Andrew Macphail

Sir Andrew Macphail
Born	John Andrew Macphail November 24, 1864 Orwell, Prince Edward Island
Died	September 23, 1938 (aged 73) Montreal, Quebec, Canada
Language	English
Nationality	Canadian
Ethnicity	Scottish
Citizenship	British subject
Notable works	Three Persons, The Master's Wife
Notable awards	Knighthood, FRSC, Lorne Pierce Medal
Spouse	Georgina Burlan
Children	Jeffrey, Dorothy

Sir John Andrew Macphail (November 24, 1864 – September 23, 1938) was a Canadian physician, author, professor of medicine, and soldier. "A prolific and versatile writer, Sir Andrew Macphail was one of the most influential Canadian intellectuals of his time."^[1]

Life and Work

Macphail was born in Orwell, Prince Edward Island, on the family's newly purchased 100-acre farm. His father was William Macphail, a schoolmaster; his mother was Catherine Moore Smith formerly of Newton, P.E.I.^[2]

Macphail was educated at Prince of Wales College in Charlottetown, and then at McGill University in Montreal,^[3] where he received his medical degree in 1891.^[4] "During his studies at McGill Macphail wrote reviews and articles for various newspapers, including the Montreal Gazette and the Chicago Times, and saved enough money to finance a trip around the world." He resumed his studies in England, where he became "a member of the Royal College of Surgeons and a licentiate of the Royal College of Physicians. He returned to Canada in 1892."^[1]

First issue of Canadian Medical Association Journal, January 1911.

He married Georgina Burlan of Montreal in 1893. They had two children, Jeffrey and Dorothy.^[2]

From 1893 until 1905 Macphail practised medicine and taught at the University of Bishop's College.^[5] At Bishop's, he was professor of the diseases of children. Beginning in 1895 he also served as a consulting pathologist at the city's Western and Verdun hospitals.^[6]

In 1903 he became editor of the Montreal Medical Journal; "when it merged with another medical periodical eight years later to establish the Canadian Medical Association Journal, Macphail was made editor of the new monthly."^[5] He was editor of the Journal until the outbreak of World War I.^[6]

He was appointed McGill's first Professor of the History of Medicine in 1907, and held that position until 1937.^[3]

Macphail enlisted in World War I at the age of 50, and served at the front with a field ambulance corps for 20 months.^[4] Assigned to the Sixth Field Ambulance, he "served with distinction at a number of battles including Vimy Ridge."^[6]

Writing

Macphail wrote The Medical Services, Volume One of the Official History of the Canadian Forces in the Great War.^[1] His volume "appeared in 1925 and, as a result of its critical view of both the minister of militia and the surgeon general, caused a major controversy in political and military circles."^[6]

He wrote an essay on Canadian poet John McCrae, "An essay in character," for the 1919 edition of McCrae's In Flanders Fields And Other Poems.

Macphail was also a novelist. The vine of Sibmah: a relation of the Puritans (1906) is a romantic novel set in the Restoration period. In 1921 he published the first translation of Louis Hémon's classic Maria Chapdelaine.^[5]

Macphail published four one-act plays — The land (1914), The last rising (1930), Company (1936), and The new house (1937) — "none of which were performed."^[5] The Land was "a loose adaptation of The Taming of the Shrew, which MacPhail uses to critique market speculation ... class inequality, and what he saw as the disintegration of the family. His solution is a return to 'the land' and to a rural agrarian society."^[7]

His 1929 book, Three persons, "is made up of extended reviews of memoirs by three figures of the First World War, including T. E. Lawrence."^[5] The reviews were "a sensation on both sides of the Atlantic. Indeed, the London Mercury labelled the book 'the most devastating review published in the last hundred years.'"^[6]

Macphail was "throughout his career essentially an essayist, a literary role to which his strong personality was ideally suited."^[6] "Essays in puritanism (1905) is a series of biographical studies of literary and religious figures; Essays in politics (1909) is about contemporary political issues, particularly ... the imperial connection between Canada and Great Britain; Essays in fallacy (1910) offers lengthy polemical critiques of feminism, modern education, and modern theological trends."^[5]

University Magazine

Many of Macphail's essays were taken from the University Magazine, a literary journal which he founded in 1907 and (except for the four years of World War I) edited until its closing in 1920. It has been called "an outstanding Canadian quarterly." ^[3] The Governor General, Earl Grey, called it "the best periodical published in Canada." Sponsored by Dalhousie, McGill and Toronto universities, its contributors included Rudyard Kipling, several cabinet ministers, and many Canadian academics and literary figures such as Stephen Leacock and Marjorie Pickthall.^[6]

The Master's Wife

Macphail's book The Master's Wife was published posthumously, in 1939.^[4] It is the book to which Macphail "devoted most care, and which he considered his best."^[3] Part biography of himself and his family ("The Master" was his father), part history of their community, Orwell, the book has been called "an excellent description of 19th century life on P.E.I., a very important social history of P.E.I.'s past."^[4]

A facsimile of the 1939 edition is sold by the University of Prince Edward Island's Institute of Island Studies, with all profits going to the Sir Andrew Macphail Foundation.^[8]

Recognition

Macphail was "knighted for his literary and military work" in January 1918.^[3]

He was awarded an honorary doctorate from McGill. He received the Quebec government prize for literature in 1928.^[6]

Macphail was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society of Canada in 1910.^[1] In 1930, the Society awarded him its Lorne Pierce Medal.^[6]

The Sir Andrew Macphail Foundation preserves his birthplace and its 140-acre property in Orwell as a museum, the Sir Andrew Macphail Homestead.^[2] It is the site of the Macphail Woods Ecological Forestry Project, a joint effort of the Foundation and the Environmental Coalition of Prince Edward Island to preserve the old-growth Acadian Forest covering much of the property.^[9]

Publications

• Essays in Politics. London, New York: Longman's Green, 1903.^[10]
• Essays in Puritanism. London: T.F. Unwin, 1905.^[10]
• Essays in Fallacy. New York: Longmans Green, 1910.^[10]
• The Book of Sorrow. London, New York: Oxford U P, 1916.^[10]
• The Cavendish Lecture on a Day's Work. London: Lancet, 1917.^[10]
• Official History of the Canadian Forces in the Great War 1914-1919: The Medical Services. Ottawa: Acland, 1925.^[10]
• An Address on American Methods in Medical Education. London: British Medical Association, 1927.^[10]
• Three Persons. London: J. Murray, 1929.^[5]
• The Bible in Scotland. London: J. Murray, 1931.^[10]
• Our Canadian Speech. Montreal: La Patrie, 1935.^[10]
• The Master's Wife. Toronto: McClelland and Stewart.

Fiction and drama

• The Vine of Sibmah: A Relation of the Puritans. New York: Macmillan, 1906.^[10]
• The Land. 1914.^[5]
• The Last Rising. 1930.^[5]
• Company. 1936.^[5]
• The New House. 1937.^[5]

Selected articles

• "John Knox and the Church of England," The University Magazine, Vol. VI, 1907.
• "Loyalty — to What," The University Magazine, Vol. VI, 1907.
• "The Patience of England," The University Magazine, Vol. VI, 1907.
• "What Can Canada Do," The University Magazine, Vol. VI, 1907.
• "The American Woman," Part II, The Living Age, Vol. CCLIX, 1908.
• "The Dominion and the Spirit," The University Magazine, Vol. VII, 1908.
• "Protection and Politics," The University Magazine, Vol. VII, 1908.
• "Why the Conservatives Failed," The University Magazine, Vol. VII, 1908.
• "New Lamps for Old," The University Magazine, Vol. VIII, 1909.
• "British Diplomacy and Canada," The University Magazine, Vol. VIII, 1909.
• "The Nine Prophets," The University Magazine, Vol. VIII, 1909.
• "Canadian Writers and American Politics," The University Magazine, Vol. IX, 1910.
• "Oxford and Working-class Education," The University Magazine, Vol. IX, 1910.
• "An Obverse View of Education," The University Magazine, Vol. IX, 1910.
• "A Voice from the East," The University Magazine, Vol. IX, 1910.
• "The New Theology," The University Magazine, Vol. IX, 1910.
• "Certain Varieties of the Apples of Sodom," The University Magazine, Vol. X, 1911.
• "The Cleaning of the Slate," The University Magazine, Vol. X, 1911.
• "Confiscatory Legislation," The University Magazine, Vol. X, 1911.
• "Why the Liberals Failed," The University Magazine, Vol. X, 1911.
• "The Tariff Commission," The University Magazine, Vol. XI, 1912.
• "The Cost of Living," The University Magazine, Vol. XI, 1912.
• "The Navy and Politics," The University Magazine, Vol. XII, 1913.
• "Unto the Church," The University Magazine, Vol. XII, 1913.
• "Theory and Practice," The University Magazine, Vol. XII, 1913.
• "The Hill of Error," The University Magazine, Vol. XII, 1913.
• "The Dominion and the Provinces," The University Magazine, Vol. XII, 1913.
• "Patriotism and Politics," The University Magazine, Vol. XIII, 1914.
• "On Certain Aspects of Feminism," The University Magazine, Vol. XIII, 1914.
• "Consequences and Penalties," The University Magazine, Vol. XIII, 1914.
• "The Day of Wrath," The University Magazine, Vol. XIII, 1914.
• "Val Cartier Camp," The University Magazine, Vol. XIII, 1914.
• "An Ambulance in Rest," The University Magazine, Vol. XVI, 1917.
• "In this Our Necessity," The University Magazine, Vol. XVI, 1917.
• "The Conservative," The University Magazine, Vol. XVIII, 1919.
• "Women in Democracy," The University Magazine, Vol. XIX, No. 1, 1920.
• "The Immigrant," The University Magazine, Vol. XIX, No. 2, 1920.

Other works

• In Flanders Fields, by John McCrae, with an essay by Andrew Macphail, 1919.
• A Vista, by John Crichton, with a preface by Andrew Macphail, 1921.
• Selected Poems, by Arthur Bourinot, with a note by Andrew Macphail, 1935.

References

• Ian Ross Robertson, Sir Andrew Macphail: The Life and Legacy of a Canadian Man of Letters (Montreal: McGill-Queen's University Press, 2008). ISBN 978-0-7735-3419-3
• S.E.D. Shortt, The Search for an Ideal: Six Canadian Intellectuals and their Convictions in an Age of Transition, 1890-1930 (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1976).

Notes

1. Damien-Claude Bélanger, "John Andrew Macphail (1864-1938)," Quebec History, Marianopolis College, Web, Apr. 6, 2011.
2. "Welcome to the Sir Andrew Macphail Foundation," Sir Andrew Macphail Foundation, Island Register.com, Web, Apr. 5, 2011.
3. Ian Ross Robertson, "Sir Andrew Macphail" Canadian Encyclopedia (Edmonton: Hurtig, 1988), 1281.
4. "Sir Andrew Macphail," Sir Andrew Macphail Foundation, IslandRegister.com, Web, Apr. 5, 2011.
5. Ian Ross Robertson, "Sir Andrew Macphail biography" (1864 – 1938), Encyclopedia of Literature, 8293, JRank.org, Web, Apr. 5, 2011
6. "S.E.D. Shortt, "Sir Andrew Macphail: physician, philosopher, founding editor of CMAJ," CMA Journal, Vol. 118 (February 4, 1978), 326, Web, Apr. 5, 2011.
7. "The Land: A Play of Character, in One Act with Five Scenes" (1914), Canadian Adaptations of Shakespeare Project, UOGuelph.ca, Web, Apr. 17, 2011.
8. "The Master's Wife by Sir Andrew Macphail," Institute of Island Studies, Web, Apr. 5, 2011.
9. About Us, Macphail Woods Ecological Forestry Project, Web, Apr. 5, 2011.
10. Search results: Andrew Macphail, Open Library, Web, May 9, 2011.

External links

• Works by Andrew Macphail at Project Gutenberg
• Works by or about Andrew Macphail at Internet Archive
• Works by Andrew Macphail, at Hathi Trust
• Works by Andrew Macphail at LibriVox (public domain audiobooks)
• Sir Andrew Macphail at The Canadian Encyclopedia