/en

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Killam Bentley
Killam Bentley