Robertson Davies, was one of modern Canada’s most venerated authors whose constituency extended far beyond his country. Exuding eminence, Davies continued a brilliantly productive literary career right up to his death in 1995. He had been, in his time, a novelist, essayist, playwright, journalist, critic, scholar and, as well, an actor – an early interest that influenced him, both in his writings and in his own dramatic presence as the magical “Man of Myth.”
 

Sometime journalist, publisher, editor, novelist, playwright, actor, and professor, Robertson Davies, once considered a potential recipient of the 1993 Nobel Prize for Literature, was born “in the cusp of Leo and Virgo with Mercury in the ascendant.” This probably explains why this Canadian literary figure had a resplendent aura of magic, myth, and marvel. [Photo, courtesy Peter Paterson]

Born at Thamesville, Ontario, in 1913, the third son in the well-to-do family of Senator Rupert Davies, newspaper publisher, he moved as the family’s business concerns required, first to Renfrew, thence to Kingston where his father owned the local Whig-Standard. As a child, young Rob Davies acted in amateur plays in Kingston and thus acquired an early passion for theatre. When he was sent to Toronto’s prestigious Upper Canada College – shy and sensitive as he was, neither an athlete nor a classroom leader – he adopted the shielding, dramatic persona of an urbane British-accented gentleman of taste. Afterwards, at Queen’s University from 1932 to 1935, despite all his native intelligence, he did not proceed to a degree. But then he moved on to Oxford and flourished in its stately (and dramatic) surroundings, taking a B.Litt degree in 1938 while also zestfully acting in Oxford’s notable Dramatic Society. In 1940, in fact, Davies joined the-still-more-noted Old Vic Theatre Company in London where he also married its stage manager – known since Oxford days – his lifelong wife, Brenda.

Davies returned to Canada in 1940 as literary editor of Saturday Night. In 1942 he became the editor of the Peterborough Examiner, another of his father’s papers, and also its increasingly popular columnist, “Samuel Marchbanks,” whose witty comments and humorous accounts would later be published in three volumes between 1947 and 1967. In 1955, Davies advanced to publisher of the Examiner, a post he held till 1965 although by that date he had entered the scholarly world and, more than that, had already produced a whole stream of other writings: articles, plays, and high-quality novels.

His first play, Eros at Breakfast, won a Dominion Drama Award in 1948 and was followed by Fortune, My Foe, published in 1949; My Heart’s Core appeared in 1950. Then came a series of novels: Tempest-Tost (1951), Leaven of Malice (1954) (which won the Stephen Leacock Medal for humorous writing), and A Mixture of Frailties (1958). This trio was succeeded in 1961 by something completely different – his perceptive collection of scholarly essays, A Voice from the Attic, which garnered another literary prize, the Lorne Pierce Medal in 1961. By now Davies was settling into academic life, having in 1960 begun teaching literature and drama at Trinity College in the University of Toronto as he would do over the next 20 years. Furthermore, in 1963 he was also made Master of Massey College, the University’s new college for chosen graduate students and associated senior staff; and in that position he presided elegantly but warmly till his retirement in 1981: a courtly guide and mentor, a kindly counsellor, and a sparkling raconteur. His writing activities went on apace. He produced a new trilogy of novels: Fifth Business in 1970 (which, according to the New York Times, earned “major acclaim”), The Manticore (1972), and World of Wonders (1975). References to the stage, along with others reflecting on image arts and Jungian psychology, marked these outstanding, fascinating novels. An unstoppable Robertson Davies continued to flow steadily on, issuing The Rebel Angels (1981), What’s Bred in the Bone (1985), and still other works, including The Lyre of Orpheus (1988) and Murther & Walking Spirits (1991) to arrive in 1994 at his last novel, The Cunning Man (1994).

The charm, insight, and excellence of Davies’ complex and prolific outpourings brought unprecedented reflected glory to Canada. And “Dr. Davies,” superb in his flowing white locks and beard, his protuberant brow, and his swirling cloak and broad-brimmed hat, will remain among many other distinguished but more utilitarian-seeming Canadian wayfarers, a theatrical figure in the best sense.

J.M.S. Careless