{{short description|Canadian author and poet|bot=PearBOT 5}} {{Use dmy dates|date=January 2025}} thumb|Image of David Arnason '''David Arnason''' (born 23 May 1940) is a Canadian author and poet of Icelandic heritage from Winnipeg, Manitoba.
==Life== Born in Gimli, Manitoba, Arnason is of Icelandic descent and often writes about the Icelandic community in Canada. He is the son of Baldwin and Gudrun Arnason<ref name=":0">{{Cite web|url=https://umlarchives.lib.umanitoba.ca/david-arnason-fonds|title=David Arnason fonds – University of Manitoba Archives|website=umlarchives.lib.umanitoba.ca|language=en|access-date=2018-03-03}}</ref> and the eldest of seven children. He attended the University of Manitoba where he received a B.A. (1961), a Certificate in Education (1963) and M.A. (1969), and has a PhD from the University of New Brunswick (1983–1984).<ref name=":0" /><ref name="umanitoba.ca">{{cite web |url=http://www.umanitoba.ca/canlit/authorlist/individual/homepages/david_arnason/arnason.html |title=Gimli born writer |accessdate=2010-02-19 |url-status=dead |archiveurl=https://web.archive.org/web/20081001213208/http://www.umanitoba.ca/canlit/authorlist/individual/homepages/david_arnason/arnason.html |archivedate=1 October 2008 }}</ref> Arnason co-founded the ''Journal of Canadian Fiction''<ref name=":0" /> with John Moss at the University of New Brunswick in 1972.
He was one of the co-founders of Queenston House Press in Winnipeg and has been an editor of Turnstone Press in Winnipeg since 1975. He was chairman of the Literary Press Group and a member of the executive of the Association of Canadian Publishers. He served on the Manitoba Arts Council 1985–1987. He was a general editor of the Macmillan Themes in Canadian Literature series.<ref name=":0" /> He has been a member of the advisory board of Anansi Press.<ref name=":0" /> He began working for the CBC in the early 1970s; he has reviewed books and theatre, as well as created various radio adaptations.<ref name=":0" /> He has written short stories, poetry, and novels, fiction and non-fiction.<ref name=":0" /> He edited Dorothy Livesay's ''Right Hand, Left Hand''.<ref name=":0" />
He has taught at the University of Manitoba since 1973<ref name=":0" /> and was the head of the English Department from 1997 to 2006.<ref name="umanitoba.ca"/> He was Acting Head of the Department of Icelandic, at the University of Manitoba from 1998 to 2006. As of 2018, he is a full professor at the University of Manitoba and chair of both the Icelandic and the English departments.<ref name=":0" /> The University of Manitoba Archives and Special Collections hold the David Arnason Fonds,<ref name=":0" /> which includes manuscripts and correspondence.<ref name=":0" /><ref>{{Cite web |title=University of Manitoba - Libraries - David Arnason fonds |url=https://www.umanitoba.ca/libraries/units/archives/collections/rad/arnason.html |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210914172946/https://www.umanitoba.ca/libraries/units/archives/collections/rad/arnason.html |archive-date=14 September 2021 |access-date=2026-03-30 |website=www.umanitoba.ca |url-status=dead }}</ref>
==Works== *1980: ''Marsh Burning'' *1981: ''The Icelanders'' *1982: ''Fifty Stories and a Piece of Advice'' *1984: ''The Circus Performers' Bar'' *1987: ''Skrag'' *1989: ''The Happiest Man in the World and Other Stories'' *1992: ''The Pagan Wall'' *1994: ''The Dragon and the Dry Goods Princess'' *1994: ''The New Icelanders: A North American Community'' *1995: ''If Pigs Could Fly'' *2001: ''King Jerry'' *2002: ''The Demon Lover'' *2005: ''The Imagined City: A Literary History of Winnipeg'' Edited by David Arnason & Mhari Mackintosh, {{ISBN|978-0-88801-298-2}} – The Imagined City won both The Carol Shields Winnipeg Book Award and The Mary Scorer Book Award for best book by a Manitoba publisher in 2005. *2010: ''Baldur's Song: A Saga''
==See also== {{Portal| Poetry| Biography| Canada}} *Canadian literature *Canadian poetry *List of Canadian poets
==References== {{reflist}}
== External links == *[http://jsse.revues.org/index310.html "“The fiction that makes us real”: Playful Accreditation in David Arnason's “The Sunfish”", ''JSSE'', Héliane Ventura] *[https://rmc.library.cornell.edu/Fiske/northamerica.html "Icelanders in North America:A Bibliography", Patrick J. Stevens, 17 June 1994]
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{{DEFAULTSORT:Arnason, David}} Category:1940 births Category:Canadian male novelists Category:20th-century Canadian poets Category:20th-century Canadian male writers Category:Canadian male poets Category:Canadian people of Icelandic descent Category:Living people Category:Writers from Winnipeg Category:People from Gimli, Manitoba Category:20th-century Canadian novelists Category:21st-century Canadian novelists Category:21st-century Canadian poets Category:21st-century Canadian male writers Category:Poets from Manitoba