Startlingly, John Ibbitson opens his book with the observation that “sometime, not too long ago, while no one was watching, Canada became the world’s most successful country.” Startling because even the most enthusiastic of those who wave flags are unlikely to be quite so bold. It’s nice, but “the world’s most successful country” is moot. Still, the broad point is well taken because within memory Canada has been a nation transformed as perhaps no others have been. It is certainly not the land of our fathers.
My own barometer of change is the recollection that when I was growing up in Toronto one of the heroes of the day was a fine lightweight boxer, a black man who was known in the sports pages as Li’l Arthur King. I have no idea who actually gave him that name but my bet is that it was some promoter who thought it would be kind of cute: We’ve got this Negro boy, not a bad boxer, maybe a contender, so let’s give him a Negroish kind of name. We’ll call him Li’l...
John Gray wrote for a number of newspapers, including the Globe and Mail, for which he was Ottawa bureau chief, national editor, foreign editor, foreign correspondent, and national correspondent. He published Paul Martin: The Power of Ambition in 2003.
Advertisement
Advertisement