Roderick Haig-Brown
Roderick Haig-Brown was a prominent naturalist and writer celebrated for his profound engagement with the Canadian wilderness through various literary forms, including nonfiction, fiction, memoir, and history. Born in England in 1908, he moved to Vancouver Island, British Columbia, as a teenager, where he initially worked as a logger and trapper. His literary career began with a focus on fishing, gaining recognition for his authoritative insights into the relationship between fish and their environment. His notable works include *The Western Angler* (1939), which blends personal anecdotes with scientific knowledge, and *Return to the River* (1941), which addresses the life cycle of salmon and environmental concerns.
Haig-Brown also authored novels, such as *Timber* (1942) and *Starbuck Valley Winter* (1943), the latter winning a Canadian Library Association medal. He served in the Canadian army and the Royal Canadian Mounted Police during World War II but continued to write, producing *A River Never Sleeps* (1946) and *Saltwater Summer* (1948). His later works, including *The Living Land* (1961) and *The Whale People* (1962), expanded into environmental themes and the history of western Canada. Haig-Brown's writing is noted for its graceful style, combining environmental advocacy with rich, poetic descriptions, making significant contributions to Canadian literature before his passing in 1976.
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Roderick Haig-Brown
Nonfiction Writer
- Born: February 21, 1908
- Birthplace: Lansing, Sussex, England
- Died: October 9, 1976
- Place of death: Campbell River, British Columbia, Canada
Biography
Roderick Haig-Brown was a naturalist and writer known for his writing about the Canadian wilderness. His writing crossed a number of genres—nonfiction, fiction, memoir, history, adult and juvenile—and it always showed knowledge, affection, and concern for the Canadian environment. He is especially recognized as an authority on fish and fishing.
Born in England in 1908, Haig-Brown began hunting and fishing as a boy. He left school early and moved to Vancouver Island, British Columbia, while still a teenager, working as a logger and trapper in his adopted country. He began his literary career by writing about fishing in western Canada. In 1934, he married Ann Elmore and settled in the village of Campbell River on Vancouver Island as a full-time writer.
His book The Western Angler (1939) combines scientific information, personal experience, and fishing lore in the engaging way that would become Haig-Brown’s trademark. This critically acclaimed book explains the relationship between fish and the environment, establishing another one of his themes. Return to the River: A Story of the Chinook Run (1941) details the life cycle of the Columbia River salmon, the impact of the Bonneville Dam, and the necessity of preserving the river environment. Haig-Brown followed these books with two novels: Timber: A Novel of Pacific Coast Loggers (1942), which drew on his logging experiences, and Starbuck Valley Winter (1943), a juvenile adventure story in which the hero matures during a winter running a trap line in the Canadian wilderness. Starbuck Valley Winter won a Canadian Library Association medal in 1947.
From 1943 to 1946, Haig-Brown served in the Canadian army and the Royal Canadian Mounted Police. During World War II, he wrote another fishing book, A River Never Sleeps (1946), which includes anecdotal essays based on his personal experience. This memoir was followed by two more novels: Saltwater Summer (1948) is another award-winning young adult novel featuring the hero of Starbuck Valley Winter, and On the Highest Hill (1949) is an ambitious adult novel about a protagonist who ultimately prefers the wilderness to the imperfect civilized world. Fisherman’s Spring (1951) is the first of four books of fishing experiences that follow the seasons.
During the 1950’s, Haig-Brown began to research and write about the history of western Canada. Captain of the Discovery: The Story of Captain George Vancouver (1956) is a young adult history and biography. This period produced a radio series for the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation called The Land is Bright (1958); the material on the program later was published as The Farthest Shores (1960) and Fur and Gold (1962). The Living Land: An Account of the Natural Resources of British Columbia (1961) is another nonfiction book about the Canadian environment.
Another young adult novel, The Whale People (1962), about coastal Native Canadians, won a Canadian Library Association award in 1963. Two of Haig-Brown’s latter books, The Salmon (1974) and Bright Waters, Bright Fish (1980), continued his role as an expert writer on fish and fishing and a spokesman for the Canadian environment.
Haig-Brown died in 1976. He is known as a graceful stylist who combined scientific information on conservation and environmental matters with poetic description. He made a solid contribution to the literature of the Canadian environment.