![]() ![]() Protagonist Neil MacRae returns to Nova Scotia from the battlefields of Europe, where his body, mind and reputation have been battered. The mythological template of Homer's Odyssey is clearly in evidence throughout the book the tale of a hero's return and redemption is also the narrative of a culture's coming of age. Barometer Rising marks a shift in MacLennan's writing from works with international themes - which failed to find publishers - to the decidedly nationalist theme that occupies his major works.īarometer Rising is an allegory of Canada's shift away from the political and cultural influences of colonial, Imperial Britain to a decolonized independence and emergent national consciousness throughout the course of the First World War. ![]() MacLennan himself was a survivor of the Explosion, and drew on his own memories as a boy of 10 who witnessed the destruction. ![]() First published (New York: Duell, Sloan and Pearce) in 1941 amidst the turmoil of the Second World War, the novel is set during the First World War, not on the battlefields of Europe but in Canada before, during and after the Halifax Explosion, which destroyed much of that city's north end on the morning of December 6, 1917. ![]() Barometer Rising was the first novel published by Hugh MacLennan, arguably Canada's most significant novelist of the middle of the twentieth century and certainly its most recognized. ![]()
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