Adolphe-Basile Routhier is best remembered now for his patriotic poem "O Canada" (in Les Echos, 1882), which, set to the music of Calixa Lavallée, has become the national anthem. Essayist, journalist, poet, novelist, historian, playwright, and lecturer, he was considered in his day to be a major author and one of the most eloquent spokesmen for the cultural and political aspirations of French Canada.

Born to Charles and Angéline Lafleur Routhier in the tiny village of St-Placide, Quebec, on 8 May 1839, Routhier completed classical studies at the Collège de Ste-Thérèse before entering the law school of Laval University in Quebec City. A brilliant scholar, he accepted a professorship of civil law and, later, international law at Laval soon after his admission to the bar in 1861. The following year he married Marie-Clorinde Mondelet. An unsuccessful Bleu (Conservative) candidate in the federal...