The Morningside Years

From 1972 to 1997, each weekday morning, "Morningside host Peter Gzowski guided what he considered the most intelligent listeners in the country through three hours of the most intelligent radio programming in the land. He took us through the briars of political and social policy debate, entertained us with the best of Canadian music and song, challenged us with the mysteries of science, tipped us to the better books of the season and introduced us to their authors, gave us tested and mouthwatering recipes, read aloud our best letters to him, and took us off the beaten path of Canada to show us who and where we are. The program lives on in "The Morningside Years. In these pages - and on the accompanying free compact disk - you'll find a collection of the most memorable items from the program's years on air. Here you'll rediscover Gzowski's interviews with the stars of Canadian literature - Margaret Laurence, Robertson Davies, W. O. Mitchell, Alice Munro, Timothy Findley, and Margaret Atwood. The heartbreaking drama by Emil Sher, "Mourning Dove, is presented in its entirety, as is the exceptional panel discussion of Louis Riel's trial. There's a chapter of the fifteen best letters to the program, as well as a mini-"Morningside Papers - "The Sixth (and Definitely Last)." There are photographs, too: a "Morningside family album and a series of candid shots taken in the studio during what may have been the most exciting day in the program's life - the day spent preparing for the 1997 Red River Rally. There are conversations with scientists, and letters from abroad and from the North. And, on the accompanying CD, among other memorable pieces, there are excerpts from a classicpolitical conversation among Eric Kierans, Stephen Lewis, and Dalton Camp, a hilarious conversation with Stuart McLean, a moment with Margaret Visser, a new arrangement of "O Canada," sung a cappella by Quartette, and an unforgettable discussion among all the Canadian women who ever swam Lake Ontario. Dalton Camp, one of the most companionable fixtures of "Morningside, contributes a funny and surprisingly tender foreword, but Gzowski has the final word in the book: an essay in which he reflects on what "Morningside was and what it meant to him. His retirement as host of "Morningside in May 1997 occasioned a flood of affection for the man and accolades for his journalism that was unprecedented in Canadian broadcasting. Many lamented not just the passing of "Morningside, but also the loss of a daily presence who, with the tools of unfeigned curiosity and simple courtesy, tended a vast field in which Canada's tallest poppies thrived. A priceless keepsake, "The Morningside Years is Peter Gzowski's salute to his listeners and an enduring memento of Canadian broadcasting at its best.

A New York Times Book Review Editors' Choice Book • When Ohio-born Pru Steiner arrives in New York in 1976, she follows in a long tradition of young people determined to take the city by storm. But when she falls in love with and marries Spence Robin, her hotshot young Shakespeare professor, her life takes a turn she couldn’t have anticipated. Thirty years later, something is wrong with Spence. The Great Man can’t concentrate; he falls asleep reading The New York Review of Books. With their daughter, Sarah, away at medical school, Pru must struggle on her own to care for him. One day, feeling especially isolated, Pru meets a man, and the possibility of new romance blooms. Meanwhile, Spence’s estranged son from his first marriage has come back into their lives. Arlo, a wealthy entrepreneur who invests in biotech, may be his father’s last, best hope. Morningside Heights is a sweeping and compassionate novel about a marriage surviving hardship. It’s about the love between women and men, and children and parents; about the things we give up in the face of adversity; and about how to survive when life turns out differently from what we thought we signed up for.

In this bestselling timeless classic, Peter Gzowski recounts the 1980-81 season he spent travelling around the NHL circuit with the Edmonton Oilers. These were the days when the young Oilers, led by a teenaged Wayne Gretzky, were poised on the edge of greatness, and about to blaze their way into the record books and the consciousness of a nation. While the story of the early Oilers embodies the book, The Game of Our Lives is much more than a retelling of one season in the life of an NHL team. Unlike any book ever written in the annals of hockey, Gzowski beautifully weaves together the anatomy of a modern NHL team with the magnificent history of the game to create one of the best books about hockey in Canada. Here are the great teams and the great players through the ages—Morenz, Richard, Howe, Orr, Hull—the men whose rare and indefinable genius on the ice exemplified the speed, grit and innovation of the game. The Game of Our Lives is the best book on the Canadian passion for hockey; a wondrously perceptive account of the hold the game has on Canadians. —Jack Granatstein, The National Post

Born in 1934, Peter Gzowski covered most of the last half of the century as a journalist and interviewer. This biography, the most comprehensive and definitive yet published, is also a portrait of Canada during those decades, beginning with Gzowski's days at the University of Toronto's The Varsity in the mid 1950s, through his years as the youngest-ever managing editor of Maclean's in the 1960s and his tremendous success on CBC's Morningside in the 1980s and 1990s, and ending with his stint as a Globe and Mail columnist at the dawn of the 21st century and his death in January 2002. Gzowski saw eight Canadian Prime Ministers in office, most of whom he interviewed, and witnessed everything from the Quiet Revolution in Québec to the growth of economic nationalism in Canada's West. From the rise of state medicine to the decline of the patriarchy, Peter was there to comment, to resist, and to participate. Here was a man who was proud to call himself Canadian and who made millions of other Canadians realize that Canada was, in what he claimed was a Canadian expression, not a bad place to live.

The colourful story of Don Harron’s 77-year career in the entertainment business. After 15 books about somebody else (mostly alter ego Charlie Farquharson) plus one book by his drag-queen character, Charlie’s rich city cousin Valerie Rosedale, Don Harron now presents the story of his 77-year stint in the entertainment business. The actor’s colourful career includes such highlights as making money in 1935 as a 10-year-old cartoonist doing mother-and-son banquets; winning an ACTRA Award as best radio host for Morningside; six stage shows on Broadway, three in London’s West End, and 10 years of Shakespeare in three countries; a Gemini Award for lifetime achievement; writing the lyrics for five musicals, including Anne of Green Gables; and being appointed to the Canadian Country Music Hall of Honours due to his appearances on Hee Haw. Whether playing a serious stage role or hamming it up as Charlie Farquharson, Harron is always insightful and provides a unique perspective on a long life in the entertainment business.