Speakers Shane Koyczan: Poet

Shane Koyczan

Shane Koyczan makes spoken-word poetry and music. His poem "To This Day" is a powerful story of bullying and survival, illustrated by animators from around the world.

Why you should listen to him:

Shane Koyczan is a poet, author and musician. He performed at the opening ceremonies of the Vancouver 2010 Winter Olympics, where an audience of more than 1 billion people worldwide heard his piece “We Are More.” He has also published three books: Stickboy, Our Deathbeds Will Be Thirsty and Visiting Hours, selected by both the Guardian and the Globe and Mail for their Best Books of the Year lists.

In 2012, Koyczan released a  full-length album with his band Shane Koyczan and the Short Story Long. The album includes the viral hit “To This Day,” which highlights the anguish of anyone who grew up feeling different or just a little bit alone. To bring visual life to this image-rich poem, Koyczan invited artists from around the world to contribute 20-second segments of animation to the project. Posted on YouTube on Feb. 19, 2013, by the close of the month the video had been viewed 6 million times.

"If you have time to watch only one video today, it should probably be this one. After being posted to YouTube, animated spoken-word poem 'To This Day,' by Canadian poet Shane Koyczan, has spread like wildfire online ... Slate called the video 'beautiful,' Yahoo! News dubbed it 'powerful' and Mashable promised that it will 'reshape your views on name calling, harassment and pain.'"
The Huffington Post

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Quotes by Shane Koyczan

  • “I've been shot down so many times I get altitude sickness just from standing up for myself.”

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  • “If you can't see anything beautiful about yourself, get a better mirror.”

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  • “Don't tell me that [broken heartstrings] hurt less than a broken bone, that an ingrown life is something surgeons can cut away, that there's no way for it to metastasize — it does.”

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