Karen Shenfeld About Contact
Poet, Filmmaker, Writer, Editor
Photo of Karen Shenfeld, leaning on a table.
Photo by Cathy Gauthier

"She is a magician of sorts who makes ancient voices familiar while imbuing modern life with archaic resonance."
—Ricardo Sternberg on Karen Shenfeld.

Poetry by Karen Shenfeld

Book cover of Karen Shenfeld - The Law of Return
Book cover of Karen Shenfeld - The Fertile Crescent
Book cover of Karen Shenfeld - My Father's Hands Spoke in Yiddish
Book cover of Karen Shenfeld - To Measure the World

Films by Karen Shenfeld

Biography of Karen Shenfeld

Karen Shenfeld was born and raised in a 1950s’ Toronto subdivision named for a minor English lord. She is the daughter of Louis Shenfeld, a world-renowned expert on urban air pollution and Margaret Parker Shenfeld, one of Canada's first female dentists. Karen followed in the academic footsteps of her paternal aunt, attaining an Honours B.A. in English Literature from York University. There, she studied under the tutelage of the fine poet, and scholar of the English Romantics, Robert Casto. She was also mentored by the prophet, Irving Layton.

On her 18th birthday, she received a pair of embroidered, camel-skin slippers, a gift from a friend who had travelled in the Indian province of Rajasthan. Once she slipped them on her bare feet, she was unable to remove them, and she was suddenly struck by a desire for adventure.

Among her many journeys, she has crossed the Sahara Desert from north to south through Algeria, travelled the length of the Congo River in Africa by riverboat, and voyaged through India, from Kashmir to Kerala. It was on the road that she began to pursue her reckless calling of poetry.

She has published three books of poetry with Guernica Editions: The Law of Return (1999), which won the Canadian Jewish Book Award for poetry in 2001, The Fertile Crescent (2005), and My Father’s Hands Spoke in Yiddish (2010). She published her most recent book of poetry, To Measure the World, with Ekstasis Editions in May of 2020.

She has given numerous national and international readings, and her work has also appeared in well-known journals and anthologies published in Canada, the United States, England, South Africa, Mexico, and Bangladesh. Her poetry has been read on CBC Radio, and she has been interviewed on air for CKLN's programme, "In Other Words.” She has also read her poetry and/or been interviewed on “The Shortwave Shindig,” produced by David Goren in Flatbush, N.Y., and on “39 Dover Street” and “16 Gwendoline Street,” short-wave radio programmes produced by Stephen John Jones in Britain.

Shenfeld has been the recipient of Toronto, Ontario, and Canada arts council grants to support the writing of her poetry.

Karen Shenfeld has also brought her poetic sensibility to the writing of magazine stories and filmmaking. Her personal documentary, Il Giardino, The Gardens of Little Italy, was screened at the 2007 Planet in Focus Environmental Film & Video Festival. Her second documentary, Maggie & Merly, premiered at the 2017 ReelHeart International Film and Screenplay Festival.

The Toronto-born traveller now lives in Magnetawan, a small village in the near north of Ontario, with acoustic blues guitarist, Jim McCuaig. She is currently writing her fifth book of poetry and a screenplay for a feature film that has been optioned by the director, Bruce McDonald. She has one son, AI software engineer Oren Watson.