Born in Belleville, Ontario in 1921, Mowat’s
childhood was spent moving from place to place with his mother
Helen and his father Angus, a librarian with a penchant for
storytelling. The biography includes archive film interviews
with Mowat’s parents.
Mowat’s writing career began at age 14 when he wrote
a column on birds for the Saskatoon StarPhoenix. While living
in Saskatchewan, young Farley visited the far north and started
his lifelong passion for the preservation of Canada’s
wildlife.
Mowat has sold 18 million books in 24 languages including
Sea of Slaughter, A Whale for the Killing, And No Birds Sang,
People of the Deer, Never Cry Wolf and Born Naked, an autobiography
of his first 15 years. He talks about the ongoing criticism
that some of his books are more fiction than “subjective
non-fiction.”
Mowat was busy writing his 35th book when this biography
was being filmed at his summer home in Cape Breton, Nova Scotia.
It’s about a vanished European tribe who, according
to Mowat, settling in North America before the Vikings.
During the programme, viewers meet Mowat’s first wife
Frances, his second wife Claire and his only son Sandy. Publisher
Jack McClelland, literary critic Robert Fulford and family
members help reveal the real man behind the well-known kilted,
rum-swigging, loud public persona which Mowat has held up
to the public for years.
Original Air Date - January 8, 1997
Links
Farley
Mowat (Historica)
Farley
Mowat: On Writing Fiction, Non-fiction and Autobiography
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