RIP Farley Mowat

[a1mamacat]

Farley Mowat, one of Canada's best-known authors and a noted environmentalist, has died at age 92.

Mary Shaw-Rimmington, the author's assistant, confirmed his passing to CBC News on Wednesday afternoon.

Author and environmentalist Farley Mowat has died at age 92. One of Canada's most-loved writers, his books have been published in 52 languages and sold more than 17 million copies. He's shown here in a file photo from 2007, when he donated 80 hectares of coastal land in Cape Breton to a nature preservation group.

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Mowat, author of dozens of works including Lost in the Barrens and Never Cry Wolf, introduced Canada to readers around the world and shared everything from his time abroad during the Second World War, to his travels in the North and his concern for the deteriorating environment.

CBC DIGITAL ARCHIVES: Farley Mowat on Telescope

More than 17 million copies of his books, which have been translated into dozens of languages, have been sold worldwide. The gregarious writer was a consummate storyteller, whose works spanned non-fiction, children's titles and memoirs.

Liberal Leader Justin Trudeau described Mowat as "a family friend from my childhood" who "got along great with my father," former prime minister Pierre Elliott Trudeau, in comments to reporters in Ottawa on Wednesday.

He recalled that the writer once gave his family a dog, which they promptly named Farley, in his honour.

"My. Mowat was obviously a passionate Canadian who shaped a lot of my generation, growing up, with his books. He will be sorely missed," Trudeau said.
Farley Mowat

Farley Mowat was inducted into Canada's Walk of Fame in Toronto in 2010. (Frank Gunn/Canadian Press)

Mowat won a Governor General's Award for Lost in the Barrens in 1956 and the Stephen Leacock Memorial Medal for Humour for The Boat that Wouldn't Float in 1970. He became an officer of the Order of Canada in 1981 and had a public school near Ottawa named after him in 2006.

Born in Belleville, Ont., on May 12, 1921, Mowat developed an early love of nature and writing.

As a preteen, he wrote a regular column about birding for the Saskatoon Star-Phoenix from 1930 to 1933.

At 18, he enlisted in the army to fight in the Second World War. He spent three years overseas, serving first in Italy, then in the Netherlands, Belgium and Germany. He returned to Canada in 1945, spending summers in the Arctic and winters studying at the University of Toronto.

His first book, People of the Deer, was based on his experience in the Far North with the Inuit people and made him an immediate celebrity. A lifelong naturalist, many of his books focus on man's relation to nature.

CBC DIGITAL ARCHIVES: Kate Aitken: Meet the Mowats

His 1963 book Never Cry Wolf is credited with helping to change the popular perception of wolves, even leading to a ban on wolf hunting in Russia after the book was published there.

The flagship of the Sea Shepherd Conservation Society was named after him, with his blessing, in recognition of his activism against the whaling industry.
Controversial writer

Considered among one of the most widely read Canadian authors, the fiery Mowat inspired passionate debate and courted controversy.

Though highly praised by his fans, he was also criticized for exaggerating in his writing and playing loose with facts — for instance, a 1996 Saturday Night magazine cover story probed the considerable discrepancies between his original notebooks with his published works.

Still, Mowat defended himself, stating in the mid-1970s that he "eschewed the purely factual approach," but was not interested in writing fiction.

"My métier lay somewhere in between what was then a grey void between fact and fiction," he wrote.

He delivered an even stronger defence during a 1999 Habourfront International Festival of Authors discussion with Peter Gzowski, the then CBC host who passed away in 2002.

When Gzowski challenged Mowat about the volume of facts needed in writiing non-fiction, the passionate writer declared: "F--k the facts!"

Green Party Leader Elizabeth May also defended her longtime friend, emotionally noting that she had been planning to call him next Monday to wish him a happy 93rd birthday.

"In telling a non-fiction story, you're allowed to tell a story," she said, adding that Mowat felt incredibly hurt by the negative Saturday Night article.

"He knew how to tell a story, but he also knew how to tell the truth."

[SportsFan68]

I read Lost in the Barrens when I was a kid but never got to People of the Deer. I'm glad he lived and wrote.