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Hugh MacLennan

 
Britannica Concise Encyclopedia: John Hugh MacLennan
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(born March 20, 1907, Glace Bay, Cape Breton, Nova Scotia, Can. — died Nov. 7, 1990, Montreal, Que.) Canadian novelist and essayist. He was a Rhodes scholar at Oxford University and earned a doctorate at Princeton, then taught at McGill University (1951 – 81). His novels include Barometer Rising (1941), Two Solitudes (1945), The Watch That Ends the Night (1959), and Voices in Time (1980). He won five Governor-General's awards for his fiction and nonfiction. He is regarded as the first major English-speaking novelist to use Canadian themes.

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Biography: Hugh MacLennan
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Hugh MacLennan (1907-1990) was a widely respected Canadian novelist and academic. He wrote primarily of Canadian themes and was credited with being the first writer to establish a national literary identity for Canada. Although MacLennan was known first and foremost as a novelist, he published several collections of essays and has himself been the subject of academic study. The National Film Board (NFB) of Canada has paid tribute to MacLennan by dramatizing his life and work.

Born March 20, 1907, in Glace Bay, Cape Breton Island, Nova Scotia, (John) Hugh MacLennan grew up in Halifax, where he was educated at Dalhousie University. He received his bachelor's degree there in 1929, and won a Rhodes scholarship, which took him to Oxford University. The Oxford years were invaluable, for they provided MacLennan with the opportunity to travel extensively and test his left-wing convictions against firsthand impressions and personal observations.

He returned to Canada in the mid-30s, taking a teaching job at Lower Canada College near Montréal. He later failed to publish a novel based on his earlier travels.

Earned Ph.D. at Princeton

Unable to find suitable employment, MacLennan enrolled in the graduate school at Princeton University and studied Roman history. He obtained a doctorate in 1935 with a dissertation titled Oxyrhynchus: An Economic and Social Study (1940).

Writing Career Took Off

MacLennan was inspired, by his earlier literary failures, to write Barometer Rising (1941), a novel based on the 1917 explosion of a munitions ship in Halifax Harbor. This disaster symbolized a traumatic break for Canada from its colonial, pre-World War I past - while embodying a conflict of generational attitudes. With the success of this work, MacLennan staked out a national identity and continued to write, producing Two Solitudes (1945); The Precipice (1948); Each Man's Son (1951); The Watch That Ends the Night (1959); and The Return of the Sphinx (1967). He worked with themes that mirrored major national concerns and the moral and social issues of his time, as well as a growing self-awareness in Canada. He said, however, that he never lost sight of Canada as part of the world community.

Storylines Spoke of His Culture

As a novelist, MacLennan deliberately undertook to forge a Canadian consciousness in literature, an endeavor which appears to have left him little time or opportunity to experiment with different literary techniques - but which enabled him to master traditional techniques and the economies of an honest and forthright style. Because he was adept at using narrow storylines as springboards to broader statements about his country and his culture, he became a widely translated and respected writer.

MacLennan also wrote nonfiction, including: The Colour of Canada (1972); Rivers of Canada (1974); Voices in Time (1980); and On Being a Canadian Writer (1991).

Essays Were Notable

MacLennan was an essayist of considerable skill. He published several collections of essays, including Cross Country (1949); Thirty and Three (1954); Scotchman's Return and Other Essays (1960); Seven Rivers of Canada (1961); and The Other Side of Hugh MacLennan (1978).

He wrote for a 1965 issue of American Heritage that focused on Canada. The Winter 1979-80 issue of Journal of Canadian Studies was the Hugh MacLennan issue. In 1995, his essay titled "French is a Must for Canadians" appeared in the anthology Influential Writing, edited by W. Connor and M. Legris.

His Keen Perception Won Awards

In his role as essayist, MacLennan showed a keen perception of Canada's history, environment, and character. He wrote in a lucid, conversational style which was not without its passion, its moods, and its ironic insights. In 1951 MacLennan accepted an appointment to McGill University. He taught in the English department until 1981, publishing McGill: the Story of a University in 1960. In 1952 he received the Lorne Pierce Medal from the Royal Society of Canada; in 1953 he was elected to the Society. In 1967 MacLennan was named a companion of the Order of Canada. He contributed the foreword to Gertrude Katz, The Time Gatherers; Writings from Prison (1970).

MacLennan won the Governor General's Literary Award more than any other Canadian author: three times for fiction (Two Solitudes, The Precipice, The Watch that Ends the Night ) and twice for nonfiction (Cross-Country and Thirty and Three). In 1987 he became the first Canadian to be awarded the James Madison Medal by Princeton University. The medal is given annually to a distinguished graduate.

MacLennan died Nov. 7, 1990, at the age of 83.

Further Reading

There have been several book-length studies of MacLennan, of which the most ambitious is Robert H. Cockburn, The Novels of Hugh MacLennan (Harvest House, 1969). Also of considerable interest are: George Woodcock, Hugh MacLennan (Copp Clark Publishing Co., 1969); Patricia Morley, The Immoral Moralists: Hugh MacLennan and Leonard Cohen (Clarke, Irwin, 1972); Paul Goetsch, Hugh MacLennan (McGraw-Hill Ryerson, 1973); Elspeth Cameron, Hugh MacLennan: a Writer's Life (University of Toronto Press, 1981); Thomas Donald MacLulich, Hugh MacLennan (Twayne, 1983); and Frank M. Tierney, ed., Hugh MacLennan (University of Ottawa Press, 1994).

MacLennan has often been featured in Canadian Literature, a quarterly of Criticism and Review, including Nos. 3 ("The Story of a Novel"), 6 ("The Defence of Lady Chatterley"), 33 (Questionnaire and Answers section), 41 ("Reflection on Two Decades"), 68-69 (interview with Ronald Sullivan), and 90 (review of Elspeth Cameron's Hugh MacLennan: a Writer's Life), 99 and 112 (review of On Being a Maritime Writer.

MacLennan's work with Marian Engel, who wrote her master's thesis under his direction, is documented in a collection of letters called Dear Marian, Dear Hugh: The MacLennan-Engel Correspondence (1995), edited by Christl Verduyn and published by University of Ottawa Press; The Hugh MacLellan Papers (May, 1986) describes the University of Calgary's archival holdings of the author's personal and professional papers as well as correspondence, news clippings, scrapbooks and miscellaneous writings.

The National Film Board (NFB) of Canada has produced at least three documentaries featuring the life and work of Hugh MacLennan; The first, Hugh MacLennan: Portrait of a Writer (1982), is described by the NFB as a tribute to MacLennan for paving the way for a thriving national literary movement; the second, View from the Typewriter (1983), discusses the work of MacLennan and nine other prominent Canadian writers; Each Man's Son was dramatized in 1954.

 
Columbia Encyclopedia: Hugh MacLennan
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MacLennan, Hugh (məklĕn'ən), 1907-90, Canadian writer, b. Glace Bay, N. S. From his vantage at McGill Univ. in Montreal where he taught from 1951 to 1981, MacLennan wrote novels and essays that helped define Canadian literature. Among his novels are Barometer Rising (1941); Two Solitudes (1945), a study of the conflicts between English and French Canadians; Each Man's Son (1951); The Watch That Ends the Night (1959); Return of the Sphinx (1967), and Voices in Time (1980). He also published several nonfiction works including Cross Country (1949), Thirty and Three (1955), Scotsman's Return and Other Essays (1960), and The Colour of Canada (1967).
Quotes By: Hugh Maclennan
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"A novel must be exceptionally good to live as long as the average cat."

Wikipedia: Hugh MacLennan
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Hugh MacLennan
Born John Hugh MacLennan
March 20, 1907(1907-03-20)
Glace Bay, Nova Scotia
Died November 9, 1990 (aged 83)
Montreal, Quebec
Notable work(s) Two Solitudes
Notable award(s) Order of Canada
1967
National Order of Quebec
1985

John Hugh MacLennan, CC, CQ (March 20, 1907 – November 9, 1990) was a Canadian author and professor of English at McGill University. He won five Governor General's Awards and a Royal Bank Award.

Contents

Family and childhood

MacLennan was born in Glace Bay, Nova Scotia on March 20, 1907.[1][2] His parents were Dr. Samuel MacLennan, a colliery physician, and Katherine MacQuerrie; Hugh also had an older sister named Frances.[1][2] Samuel was a stern Calvinist, while Katherine was creative, warm and dreamy, and both parents would be large influences on Hugh's character.[3] In 1913, the family spent several months in London while Samuel took on further study to become a medical specialist.[4] On returning to Canada, they briefly lived in Sydney, Nova Scotia before settling in Halifax.[4] In December 1917, young Hugh experienced the Halifax Explosion, which he would later write about in his first published novel, Barometer Rising.[2][5] From the ages of twelve to twenty-one, he slept in a tent in the family's backyard, even in the cold winter, possibly as an escape from his strict father.[2][6] Hugh grew up believing in the importance of religion; he and Frances regularly went to Sunday School, and the family attended Presbyterian church services twice each Sunday.[7] He was also active in sports, and became especially good at tennis, eventually winning the Nova Scotia men's double championship in 1927.[8]

Education

MacLennan and his sister were pushed extremely hard by their father to spend long hours learning the Classics.[6] While this was very difficult for Frances, who had no interest in Greek, Hugh grew to enjoy this field of study.[6] Their father had an ambitious educational path planned for Hugh: studying the Classics at Dalhousie University, getting a Rhodes Scholarship, and then continuing his studies in England.[9] MacLennan received top marks at Dalhousie and succeeded in winning a Rhodes Scholarship, allowing him to go on to Oxford University.[2][10]

While at Dalhousie, he realized that his inner wish was to pursue an artistic career, the influence of his creative mother.[9] At Oxford, he struggled with balancing his passion for Greek and Latin studies with these artistic instincts.[11] In his first year, MacLennan worked incredibly hard at his Classics courses, but was only able to achieve second-class.[12] By his second year, he had resolved himself to such results, and while still working diligently, decided not to overwork himself as before.[13] In his fourth year, he was finding it increasingly difficult to concentrate on his studies, and spent more and more time at tennis and writing poetry.[14] In letters to his family from around this time are hints that he hoped to be a successful writer.[15] In late 1931, MacLennan sent some of his poetry to three publishers, including the firms of John Lane and Elkin Mathews, but it was turned down.[16]

MacLennan's four years in Oxford gave him the opportunity to travel throughout Europe, and he visited countries such as Switzerland, France, Greece and Italy.[2][17] He spent some of his holidays lodging with a family in Germany, through which he acquired a very good proficiency in German.[18] His travels and his exposure to different political ideas caused MacLennan to begin to question his father's puritanical, Conservative attitudes that he had until then taken for granted.[19]

MacLennan won a $400 scholarship to continue his studies at Princeton University, and despite his growing disinclination to keep studying the Classics, he decided to go there.[20] This was partly to appease his father, and partly because the depression meant that there were few jobs available.[21] In June 1932, while sailing home from England, he met his future wife, American Dorothy Duncan.[22] Falling in love with her made him change his mind about Princeton.[23] For one thing, his father insisted he should not get married before becoming financially independent, which would mean delaying marriage at least until his graduation. In addition, MacLennan was already unhappy about having to accept money from his father for the part of his Princeton studies that would not be covered by his scholarship.[23] However, his applications were rejected from both of the Canadian universities he applied to that had Classics Department positions opening; thus, he grudgingly agreed to go to Princeton after all.[24]

His three years at Princeton were unhappy. The style of classical study there was very different from what he was used to at Oxford, with Princeton's scholarship "consist[ing] of extremely detailed analyses of classical texts and sources—thorough, but unoriginal."[25] He began to rebel against his father's ideals: he stopped going to church and put increasing energy into his writing at the expense of his studies; furthermore, in addition to resenting his financial dependence on his father, he continued his relationship with Dorothy even though he knew his father would not approve of her American, Lowland Scottish, Christian Science, business-world background.[26] During this time, MacLennan also began to be influenced by Marxism.[27]

Unpublished novels

At Princeton, MacLennan wrote his first novel, So All Their Praises. He found one publisher who was willing to take the manuscript, as long as he made certain changes; however, this company went out of business before the book could be published.[28] In spring 1935, he finished his PhD thesis, Oxyrhynchus: An Economic and Social Study, about the decline of a Roman colony in Egypt,[2][29] which was published by Princeton University Press and reprinted in 1968 by A.M. Hakkert.[29]

In 1935, the depression resulted in there being very few teaching jobs available,[30] and MacLennan's field of study, the Classics, was in particular becoming less significant in North American education.[20] He took a position at Lower Canada College in Montreal, even though he felt it was beneath him, as just his Dalhousie BA would have been a sufficient qualification for the job.[30] He generally did not enjoy working there, and resented the long hours required of him for low pay, but was nonetheless a stimulating teacher, at least for the brighter students.[31] MacLennan would later poke fun at Lower Canada College in his depiction of Waterloo School in The Watch That Ends the Night.[32] On June 22, 1936, he and Dorothy were wed near her home in Wilmette, Illinois, and settled in Montreal.[33]

Meanwhile, in 1934–1938, MacLennan was working on his second novel, A Man Should Rejoice.[34] Longman, Green and Company and Duell, Sloan and Pearce both showed strong interest in the novel, but in the end neither published it.[35]

In February 1939, MacLennan's father died after suffering from high blood pressure. It was a huge shock to MacLennan, as in the previous year they had just begun to become closer and to reconcile their opposing views.[36] For several months after his father's death MacLennan continued to write letters to him, in which he discussed his thoughts on the possibility and implications of a war in Europe.[37]

Barometer Rising

Dorothy convinced MacLennan that the failure of his first two novels was he had set one in Europe and the other in U.S.A; she persuaded him to write about Canada, the country he knew best.[38] She told him that "Nobody's going to understand Canada until she evolves a literature of her own, and you're the fellow to start bringing Canadian novels up to date."[38] Until then there had been no real tradition of Canadian literature, and MacLennan set out to define Canada for Canadians through a national novel.[39]

Barometer Rising, his novel about the social class structure of Nova Scotia and the Halifax Explosion of 1917, was published in 1941.

Later novels

His most famous novel, Two Solitudes, a literary allegory for the tensions between English and French Canada, followed in 1945. That year, he left Lower Canada College. Two Solitudes won MacLennan his first Governor General's Award for Fiction.

In 1948, MacLennan published The Precipice, which again won the Governor General's Award. The following year, he published a collection of essays, Cross Country, which won the Governor General's Award for Non-Fiction.

In 1951, MacLennan returned to teaching, accepting a position at McGill University. In 1954, he published another essay collection, Thirty and Three, which again won the Governor General's Award for Non-Fiction.

One of MacLennan's students at McGill was Marian Engel, who became a noted Canadian novelist in the 1970s. Another notable student was Leonard Cohen, the popular songwriter, poet and novelist.

Duncan died in 1957. MacLennan married his second wife, Aline Walker, in 1959. That same year, he published The Watch That Ends the Night, which won his final Governor General's Award.

In 1967, he was made a Companion of the Order of Canada. In 1985 he was made a Knight of the National Order of Quebec.

MacLennan continued to write and publish work, with his final novel Voices in Time appearing in 1980. He died in Montreal, Quebec.

The Canadian band The Tragically Hip, on their album Fully Completely, have a song called "Courage (for Hugh MacLennan)". A passage from The Watch That Ends the Night is adapted for use in the songlink title.

Bibliography

Novels

Non-fiction

  • Oxyrhyncus : an Economic and Social Study (1935)
  • Canadian Unity and Quebec (1942)
  • Cross Country (1949)
  • The Future of the Novel as an Art Form (1959)
  • Scotchman's Return and other essays (1960)
  • Seven Rivers of Canada (1961)
  • The Colour of Canada (1967)
  • The Other Side of Hugh MacLennan (1978)
  • On Being a Maritime Writer (1984)
  • Dear Marian, Dear Hugh:The MacLennan-Engel Correspondence (1995; ed. Christl Verduyn)

Notes

  1. ^ a b Cameron (1981), 4–5.
  2. ^ a b c d e f g Hoy (1990), 1.
  3. ^ Cameron (1981), 5–6.
  4. ^ a b Cameron (1981), 8.
  5. ^ Cameron (1981), 13.
  6. ^ a b c Cameron (1981), 15.
  7. ^ Cameron (1981), 12.
  8. ^ Cameron (1981), 17, 21.
  9. ^ a b Cameron (1981), 20.
  10. ^ Cameron (1981), 21.
  11. ^ Cameron (1981), 23, 58.
  12. ^ Cameron (1981), 26–27, 33.
  13. ^ Cameron (1981), 48.
  14. ^ Cameron (1981), 56.
  15. ^ Cameron (1981), 57–58.
  16. ^ Cameron (1981), 58.
  17. ^ Cameron (1981), 31–32, 34–36, 39–40, 55–56.
  18. ^ Cameron (1981), 46, 53–54, 60.
  19. ^ Cameron (1981), 43, 58–59.
  20. ^ a b Cameron (1981), 62.
  21. ^ Cameron (1981), 61–62.
  22. ^ Cameron (1981), 66.
  23. ^ a b Cameron (1981), 71.
  24. ^ Cameron (1981), 72–73.
  25. ^ Cameron (1981), 73.
  26. ^ Cameron (1981), 77.
  27. ^ Cameron (1981), 78–79, 82.
  28. ^ Cameron (1981), 87.
  29. ^ a b Cameron (1981), 91.
  30. ^ a b Cameron (1981), 101.
  31. ^ Cameron (1981), 105–106.
  32. ^ Cameron (1981), 104.
  33. ^ Cameron (1981), 112.
  34. ^ Cameron (1981), 107–112, 119.
  35. ^ Cameron (1981), 119–120.
  36. ^ Cameron (1981), 121.
  37. ^ Cameron (1981), 121–124.
  38. ^ a b Cameron (1981), 133.
  39. ^ Peepre-Bordessa, Mari (1990), 52.

References

  • Cameron, Elspeth (1981). Hugh MacLennan: A Writer's Life. University of Toronto Press. ISBN 0802055567.
  • Hoy, Helen (1990). Hugh MacLennan and His Works. ECW Press. ISBN 1550220306.
  • Peepre-Bordessa, Mari (1990). Hugh MacLennan's National Trilogy: Mapping a Canadian Identity (1940–1950). Suomalainen Tiedeakatemia. ISBN 9514106148.

External links


This entry is from Wikipedia, the leading user-contributed encyclopedia. It may not have been reviewed by professional editors (see full disclaimer)

 
 
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