SOURCE: "Canadian Nationalism in Search of a Form: Hugh MacLennan's Barometer Rising," in Journal of Canadian Fiction, Vol. 1, No. 4, Fall, 1972, pp. 68-71.

In the essay below, Arnason discusses MacLennan's formulation of a Canadian consciousness in Barometer Rising and Two Solitudes.

Hugh MacLennan published his first novel, Barometer Rising, in 1941. Since that time, he has become the "grand old man" of Canadian novelists, an assessment that has little to do with his age or the quality of his achievement, but is rather an acknowledgement that the development of a Canadian consciousness is paralleled in the development of his work.

Success did not come easily or quickly to MacLennan. He wrote two novels, So All Their Praises (1933) and Man Should Rejoice (1937) which were never published. Both were concerned with broad international issues. It was only when MacLennan narrowed his scope and turned to a Canadian subject that he did succeed...