From Library Journal
To his prolific and diversified body of work ( Never Cry Wolf LJ 9/1/63; My Father's Son , LJ 1/93), Mowat, now in his seventies, adds an autobiographical account of growing up in Canada during the 1920s and 1930s. This portrait of his youth, marked by humor, sympathy, and understanding, possesses the crystalline clarity, brightness, and color of a child's world--a world in which there already exist the beginnings of most of Mowat's experiences as nature writer and activist. There are no dull pages here; every man, woman, child, and animal mentioned even casually makes an impression. But the book is more than a family album or catalog of events. Out of it rises an authentic picture of Canadian life as it existed in the first half of the century. The book should stir up interest on both sides of the border and is highly recommended to all those who like good writing. Previewed in Prepub Alert, LJ 12/93.
- A.J. Anderson, GSLIS, Simmons Coll., Boston
Copyright 1994 Reed Business Information, Inc.
The famous environmentalist's father, Angus Mowat, was the genteel product of dreamers and failures, but he made a respectable career for himself as a writer and a librarian. Angus and libraries, in fact, draw forth some of Farley Mowat's most entertaining anecdotes in this affectionate memoir of his childhood. Angus loved sailing. When he moved his family to landlocked Saskatoon and couldn't sail, he insisted on canoeing to town down the Saskatchewan River, then portaging his craft through city traffic to the library. The tales of Angus and Helen Mowat's early marriage, when Angus ran libraries in remote farmtowns, charmingly evoke Canadian rural life in the 1920s, while the Mowats' overland trek to Saskatchewan in the 1930s gives Farley's memoir a more somber note, portraying the effect on poor but enduring families of a double disaster: the Depression and the dust bowl. But primarily, these memories are of an inquisitive, bookish boy who loved animals: brown squirrels, white rats, birds of all kinds, bears, muskrats--even an alligator. Farley's account of a truck ride in subzero weather to a fur trappers' camp is particularly vivid, bringing to mind the wonder and savage innocence of his Never Cry Wolf (1963) and suggesting a basis for his animal-rights convictions. A mostly sweet memoir, and Mowat's many readers will not be disappointed. John Mort
From Kirkus Reviews
This spirited memoir of a Canadian childhood by the great nature writer (Never Cry Wolf--not reviewed) is a prequel to My Father's Son and gives the boy's version of the years given a dog's-eye view in The Dog Who Wouldn't Be. Mowat comes from a long line of male misfits. His grandfather was a poet and general failure at whatever he tried, and his father, Angus, was much the same, although he eventually made a living as a novelist-librarian. To most readers, Mowat's childhood will seem a dream, though it's presented with grit and texture. Angus was for a time a beekeeper, and the family lived on oatmeal, soda crackers, and honey until a pestilence killed the bees by the tens of thousands. Angus' trials as a sailor took a toll on his long-suffering wife, Helen, as, year after year, she and Farley (called Bunje) faced storms at sea and holds awash. Bunje acquired an early love for snowshoeing in the woods, iceboating, and fishing. In these pages he fixates on animals, insects, frogs, crayfish, and creepy-crawlies of all shapes and sizes, whom he calls the ``Others,'' and often bathes in the tub with Hercules, his turtle the size of a small dinner plate. He sinks into a great manure pile and loses his pants and shoes. He and pal Geordie snatch funny rubber things from the sewage disposal pipes, fill them with water, and bomb people from his parents' bedroom window. As he turns nine, his idyllic 1920s darken into the '30s as the Depression deepens. Bunje becomes a tireless scribbler of doggerel, much of which he repeats here. Offered a library job in far-off Saskatchewan, Angus builds an ark to hitch onto their coupe and the family sets off on a huge odyssey across Canada to the wildlife- filled prairies that awaken young Mowat to the best days of his life. Born Naked is, like Bunje, wide-eyed and bouncy with the basic joy of being conscious. -- Copyright ©1994, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.
Review
"Readers can join Farley Mowat in this classic memoir, enjoying his often hilarious memories of his eccentric father and long-suffering mother in a series of dilapidated houses and unseaworthy boats, as he developed his undying love for nature and wildlife." ― Born Naked
From the Inside Flap
A CHILDHOOD ADVENTURE
In the summer of 1933 Angus Mowat, a soldier, sailor, beekeeper, and librarian, packed his family into a homemade camper dubbed the "Ark" and set off from Windsor, Ontario, to Saskatoon. For twelve-year-old Farley the trip through the prairie, with its teeming wildlife and big-sky beauty, would have a lasting effect on his life, giving birth to his love of the outdoors.
In Born Naked Mowat tells the story of his unusual childhood, from sailing trips on Lake Ontario to explorations of Point Pelee, Vancouver Island, and Hudson Bay. It is the story of an eccentric family who stuck together through though economic times with ingenuity, hard work, and unfailing love. It is also the story of a young boy's awakening to nature within and around him, an awakening that would one day make him one of the world's most popular authors.
Wry, funny, and wise, this remarkable book is a moving memoir of the childhood of a great writer and naturalist.
About the Author
FARLEY MOWAT's many books, including NEVER CRY WOLF, SEA OF SLAUGHTER, and BORN NAKED, have delighted young and old alike. They have sold over fourteen million copies worldwide and have been published in fifty-two languages. He lives in Port Hope, Ontario, with his wife, the writer, Claire Mowat.
