Marshall McLuhan, 1911–1980.
Judith Fitzgerald
Award-winning poet, music critic, and literary journalist Judith Fitzgerald began her career in the early 1980s as an Entertainment writer with The Globe and Mail (where her work earned the Fiona Mee Literary Journalism Award). Her poetry, reviews, profiles, interviews, criticism, editorials, features, and columns have been published in numerous national and international anthologies, periodicals, journals, and newspapers.
Fitzgerald has published sixteen books of poetry, including Victory, Rapturous Chronicles, River, and Twenty-Six Ways Out of This World. She has received a Writers’ Choice Award and has been shortlisted for the Governor General’s Award, the Pat Lowther Award, and the Trillium Award. Fitzgerald’s best-selling Building a Mystery: The Story of Sarah McLachlan and Lilith Fair (Quarry) was released in December 1997; its update, Sarah McLachlan: Building a Mystery (New Millennium Edition: Quarry/ Omnibus), was published in June 2000.
In 1994, with the generous cooperation of the University of Windsor’s Assumption College and Department of Communications, Fitzgerald conceived and coordinated Makin’ McLuhan, a multimedia colloquium the CBC hailed as “an invigorating event which goes a long way towards reclaiming and reaffirming the reputation of one of Canada’s foremost thinkers.”
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In the same collection
Ven Begamudré, Isaac Brock: Larger Than Life.
Lynne Bowen, Robert Dunsmuir: Laird of the Mines.
Kate Braid, Emily Carr: Rebel Artist.
William Chalmers, George Mercer Dawson: Geologist, Scientist, Explorer.
Stephen Eaton Hume, Frederick Banting: Hero, Healer, Artist.
Naïm Kattan, A.M. Klein: Poet and Prophet.
Betty Keller, Pauline Johnson: First Aboriginal Voice of Canada.
Michelle Labrèche-Larouche, Emma Albani: International Star.
Dave Margoshes, Tommy Douglas: Building the New Society.
Raymond Plante, Jacques Plante: Behind the Mask.
T.F. Rigelhof, George Grant: Redefining Canada.
Arthur Slade, john Diefenbaker. An Appointment with Destiny.
John Wilson, John Franklin: Traveller on Undiscovered Seas.
John Wilson, Norman Bethune: A Life of Passionate Conviction.
Rachel Wyatt, Agnes Macphail: Champion of the Underdog.
Marshall McLuhan
Marshall MCLUHAN
Copyright © 2001 Judith Fitzgerald and XYZ Publishing.
All rights reserved. The use of any part of this publication reproduced, transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, or stored in a retrieval system without the prior written consent of the publisher – or, in the case of photocopying or other reprographic copying, a licence from Canadian Copyright Licensing Agency – is an infringement of the copyright law.
Canadian Cataloguing in Publication Data
Fitzgerald, Judith
Marshall McLuhan: wise guy
(The Quest Library; 14).
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 0-9688166-7-3
1. McLuhan, Marshall, 1911–1980. 2. Mass media specialists – Canada – Biography. I. Title. II. Series: Quest library; 14.
P92.5.M3F57 2001 302.23’092 C200-1941199-5
Legal Deposit: Fourth quarter 2001
National Library of Canada
Bibliothèque nationale du Québec
XYZ Publishing acknowledges the support of The Quest Library project by the Canadian Studies Program and the Book Publishing Industry Development Program (BPIDP) of the Department of Canadian Heritage. The opinions expressed do not necessarily reflect the views of the Government of Canada.
The publishers further acknowledge the financial support our publishing program receives from The Canada Council for the Arts, the ministère de la Culture et des Communications du Québec, and the Société de développement des entreprises culturelles.
Chronology: Judith Fitzgerald
Index: Darcy Dunton
Layout: Édiscript enr.
Cover design: Zirval Design
Cover illustration: Francine Auger
Photo research: Cynthia Cecil
Editorial assistant: Cheryl Taylor
Printed and bound in Canada
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Wise Guy is a literary study of Marshall McLuhan’s life and career. The quotation of phrases from books written by Marshall McLuhan and copyrighted by his publishers is intended to illustrate the biographical information and criticism of McLuhan’s work presented by the author and thus constitutes fair dealing under Canadian copyright law.
The medium, or process, of our time – electric technology – is reshaping and restructuring patterns of social interdependence and every aspect of our personal life. It is forcing us