Poet Laureate

Janice Lore 2024 - 2026

Photo: Nora Boileau Morrison

Janice Lore has had a life-long love of poetry and theatre, and has written poetry, plays and stories since she was 7 years old. “Writing,” she says, “is one of the ways I make sense of the world.” As Tofino’s 2024-2026 Poet Laureate and longtime Tofino resident, Janice can be found around town performing poetry and facilitating community events that celebrate local poets and other creatives.

Janice was raised on a farm in southern Alberta, and comes from a large family of entrepreneurs. In 1994, she moved to Tofino BC, on the west coast of Vancouver Island. Janice ran her own accounting business for almost 40 years while writing poetry, creative non-fiction, fiction and plays, and collaborating with other artists on various performances. She has the ubiquitous novel in a drawer (as well as a play!) and is still trying to write a poem about a dream she had, in which she was looking for the balancing accounting entry for a poem.

Janice’s work has appeared in various anthologies and literary magazines, and on CBC Radio. She is interested in multi-disciplinary art projects and is inspired by collaborating with other artists. She scripted and staged a performance of her poetry chapbook, Ipsissima Verba, a “found” poem about math, philosophy, definitions and a middle-aged woman’s life. Her first commissioned work, “Requiem for the Fridge”, was written on the door of a dead refrigerator. She also makes handmade books to showcase her poetry.

Janice is a member of the Clayoquot Writers Group and Federation of British Columbia Writers, and an associate member of the League of Canadian Poets. She is a founding member of Performance Anxiety Collective, a performance poetry collective, which first presented its work to the public in December 2011. She is also a member of The Diversity Project, a performance group formed to explore universal themes through a tapestry of art forms. Their first show, Unwrapping Fear, was performed in 2014.