Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #2845499 in Books
• Published on: 1985-10
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Hardcover
• 125 pages

From Publishers Weekly
In April 1985, en route to a publicity tour in the U.S., Mowat was barred from crossing the border. The Canadian author of Never Cry Wolf and other books on wildlife and conservation was mystified, for U.S. Immigration and Naturalization Service officials refused to reveal the grounds for their action. Mowat waged a war of publicity, and it was through press accounts, rather than being informed directly, that he learned the reasons (relating to his leftist and environmentalist sympathies) for his exclusion. His brief day-by-day account of the affair, written with charm and irony, relies heavily on quotes from newspaper articles, editorials and letters of support from Canadians and U.S. citizensthe latter of whom surprised him, since he had thought of Americans as toeing their government's "arrogant, imperialistic" line. This "discovery" of Mowat's may not be news on this side of the border, but it provides an encouraging conclusion to a maddening tale of official high-handedness. October
Copyright 1985 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Library Journal
On April 23, 1985, just as he was about to board a flight from Toronto to Los Angeles to begin a promotional tour on behalf of his latest book, Canadian writ er Mowat was told by U.S. Immigration officials that he could not enter the countryno explanation given. Mowat was nonplussed. He set out at once to try to find why he was banned, and thus began one of the merriest run-arounds since ring-around-the-rosy was invent ed. It seems he was one of 40,000 listed in Immigration's ``Lookout Book'' of undesirables prohibited from entering the United States for holding views to which the government is opposed. Mowat finally got to see his file after the ban was lifted; it makes pathetic reading. His recounting of the whole episode, replete with editorials and let ters from U.S. citizens, is information al, educational, recreational, and highly recommended. A. J. Anderson, Grad uate Sch. of Library & Information Sci ence, Simmons Coll., Boston
Copyright 1985 Reed Business Information, Inc.

About the Author
Farley Mowat was born in Belleville, Ontario, in 1921, and grew up in Belleville, Trenton, Windsor, Saskatoon, Toronto, and Richmond Hill. He served in World War II from 1940 until 1945, entering the army as a private and emerging with the rank of captain. He began writing for his living in 1949 after spending two years in the Arctic. Since 1949 he has lived in or visited almost every part of Canada and many other lands, including the distant regions of Siberia. He remains an inveterate traveller with a passion for remote places and peoples. He has twenty-five books to his name, which have been published in translations in over twenty languages in more than sixty countries. They include such internationally known works as People of the Deer, The Dog Who Wouldn’t Be, Never Cry Wolf, Westviking, The Boat Who Wouldn’t Float, Sibir, A Whale for the Killing, The Snow Walker, And No Birds Sang, and Virunga: The Passion of Dian Fossey. His short stories and articles have appeared in The Saturday Evening Post, Maclean’s, Atlantic Monthly and other magazines.

Customer Reviews

An eye-opener that was fun to read
I am a long time fan of Farley Mowat's work and by chance managed to get my hands on this, one of his more obscure books, and one that I had been wanting to read for a long time.

It was a fairly quick read, I plopped myself down on the couch this evening and now only a few hours later, I've finished reading the book and done a few quick web searches to access curent imigration law.

The book itself was a fun read, threaded with the humor and wry comments that I've come to love about many of Mowat's books. More than that though it was an eye-opener and I found myself becoming increasingly angry (and concerned) about imigration law. Put simply Mowat was refused entry to the country in the mid 80's under the McCarran-Walter Act a fun little law (repealed in the 90's) that allows the INS to refuse entry to anyone on fairly shallow grounds. In this case Mowat seems to have been denied entry because of his conservation (tree-hugging) beliefs. So although the book was delightful, it gave me a definite chill as it produced definite worries about governmental regulations of freesom of speech. Especially when just a little research seemed to indicate that although this particular act was scrapped in the early 90's, there have been many attempts to bring back pieces of it, and my grasp of government as a foreign language is not good enough for me to fully comprehend current law as laid out the INS information websites.

Altogether worth both a read and some further inquiry. I'm now curious as to whether Mowat has since been granted leave to enter the usa.

This is a silly book....
This is a silly book, about a silly story, about what may even be, quite a silly country. Perhaps you should read it to find out why. Well done, Farley. Obviously not one of your best, yet it had to be written anyway, I suppose...