Farley Mowat

For many years, Farley Mowat has written of the lands, seas and peoples of the Far North with humor, understanding and compassion. Born in Belleville, Ontario in 1921, Mowat grew up in Belleville, Trenton, Windsor, Saskatoon, Toronto and Richmond Hill as his librarian father moved a household that included a miniature menagerie around the country. During World War II Mowat served in the army, entering as a private and emerging with the rank of captain. Following his discharge, Mowat renewed his interest in the Canadian Arctic, an area he had first visited as a young man with an ornithologist uncle. He began writing for his living in 1949 after spending two years in the Arctic. Since 1949 he has lived in or visited almost every part of Canada and many other lands, including the distant regions of Siberia. He has said of himself, "I am a Northern Man . . . I like to think I am a reincarnation of the Norse saga men and, like them, my chief concern is with the tales of men, and other animals, living under conditions of natural adversity."