Arthur Erickson: a Vancouverite, a traveller, an idealist, a modernist (mostly), a gay man, a partner, a charmer, a great teacher, an unreliable boss, an irresponsible businessman, a financial failure and an elder statesman. And also an architect—as the subtitle of Arthur Erickson: An Architect’s Life reminds us. David Stouck, a retired Simon Fraser English professor and biographer, attempts to unpack the tangled events of Erickson’s 84 years in this new biography.
The story is operatic in scope. Erickson, after a long apprenticeship, rose dramatically to prominence in his thirties, and would become both famous and wealthy, a friend to Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau, a jet-setter extraordinaire. And then, after a humiliation and personal losses, he had a quiet final act. Stouck covers all of this dutifully; yet, to a remarkable...
Alex Bozikovic is an editor at The Globe and Mail and writes for the paper about architecture. He also writes the blog No Mean City and has contributed to magazines such as Azure, Dwell and Metropolis.
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