Farley Mowat, 1921-2014
Beloved Canadian author and activist Farley Mowat has died at the age of 92. From Sandra Martin's obituary in the Globe and Mail today:
"Mr. Mowat was a trickster, a ferocious imp with a silver pen, an ardent environmentalist who opened up the idea of the North to curious southerners, a public clown who hid his shyness behind flamboyant rum-swigging and kilt-flipping, and a passionate polemicist who blurred the lines between fiction and facts to dramatize his cause. Above all, he was a bestselling and prolific writer who kept generations of children (and their paren'ts) spellbound by tales of adventures with wolves that were friendlier than people, whales in need of rescue, dogs who refused to cower, owls roosting in the rafters and boats that wouldn’t float."
Here are links to some of his most popular books in the Toronto Public Library catalogue:
There are so many more books by and about Mr. Mowat – far too many to list here! I will end with an image from the 1981 NFB documentary Ten Million Books: An Introduction to Farley Mowat.
3 thoughts on “Farley Mowat, 1921-2014”
So sad, the book I remember reading first in my life was by him.
I always thought that the choice of name for the Beaches branch owl sculpture was a poor one – Wordsworth. In recognition of a mid-century Canadian literary icon, I wish you would rename it FARLEY. How apropos would that be? I know you won’t do that. Oh well. But could you keep in mind for future contests or naming games for your institution that criteria and selection would favour Canadian / historical, First Nations, Local and contemporary/modern content. Please oversee this public and permanent nomenclature with a nod to northern national and inclusive pride. Considering that a child submitted this, how likely is it that that child read William Wordsworth’s poetry? How likely is it that the paren’t had great influence and never read “Owls in the Family”? Berton, Purdy, Birney, Afua, Gwendolyn, Musgrave, Brossard, Brand are just a few other names that call to mind our Maple Leaf heritage. Let’s use them, hmm?
Email
n8chrgrl@yahoo.ca
Hi Chloe,
Thank you for your comment. We will consider your suggestion in future naming contests.