Donald Grant Creighton

"Sir John A. Macdonald's flamboyant personality dominated Canadian public life from the years preceding Confederation to the end of the nineteenth century, and the political structures and national policies which developed under his leadership continue to shape public issues today. Creighton's first volume takes Macdonald from his childhood and early years as a young lawyer in Kingston, Ontario, through his swift rise in political life to positions of influence, to the great achievement of uniting the colonies of British North America in Confederation. The second volume traces Macdonald's often tumultuous subsequent career in the context of a growing and often recalcitrant nation. He was Prime Minister from 1867 to 1873 and then again from 1878 until his death in June, 1891. The evocative epilogues with which Creighton concludes each volume are widely recognized as having a place among the great passages of literary prose." "P. B. Waite's introduction to this new one-volume republication provides an illuminating account of the impact that Creighton and his biography of Macdonald had on a whole generation of historians and readers."--BOOK JACKET.

Selection of articles from the Canadian historical review and other volumes.

"Donald Creighton was for many years one of Canada's foremost historians, a firm believer that history was closer to art than it was to science. Marked by beautiful, carefully crafted prose, The Road to Confederation reflects a style that perhaps no contemporary historian would dare: romantic, suspenseful, fearlessly narrative, and full of unapologetic opinions. If not politically correct and sanitized, it is a fascinating exploration of the personalities, the political logjams, even the debt problems that marked the period leading to Confederation. The book was also, as Donald Wright's excellent introduction argues, haunted by doubt. Not only had Canada failed to live up to Creighton's vision, Creighton himself was writing from the perspective of a rapidly changing country. Quebec was moving towards a liberal, secular, and nationalist identity; English Canada was embracing bilingualism and diversity; debates about nuclear weapons were raging; and living next to the United States was becoming increasingly uneasy. The road was becoming ever less straightforward. In many respects, The Road to Confederation reveals as much about the 1960s as it does the 1860s."--Pub. desc.