With Scotland at my shoulder. . . .

When I write history, I try to wear my research lightly. And for my last five books, I have been blessed with an outstanding editor, Phyllis Bruce at HarperCollins Canada, who catches me up whenever I let my reading show. “Lighten up,” she writes in the margins. “Too academic!”

 In my new book How the Scots Invented Canada, the bibliography runs to sixty titles. Highlights include three collections of essays, a meditation, and a couple of surprises. In The Scottish Tradition in Canada, edited by W. Stanford Reid (M&S, 1976), I found thirteen scholars coming at Canadian life from fourteen angles. . . .

The expose continues here.