In two days, Sid Marty will learn whether he has hit the $50,000 jackpot.
The Lundbreck, Alta., poet, writer and singer has been shortlisted for an Alberta Arts Award. The winner will be announced Sept. 6.
“I have a one-in-three chance,” Marty said when asked about his likelihood of success.
Others nominated for the Grant MacEwan literary award include Calgary poet and educator Christopher Wiseman and Laurie Greenwood, a literacy advocate from Edmonton.
Marty has written five books of nonfiction and three of poetry, as well as articles for various magazines including Canadian Geographic and Legacy.
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He was shortlisted in 1996 for a governor-general of Canada award for one of his books and was passed over then.
Marty writes mainly on natural history and western life and culture. One of his early books, published in 1978, was Men for the Mountains. It was twice cited by the National Parks and Wilderness Association as one of the 50 books most influential in the Canadian conservation movement. It is partly based on his experience as a park warden in the Rocky Mountain parks.
Marty has long been a singer-guitarist who performs his original songs about Western Canada at various venues and on radio.
While he said he would prefer to be known as a writer rather than a performer, his singing may be the way most people connect with him. He and blues guitar player Ken Hamm will be touring though Alberta and the interior of British Columbia this fall.
The Delta Blues and Mountain Ballads show starts Sept. 26 in Twin Butte, Alta.
His latest book, The Black Grizzly of Whiskey Creek, describes a 1980 summer of bear attacks on humans around Banff.
