Farley McGill Mowat was born in Belleville, Ontario, on 12 May 1921, the son of Angus McGill and Helen E. Thomson Mowat. Educated in public schools in Ontario and Saskatchewan, he completed his B.A. at the University of Toronto in 1949 after serving overseas as an infantry officer with the Canadian army during World War II. Mowat had spent part of 1947-1948 working in the Northwest Territories as a student biologist for the Dominion Wildlife Service. It was this northern experience which proved crucial to the budding forth of his writing talent, and in 1952 he published his first book, People of the Deer. Since then Mowat has written more than a score of books, chiefly nonfiction. The sales of his work in North America and in translation in many foreign countries testify to his widespread popularity and influence as a Canadian writer. Named as an Officer of the Order of...