Defining Moments: Dispatches from an Unfinished Revolution

J.L. Granatstein, distinguished research professor emeritus of history
at York University, is the author of Who Killed Canadian History? and
co-author of The Canadian 100: The 100 Most Influential Canadians of the
20th Century and the Dictionary of Canadi

For more than 40 years, Peter C. Newman has been one of Canada’s
leading political and business journalists. His Renegade in Power,
published 35 years ago, raised the bar for political journalists, and
although his subsequent work has never quite reached that standard, he
nonetheless continues to command serious attention and a wide readership
in his historical studies and his Maclean’s column. His most recent
book takes a substantial number of his pieces, many written for
Maclean’s over the last several years, and groups them into rough
categories. Unfortunately, the pieces are not marked with the date or
the source, and some readers may have to work hard to figure out the
context and period when Newman was writing. He also suffers from a
persistent inability to resist a purple phrase, but when he is good, he
is very good. He can skewer General Jean Boyle in a line or two and
eviscerate Jean Chrétien with the comment that “He has yet to have an
original thought.” He is unafraid to offer assessments of the future,
and he knows enough history—more than most Canadian historians these
days—to be on sure ground when he writes of the past (though he is far
too soft on Louis Riel). Newman, now almost 70, remains the Canadian
master of his craft.