Poet, translator, academic, Robert Dickson was a professor in the Département d'études françaises et de traduction (Department of French Studies and Translation) at Laurentian University in Sudbury, Ontario. He won the Governor General's Award for French language poetry in 2002, for his book Humains paysages en temps de paix relative ("Human Landscapes in Times of Relative Peace"). Dickson died at his home in Sudbury on March 19, 2007 from brain cancer. Jo-Anne Elder has translated more than 20 works of poetry, theatre, film, fiction, and non-fiction from French to English, most recently Beatitudes, (Herménégilde Chiasson's Béatitudes, 2007), her second title shortlisted for a Governor General's award, and One (Serge Patrice Thibodeau's Seul on est, 2009).