McGill Libraries
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Identity area
Type of entity
Person
Authorized form of name
MacSween, R. J., 1915-1990
Parallel form(s) of name
Standardized form(s) of name according to other rules
Other form(s) of name
Identifiers for corporate bodies
Description area
Dates of existence
1915-1990
History
Rev. Roderick Joseph MacSween was born on May 8, 1915, in North Sydney, Cape Breton, Nova Scotia.
He was a Canadian Catholic priest, poet, literary critic, and educator. He graduated from St. Francis Xavier University and Holy Heart Seminary in Halifax. He was ordained during the Second World War and served as a priest in White Point, Pomquet, and New Waterford. He taught English at St. Francis Xavier University, Antigonish, Nova Scotia, for 35 years (1948-1983). In 1962, he was made chair of the Department of English. He also served as a counsellor to troubled women. In 1970, MacSween founded the Antigonish Review and established the first creative writing course in a Canadian university. A voracious reader at an early age, he accumulated a personal library of about 20,000 books. He published several books of poetry, e.g., "The Forgotten World" (1971), "The Burnt Forest (and Other Stories)" (1975), "Furiously Wrinkled" (1976), and "Called from Darkness" (1984). His biography "The Forgotten World of R.J. MacSween: A Life," written by Stewart L. Donovan, was published in 2007.
He died on October 10, 1990, in Nova Scotia, Canada.