Joseph Planta's Commentary - thecommentary.ca

Friday, 10 December 2004

Pierre Berton

By Joseph Planta

VANCOUVER - When Pierre Berton's latest book came out earlier this fall, I declined to review it, because it seemed that he would be around forever and I'd get to his next book. Two years ago, he came out with two books, a memoir on the art of writing, and some book on cats. It seemed that every season he'd have a new book. If it weren't something new, it'd be something old, a collection of old essays resurrected, or a sheath of old newspaper or magazine columns.

Pierre Berton's bibliography stands at over 50 books, averaging one a year and the some of them have become must-haves for amateur journalists or historians, or lovers of Canadiana. More than that, Berton was a dominant presence in Canadian broadcasting. He began his career in what Kipling called the black art at the University of British Columbia's famed Ubyssey. That soon led to the local papers here, to Toronto where he was on radio, television and newspapers. He was an editor at Maclean's, and a columnist at the Toronto Star, one of the nation's most prolific and certainly talked about. Along the way, he wrote books, and did he ever. His chronicles of the building of the railway are as remembered as the railway itself. He garnered accolades, medallions, prizes, honorary degrees and a degree of fame that is quintessentially Canadian-people would recognise him on television or in person, not know his name, but knew he was famous. Such is the psyche of the nation he loved and knew so well.

Traditional scholarly historians like J.L. Granatstein would hold Berton's efforts in chronicling Canada's history with a bit of contempt. Granatstein's book, Who Killed Canadian History? sort of lays blame on popular historians like Berton or Peter Newman for the decline in the nation's interest or understanding of history. For it was Berton and Newman for two, who made history accessible. Chronicles of the great men and their events in history were dry, tedious and dull, that the inclusion of journalistic methods in the narrative of the nation's pivotal moments, not to mention telling the stories of ordinary Canadians at the grassroots, made for more accessible books, as well as books that actually sold well.

More than his work, Berton was a towering figure. His personality shone through. He dominated the mediums in which he worked or appeared. His years at Front Page Challenge were as noteworthy as his books, and he was unabashedly an arrogant Canadian. He had the book sales to warrant it. He chronicled the land and its stories and became one of its most ardent nationalists. His arrogance was not the bad kind that people abhor, but the kind that people admired, because this land has but too few truly arrogant people, at least the brazen kind that Berton was. He cultivated controversy, no doubt, and he revelled in it. Just this past October he appeared on Rick Mercer's CBC program to demonstrate how to roll a joint. Frail at 84, he still enjoyed some frivolity.

Granatstein was scathing in his review of Marching As to War, Berton's last big book, a couple of years ago. Berton has lost his touch, Granatstein said, pointing out the book's errors. Berton admitted the errors, and moved on. Berton was as magnanimous about his mistakes, as he was proud of his accomplishments. Therein lays some idea of what greatness truly is.

A month or two ago, I was talking to Rafe Mair about his opposition to the Charlottetown Accord. He mentioned how the Central Canadian establishment, as one, rose to support the accord, almost arrogantly dismissing critics like Mair and the burgeoning Reform Party. Berton by virtue of his stature and personality by Charlottetown, had long been a stalwart of the Central Canadian establishment. Mair claims when higher-purpose people like Berton said they were in favour of Charlottetown, that would bring in another thousand 'no' votes in Western Canada. Even up to very recently, Berton would lend his name to op-ed pieces or advertisements against the war in Iraq, or other Canadian nationalist causes.

Pierre Berton was also contemptuous of religion. He claimed that when he died, nothing would happen-no afterlife, no heaven, no hell, nothing. That may be true for the moral Berton, but I wouldn't be surprised if another Berton book were to be offered up in the months to come. Pierre Berton was 84.

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